“The Machine Demands a Sacrifice” (1972)

This story by the ever-restless Dennis Etchison might be more science fiction than horror, though it’s certainly horrific. In the future, in Los Angeles, freelancers cruise for deaths among the auto accidents of heavy traffic, hunting body organs to sell. Policemen, called COPters, patrol from above in jetpacks somehow built into their nightsticks. The “COPter” neologism reminds me of Philip K. Dick and the story does too. As usual, Etchison’s setting is a strong part of the story. Here it is Los Angeles traffic—freeways full of cars that wait minutes to travel feet, and the web of arterials that feed them. We see one freelance team commit a heinous murder to get to the product, and Etchison even notices that the victims are Black, using racism to jack up the horror a little more. It’s good stuff, although, ever since the urban legend (waking in a strange hotel bathtub with a terrible wound in your side), criminal organ harvesting has been somewhat overplayed as an idea (even if your story was written before that market opened up). And it’s arguable that the Phildickian aspects ultimately work against the story. On paper, it shouldn’t be as good as it is. Maybe I like it more than some other Etchison stories because it’s direct rather than allusive or suggestive. I wouldn’t call it restrained and, in a way—perhaps paradoxically, and perhaps I’ll change my mind—I’m saying that’s a virtue. The crime it depicts is horrible. It makes clear what a horrible world this is. Maybe that’s too black and white? I couldn’t find much about it on the internet, which suggests it’s not considered among his best. And that’s fair enough. The science fiction trappings are probably a net negative. On aesthetic grounds “restrained” probably still wins the day. But I liked Etchison’s effortless turn to the soul-eating traffic jam. Even in 1972 he obviously knew that scene well. I also like Etchison’s Southern California roots, this seems like a good time to say. He’s like the Beach Boys—maybe he didn’t surf and all that, but he knows the landscape intimately—psychic, cultural, and otherwise. Now that I think about it, the title is also Phildickian, which does make sense for 1972 California. Etchison remains an intriguing problem in horror for me. I don’t always know why his stories work, but they often do.

Dennis Etchison, Talking in the Dark
Story not available online.