"Good morning! Weather in the Village today will be partly cloudy with late afternoon clearing and moderate temperatures. Citizens will gather at nine this morning for a parade through the Village square, after which we will-"

The adenoidal female voice was abruptly squelched when Number 6 snatched the speaker off the kitchen wall, leaving colored wires dangling. It was part of a daily ritual: every morning he yanked and disemboweled the nattering black box and every night, while he slept, "they" somehow managed to replace it, good as new, to awaken him the following day with its usual inane chatter of the weather, or lawn bowling or chess matches or thoroughly pointless parades. He hated the speaker, and this semi-fruitless gesture had become a symbol of that contempt.

Leaving the mangled equipment on the table (in the past, he'd hidden it in such interesting places as the freezer, the box spring or the flush box of the loo, but today he wasn't feeling quite so playful), he dressed, putting on the black suit with the white piping, white deck shoes and the ribboned button that sported a 6 atop the stylized drawing of a penny farthing bicycle. He'd refused to wear that at first. And in fact, he might refuse again tomorrow. But for the moment, he felt a perverse pleasure in plaguing his captors with inconsistencies, however small. Let them think they were starting to wear him down. It might make them relax their guard...

On an afterthought, he returned to the table, plucked several of the speaker's bristling wires, and shoved them into a pocket, heading for the front door with a satisfied half-smile on his face. He knew they were watching him, from any one of many cameras concealed around the house, and the wire-pocketing was a deliberate goad. Let them think he was plotting something subversive. Let them worry. "Unpredictability in all things" was the only motto to live by in this place. So, thoroughly unpredictable is what he would be.

The door hummed when he neared it, and sprang open on a hazy morning grey with a damp, clinging fog. Moisture made the cobblestones slick beneath his feet, but he walked as always toward the Village square, from whence his morning constitutional might take any one of a dozen directions.

He heard the marching band long before he came within sight of the square. Its squawking, tinny strains were being amplified by the small hooded speakers that stood on striped poles throughout the Village.

"My friends!" a voice shouted, and the thumping band music abruptly halted. "Gather here, good friends, and listen!"

6 stopped and gazed down at the mass of costumed figures standing in the fog, bristling with trumpets and drums and brightly colored umbrellas. The deathly thin man who addressed them 6 recognized as Number 61. He had been here many years, and Number 2 had long ago succeeded in breaking him. And because he was so broken, 6 both pitied and detested him. "We gather this morning," 61 was saying, "both to celebrate our new lives, and to learn from those who do not share our joy. There are those among us, my friends, who do not wish to conform. And these must be punished."

6 glanced around. Were they speaking of him? Or were there actually other dissidents here? He noticed for the first time that another figure watched the proceedings from afar. A woman, standing on the far side of the square in the shadow of a building. Was this the malcontent?

His question was answered by a movement in the crowd below. They parted to admit two black-suited men who dragged a resisting figure between them. The resister was a young man, blond, slight-of-build and clad in hospital whites. 6 had never seen him before.

"This," 61 explained, "is Number 22. Our newcomer. Assigned to the infirmary, but reluctant it seems to follow our rules. He attempted escape six hours ago, and took the life of a citizen who tried to prevent him."

The crowd gasped. 6 edged closer, curious to note that 22 seemed unable to stand on his own. The strong-arms on either side were supporting his weight. He might be drugged, or... "Do you know him?"

6 started, shocked at his own failure to notice the presence of someone else behind him. He spun on the woman he'd noticed earlier observing the proceedings from across the way. Her lapel pin was emblazoned with a 9.

"I beg your pardon?" he said politely. "Do I know who?"

"Him." 9 tilted her head toward the square and the odd ritual being carried out there. "You were watching as though somehow you cared."

Immediately suspicious, 6 replied, "Why do you ask?"

61's reedy voice shrilled from the loudspeakers, cutting off her answer. "We do hereby ostracize this citizen. He will not be spoken to, or heard or seen or touched by any who are loyal to our Village. He shall no longer exist to our eyes."

_Interesting solution,_ 6 reflected. _They cannot execute him, not if they hope to obtain some vital information from him. But they can alienate him, cut him off, show him what it's like to be totally alone..._

The two gorillas released their burden, and 22 fell to his knees. The costumed crowd, striking up a sour march on the band instruments, tromped out of the square and left him behind on the flagstones.

9 had moved half way down the incline before 6 caught up. "Where are you going?" he asked.

"To help him, of course."

"Why?"

"Don't be ridiculous."

"Answer me. Are you always so concerned for your fellow man? Or are you just Number 9, Village investigator?"

"Don't call me that. My name is Christy Reynolds and I--"

He interrupted, still walking. "Didn't they tell you there are no names here? No occupations, no pasts."

