Swanwick, Michael - Radiant Doors

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Radiant Doors by Michael Swanwick This story first appeared in Asimov's Science Fiction, September 1998

Radiant Doors by Michael Swanwick This story first appeared in Asimov's

Science Fiction, September 1998. Nominated for Best Short Story.

The doors began opening on a Tuesday in early March. Only a few at

first–flickering and uncertain because they were operating at the extreme end of

their temporal range–and those few from the earliest days of the exodus, releasing

fugitives who were unstarved and healthy, the privileged scientists and

technicians who had created or appropriated the devices that made their escape

possible. We processed about a hundred a week, in comfortable isolation and

relative secrecy. There were videocams taping everything, and our own best

people madly scribbling notes and holding seminars and teleconferences where

they debated the revelations.

Those were, in retrospect, the good old days.

In April the floodgates swung wide. Radiant doors opened everywhere,

disgorging torrents of ragged and fearful refugees. There were millions of them

and they had every one, to the least and smallest child, been horribly, horribly

abused. The stories they told were enough to sicken anyone. I know.

We did what we could. We set up camps. We dug latrines. We ladled out soup. It

was a terrible financial burden to the host governments, but what else could they

do? The refugees were our descendants. In a very real sense, they were our

children.

Throughout that spring and summer, the flow of refugees continued to grow. As

the cumulative worldwide total ran up into the tens of millions, the authorities

were beginning to panic–was this going to go on forever, a plague of human

locusts that would double and triple and quadruple the population, overrunning

the land and devouring all the food? What measures might we be forced to take if

this kept up? The planet was within a lifetime of its loading capacity as it was. It

couldn't take much more. Then in August the doors simply ceased. Somebody up

in the future had put an absolute and final end to them.

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Radiant Doors by Michael Swanwick This story first appeared in Asimov's Science Fiction, September 1998

It didn't bear thinking what became of those who hadn't made it through.

"More tales from the burn ward," Shriver said, ducking through the door flap.

That was what he called atrocity stories. He dumped the files on my desk and

leaned forward so he could leer down my blouse. I scowled him back a step.

"Anything useful in them?"

"Not a scrap. But that's not my determination, is it? You have to read each and

every word in each and every report so that you can swear and attest that they

contain nothing the Commission needs to know."

"Right." I ran a scanner over the universals for each of the files, and dumped the

lot in the circular file. Touched a thumb to one of the new pads–better security

devices were the very first benefit we'd gotten from all that influx of future

tech–and said, "Done."

Then I linked my hands behind my neck and leaned back in the chair. The air

smelled of canvas. Sometimes it seemed that the entire universe smelled of

canvas. "So how are things with you?"

"About what you'd expect. I spent the morning interviewing vics."

"Better you than me. I'm applying for a transfer to Publications. Out of these

tents, out of the camps, into a nice little editorship somewhere, writing press

releases and articles for the Sunday magazines. Cushy job, my very own cubby,

and the satisfaction of knowing I'm doing some good for a change."

"It won't work," Shriver said. "All these stories simply blunt the capacity for

feeling. There's even a term for it. It's called compassion fatigue. After a certain

point you begin to blame the vic for making you hear about it."

I wriggled in the chair, as if trying to make myself more comfortable, and stuck

out my breasts a little bit more. Shriver sucked in his breath. Quietly, though–I'm

absolutely sure he thought I didn't notice. I said, "Hadn't you better get back to

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Radiant Doors by Michael Swanwick This story first appeared in Asimov's Science Fiction, September 1998

work?"

Shriver exhaled. "Yeah, yeah, I hear you." Looking unhappy, he ducked under the

flap out into the corridor. A second later his head popped back in, grinning. "Oh,

hey, Ginny–almost forgot. Huong is on sick roster. Gevorkian said to tell you

you're covering for her this afternoon, debriefing vics."

"Bastard!"

He chuckled, and was gone.

I sat interviewing a woman whose face was a mask etched with the aftermath of

horror. She was absolutely cooperative. They all were. Terrifyingly so. They were

grateful for anything and everything. Sometimes I wanted to strike the poor

bastards in the face, just to see if I could get a human reaction out of them. But

they'd probably kiss my hand for not doing anything worse.

"What do you know about midpoint-based engineering? Gnat relays? Sub-local

mathematics?"

Down this week's checklist I went, and with each item she shook her head.

"Prigogine engines? SVAT trance status? Lepton soliloquies?" Nothing, nothing,

nothing. "Phlenaria? The Toledo incident? 'Third Martyr' theory? Science

Investigatory Group G?"

"They took my daughter," she said to this last. "They did things to her."

"I didn't ask you that. If you know anything about their military organization,

their machines, their drugs, their research techniques–fine. But I don't want to

hear about people."

"They did things." Her dead eyes bored into mine. "They–"

"Don't tell me."

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Swanwick, Michael - Radiant Doors

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