the time the man was talking he had been thinking about what it would be like to try the system while he watched, after eighteen years, the film of the body snatchers.
Then he set to work, with some trepidation, because he didn’t know much about electrical appliances. But the installation proved less problematic than he expected and, although the timer wouldn’t stop blinking 00:00 from the stop position, the machine seemed ready to perform its essential function, the only one that interested Homer at this moment: that of reading the magnetic content of the videocassette so as to decode it into luminous signals that one enjoyed by keeping one’s eyes fixed on the TV screen.
Preparing everything necessary for the taking of the system was even easier, because actually there wasn’t much to prepare. Kurt had told him to take out of the pouch a large enough dose to systemize himself, which needn’t be very much the first time. In fact he had recommended that it be extremely small, though he hadn’t seen fit to supply a parameter on the basis of which the quantity might be precisely calculated.
Using the corner of his laminated Aberdeen Public Library card as a measure, Homer extracted this blessed, tiny dose from the little pouch and put it on the Formica top of the coffee table. Kurt had counseled the use of a smooth surface, such as a hand mirror, but since Homer didn’t have any hand mirrors in the house, he thought the Formica table top would make a fair substitute, for the time being. On subsequent occasions, if it was really necessary, he would buy a mirror.
Still using the laminated library card, he shaped the extremely small dose of powdered system into a strip about a millimeter thick and just under a half-inch long. Then he took one of the straws into the kitchen and cut it in half. He sat down on the couch again, laying the length of straw next to the strip of powdered system, on the coffee table.
Everything seemed ready. Everything was laid out in accordance with Kurt’s instructions. All that remained, apparently, was to take it. The great moment had arrived. The cassette about the body snatchers was inserted the right way round in the VCR. The television was tuned to the VCR channel. All he had to do was press the Play key on the remote control. The opening credits would start to roll and he would take the powdered system through the nose, as Kurt had demonstrated.
He pressed Play.
Your first systemization is rather like your first kiss. You’re so preoccupied with the problem of where to put your nose that by the time you realize that that thing you felt on your tongue was actually her tongue, she’s already broken away from you.
During the first systemization your dominant thoughts are, first, how long it’s going to take for the powder to take effect; second, how you’ll know when it does take effect; and third, how you can be sure, if at some stage you think it has taken effect, that the feelings you’re having are the right ones.
On subsequent occasions, the difference between the system and kisses is that when you kiss you don’t think very much about it, whereas when you systemize yourself, whether it’s the second or the thousandth time, you do nothing but think. You’re almost always thinking. Thinking about things like whether this time will be better than the last, because last time wasn’t that great, though perhaps that was because maybe you’d had too much to eat, or hadn’t had enough to eat, or because it was better to take three small doses at a distance of, say, half an hour from each other, because when you take it all at once the system must be of prime quality, because if there’s anything wrong with the system - an eventuality known to people inside the system as ‘over-cut’ or ‘badly cut’ or ‘shit’ - you may, if you shoot too large a quantity, throw up, and then you’ve wasted system, time and money, not to mention the fact that if the system is too pure even worse can happen.
Such speculation is known to habitués of the system as ‘paranoia’. Of course, people outside the system get paranoid, too. But it’s not the same thing. Let’s take the example of a perfectly ordinary case of paranoid behavior, like leaving home much earlier than necessary because you’re convinced that the bus driver, not finding any traffic, will get to the bus stop, say, ten minutes earlier than the regulation time and that, since he is traveling with an empty vehicle and knows perfectly well that at the bus stop in question there’s only ever one person waiting, namely you, the person with the delusion of which we are positing an example, he will drive straight past without waiting for the regulation time, and all because you, the paranoiac, have come to the entirely baseless conclusion that the bus driver doesn’t like you.
Now, such a delusion would never even enter the head of a true systemizee. But if by some absurd hypothesis it did, he would soon put the matter in perspective. ‘What do I care when the fucking bus goes by?’ he would say. Note that he would utter these words without the slightest trace of acrimony, and would then continue: ‘Look, I may not even go to the bus stop if I don’t feel like it. Let him drive past when the fuck he wants. I’m going to stay at home and systemize myself. Who needs buses anyway? I’m never going to take another one for the rest of my life. I’m fine the way I am. I’ve got the system.’
Nothing in the world is truly important to a person who’s inside the system. Everything can be attenuated, viewed in a more reassuring light. No matter how big the problem, it can always be cut down to size. When you’re inside the system, having a paranoid delusion that’s extraneous to it seems completely meaningless, because the only, essential, constant source of paranoia is your concern with achieving the highest possible degree of integration. All other things are trivial. Decorative problems, ornamental anxieties, non-essential torments. The only thing that matters is integration into the system.
Homer’s first time. There’s not much to tell, as a matter of fact. What happened was this: as the TV screen framed a sinister sky of shifting white clouds, to the apocalyptic strains of woodwind, strings and rolling drums, Homer bent forward over the coffee table, brought the length of straw to his nose and inhaled the powdered system. At first he felt nothing, except, after a few seconds, a bitter taste in his mouth. He lay back on the couch, convinced he would soon fall asleep. The film continued and when Becky Driscoll, played by the delightful Dana Wynter, made her entry into Miles Bennell’s office, Homer was more wide awake than ever. He was still wide awake when it came to the scene where Uncle-Ira-who-isn’t-Uncle-Ira pushes the lawnmower across the lawn, exactly as Uncle Ira would do. And he was still wide awake when Becky and Dr Bennell, hunted by the Santa Mira police, who are now themselves in thrall to the difference of the body snatchers, hide in the office and swallow pills to stay awake. This is the scene where it becomes clear once and for all that it’s when people are asleep that the body snatchers take their places. So, Becky and Dr Bennell prepare to spend the night in the office and Bennell tells Becky she mustn’t close her eyes.
‘Or we may wake up changed? To something evil and inhuman?’ Becky asks.
‘In my practice I’ve seen how people have allowed their humanity to drain away. Only it happened slowly, instead of all at once. They didn’t seem to mind,’ muses Bennell.
‘Just some people, Miles,’ Becky objects.
‘All of us, a little bit. We harden our hearts, grow callous. Only when we have to fight to stay human do we realize how precious it is to us, how dear.’
At this point Miles breaks off, gazes into Becky’s dark, fawnlike eyes, her perfect profile silhouetted against the white of the curtain that filters the sinister light from the street, and adds: ‘As you are to me.’ And as the violins soar, their faces draw together till their lips touch and they kiss.
And it was no good.
He was still awake.
Perfectly, totally, utterly awake.
He should have been getting worried, seeing that a fair