9 glared at him, but said nothing. They reached the square and 22, who had managed to sit up. With a frown, 6 saw that his difficulties were not drug-induced. The man's face was bruised, and blood was drying on his badly-cut lip.

_Clumsy of them,_ 6 thought. _Old-fashioned beatings are a bit beneath their usual style._

He'd been about to voice the thought when he heard 9 gasp and saw the unmistakable look of recognition in her eyes. "Alexi! Alexi, it is you!"

22 looked up, assessing her. "That is not my name," he said, with an accent 6 placed at once as Russian.

"For God's sake, Alexi, don't do this to me. We worked together three years ago, in Milan. Don't try to tell me you don't know me!"

6 digested that information for any possible future use, then said, "I told you, there are no names here." He reached down, helped 22 to his feet.

The Russian stood, but brushed the helping hand away. "You needn't bother," he said curtly. "I've just been declared 'untouchable' after all. Or weren't you listening?"

"We don't care about that," 9 said, and 6 glanced up, surprised at the use of 'we.'

"Fine," said 22. "I'll bid you good day, then." Still unsteady on his feet, he started to walk away from them. But 9, not to be dissuaded, grabbed him by one arm.

"Alexi, wait."

He stopped and looked 9 squarely in the eye. "Are you working for them?" he asked, then nodded at 6. "Is he?"

9 frowned. "How can you ask me that?"

"Because I have to."

6 smiled grimly. "Splendid," he quipped. "We are a mutually distrustful society of three. May I suggest we move to somewhat less public quarters? Your musical friends may be back at any moment."

22 considered that, then started a slow, deliberate walk up the nearest curving pathway. "You may be half right," he said as they fell into step on either side. "But there are few non-public places here."

"Few?" 9 echoed, and cast a wary eye toward the nearest tiled rooftop, where the hidden cameras were watching, always watching. "I didn't think there were any."

"It can be arranged," 22 said cryptically.

"I'd be interested in knowing how," 6 admitted. "I've yet to find a place their wandering eye can't follow."

* * *

Not far from the path they walked, in a room beneath the green dome of Number 2's Village residence, 6's words were amplified over a loudspeaker and a wide screen transmitted the trio's images into a brightly-lit, circular room. Near its center, two men on a gleaming fulcrum revolved, a bizarre see-saw bristling with camera devices into which they continually peered. From inside his black capsule-chair, the present Number 2 watched the proceedings with interest, and heard 22's taciturn reply to 6.

"Cameras are electronic. And anything electronic can be... I believe your British term is 'buggered up.'"

Number 2 plucked a modular yellow telephone from the recesses of the chair. "Security check on all visual units," he said crisply. "Have we a non-functional camera or haven't we?"

In clipped English, the anonymous voice on the other end replied, "All units are functioning normally."

Ringing off, 2 returned his attention to the wall-sized screen, where the three prisoners were continuing their seemingly aimless walk.

"Was it true what that man said?" 9 was asking. "Did you kill someone?"

Without missing a step, 22 said, "Yes."

"Why?"

"He tried to stop me."

"And that," 6 interjected, "was all the reason you needed?"

"It was reason enough. It always has been."

"In Mother Russia, perhaps," 6 told him. "Not here."

22 stopped and glared at him, suspicion creeping back into the eyes. "Are you defending them?"

6 stiffened a little at the accusation. "No. But you'll note we cannot know which side they are on. The fact that you and I are both here is proof of that."

"Oh, but you're wrong," 9 said emphatically. "Alexi didn't work for-"

"Christy," 22 cut her off. "Please be quiet."

"I won't! And I don't care what they think."

"You will," 6 warned.

Number 2, watching, smiled from under the black shell hood of the chair. He rose, sidled to the circular control banks and touched a switch, his eyes never leaving the three of them on the screen. He plucked a blue telephone from the panel . "G-20, sector seven-four," he said into it. "Observation only, please, until further notice. Stand by."

* * *

On the winding Village pathway, 6 and 9 followed their Russian companion into a cul-de-sac where the cobbled stones inclined steadily to dead end at a weirdly-shaped angle. Behind them, a rock sea wall guarded the descent to the sea that lay calm and blue beyond. Halting at the peak of the cul-de-sac, 22 pointed to the single camera concealed beneath the eaves of the roof juncture.

"Every security system has its weakness," he said. "And no camera can see what is directly beneath it." He climbed onto the rim of a flower bed, reached up, and began pulling loose bricks from the wall some 10 inches beneath the camera.

6 watched with quiet disdain. "You really haven't been here long, have you? They have other eyes. Other ears."

"None of which will help them."

"Don't count on it."

Cautiously, 22 pulled something small and rectangular from the opening. "Hospital work does have its advantages," he said, stepping very gently off the flower bed wall. "Particularly if one is a competent chemist."

9's eyes widened with realization as 22 opened the small pasteboard box to reveal a stoppered glass bottle full of a clear liquid. "My God, Alexi, you didn't."

22 lifted the bottle gently from its cotton wadding cradle, still careful to stand beneath the camera lens. "You may be content to stay here," he said bitterly. "You may even cooperate with them, work for them. I won't. There's a helicopter delivering medical supplies to the landing field in 20 minutes. When it leaves again, I intend to be on it."

* * *

In the control room under the green dome, the curving viewscreen had dissolved into blue-green sea. Within the sea, pale globules moved, bending weirdly into long and vaguely ovoid shapes, some floating upward like huge, quivering bubbles cast loose from the ocean floor. 2 watched them in grim silence, and in a moment, when the first of them had broken the water's surface, its "eyes" had become his, and he was able to see 22 holding the small glass bottle aloft. "Security," 2 snapped into a red telephone. "Analysis at once. What does he have in that bottle?"

"I can answer that." 2 whirled to find 61 -- the cadaverous man who'd spoken in the square. "It's nitroglycerin. He stole the ingredients from hospital stores."

2's face reddened. "How in bloody hell did you let that happen?"

61 looked pained. "You wanted the escape attempt to serve as an example. It will. You wanted 6 to pity the escapee. He does."

"Don't be so certain." 2 walked back toward the screen. "How does 9 fit into this?"

61 shrugged his skeletal shoulders. "Random element."

"There are no random elements. She knew 22. They worked together."

"All the better," 61 insisted. "If they--" But 2 cut him off with an impatient wave of one hand. The trio on the screen were moving again, and the Village cameras had resumed their surveillance. Both 6 and 9 walked cautiously on either side of the man with the deadly bottle.

"For God's sake, Alexi, listen to me," 9 was pleading. "They won't let you go this way. They'll kill you."

"Possibly. But I would take a considerable number of them along with me."

"And any number of innocent bystanders as well. Including Christy," 6 said, dropping the numbers pretense himself now. "You really don't care, do you?"

Number 2 didn't wait to hear the Russian's response. He spun on 61 and said, "Get back out there. Take your lackeys and your off-key marching band and set them up on the landing field to welcome that helicopter. You wanted to make things more interesting -- now they will be."

61 paled. "But--"

"Don't argue. Go."

* * *

By the time 6, 9 and 22, moving at their painfully slow pace, had reached the landing field, the impromptu celebration 2 had ordered was already in full swing. 22 found the path to the green where the copter would land blocked by dozens of revelling celebrants oblivious to the danger that approached. They marched in circles to the off-key band's strains of "Maxwell's Silver Hammer." They laughed. They danced. They sang the lyrics to each other.

22 paused a moment, staring at them reproachfully, then held the bottle high and began to walk straight for them.

9 caught his arm, wincing as the liquid sloshed in the bottle. "Alexi, please. You can't--"

Curtly, 22 brushed the hand away. "Be one of them, then," he snapped, and abruptly was gone, disappearing into the crowd. 9's effort to follow was hampered by 6's firm grip on her shoulder.

"I wouldn't go after him if I were you."

"Well you aren't. Let go of me."

Ignoring the demand, 6 pulled her back just as a particularly enthusiastic group of Villagers surged at them, effectively dividing them from 22. 6 could see the bottle, dipping, bobbing, moving erratically above and through the mingling crowd. Here and there, a Villager would draw away from it in uncertainty, but that might have been because they had seen 22's "untouchable" number and remembered 61's admonition.

Over the noise of the party, the chuffing beat of a helicopter's blades became audible. And for the first time, 6 noticed that Number 61 had joined them, lingering on the outskirts of the crowd -- at a safe distance -- and watching as though he were waiting for something.

"Trap," 6 said suddenly, and 9 looked at him curiously.

"What?"

A cheer from the crowd announced the helicopter's landing. Three puzzled workers disembarked, and ignoring the unexpected welcoming committee as much as possible, proceeded to unload their medical cargo. The mob cheered them on.

6 spotted the nitro bottle still aloft amid the sea of bodies, still moving, jostling... The copter's engines died, and the whine of its blades fell silent, only to be replaced by another sound, high pitched and piercing.

Immediately, the crowd hushed. The band's cacophony fizzled to a final cymbal-clink. Heads turned.

There were four of them, surrounding the helicopter and the crowd on all sides like grotesque watch dogs. Oblate and ghostly white, they hovered on the landing green's perimeter, and their hideous high-pitched whistles filled the air.

With a gasp, 9 wrenched out of 6's grip and bolted into the crowd. They stirred, murmured, shrank away from the threatening spheres, but paid no attention whatsoever to her efforts to push through and between them.

"My friends!" 61's amplified voice came suddenly over the ubiquitous speakers. "You have nothing to fear! Please remain where you are, and make no sudden moves."

They seemed not to hear him. The bodies continued to mill in fearful confusion. 6 searched frantically for a sign of the nitro bottle or of 9 in the melee, but could see neither. He had to do something, had to find some way to defuse this situation before tragedy struck. His hand found the coil of wire he'd concealed in his pocket that morning, and an idea dawned...

"Remain calm," 61 ordered over the speakers, far from calm himself. "There is no reason to panic. I repeat..."

In the press of the frightened crowd, Christy Reynolds finally spied her quarry, and broke into the open just behind him, only to find herself part of a bizarre stand-off. 22, the bottle held high, shouted at the copter workers to get away from the craft, and gingerly, they obeyed. The roving spheres, whistling louder, closed in a few feet and hovered menacingly.

"Alexi, please," 9 begged from behind him. "This isn't going to work. Don't you see they've let you come this far? That they've brought all these people here just to watch you die? They'll wait until you're in the copter, over the water, and then they'll-"

The concussion of a small explosion turned all heads eastward, where 9 spotted Number 6 walking calmly away from a brightly-striped Village tram that now sat engulfed in flames, its battery shorted by a creative bit of wire-jumping. Screaming in fury, three of the rovers raced toward the burning vehicle. The crowd panicked, broke and ran in all directions, oblivious to 61's shouted pleas for them to stop, wait, be calm.

Alexi had spun at the sound of the explosion, the liquid in the bottle jiggling precariously. Almost without thought, Christy reached for it, snatched it, and with all her might, lobbed it up and away from them. It flew over the abandoned aircraft, arced, and plummeted in eerie silence to the open field beyond, where it landed in a fireball that shook the ground under their feet and sent a plume of brown smoke skyward.

With a cry, Alexi shoved her backward, and made a frantic dash for the waiting helicopter. He'd nearly reached it when, with a feral roar, the fourth rover sprang at him out of nowhere, knocked him down and immediately began to cover him with its deadly, suffocating bulk.

"No!!" 9 started forward, intending to somehow drag the thing away, but hands grasped her again, pulled her back.

"Don't," 6's voice said in her ear. "There's nothing you can do now."

"But you can't let it--"

"Look!" 6 shook her, forced her attention from Alexi's plight to the three other spheres. The fire extinguished, they stood ready now, humming, quivering hungrily.

9 struggled against 6's grip all the same, crying out when she heard Alexi's strangled sob and saw him go limp beneath the attacking sphere's weight. It backed off only when it was certain he could no longer resist, but it lingered there afterward, waiting for its masters to come and claim the prize.

"It's killed him," 9 gasped, and jumped when the trio of spheres moved in on them, herding them back and away from the helicopter and the now-limp figure beside it.

"More than likely," 6 said, keeping a firm grip on her arm as they moved obediently back. "The example was going to be made one way or the other. It probably didn't matter a fig to them which."

They walked backward in the wake of the ovoids until they were against the wall of an outbuilding on the landing field. The rovers kept them there, at bay, until a motor cart, canopied and pinstriped in gaudy pink and white, rolled up to the helicopter, disgorged two men in white. They loaded 22's motionless form into the back, and with no more emotion than furniture movers picking up a roll of carpet, drove calmly away again.

With the cart's disappearance up the Village path, the rovers regrouped, and responding to some unknown cue, all four whistled loudly and set off across the open field, heading toward the sea.

Workers reappeared and began to busy themselves again with the copter, as though nothing untoward had happened here at all.

A stifled sob escaped Christy Reynolds. "What kind of place is this?" she asked of no one in particular, and sank to the ground against the rough brick wall of the building. "What kind of cruel insane place...?"

6 looked at her, at a loss for any answer. Somewhere in the back of his mind, the nagging uncertainty still lingered that even this one may be a plant, a spy, a counterfeit set up to trap him.

There were no confidants here, he reminded himself coldly. No allies. No friends.

For the first time, he noticed that the wall they'd been herded to sported a brightly-painted sign that was apparently intended for any newcomers arriving in the Village by helicopter. Beneath the familiar motif of the canopied bicycle were tall, stylized letters in a cheery shade of red.

Only to 6, they were anything but cheerful . They were a morbid, nightmarish irony.

HELLO, the sign shouted.  WELCOME TO THE VILLAGE...
 

-End--