it necessary for the Huks to do something.
They'd been shocked to numbness by the discovery that humans knew oftheir presence on Sirene IV. They'd been made aghast by the brisk andcompetent nullification of their eighty-gee rocket defenses. They'd beenappalled by the appearance of a space fleet which--if it had been aspace fleet--could have blasted the planet to a cinder. And then theywere bewildered that the humans asked no submission--not even promisesfrom them.
There was only one conclusion to be drawn. It was that if the humanswere willing to be friendly, it would be a good idea to agree. Anotheridea followed. A grand gesture by Huks would be an even better idea.
"Wait!" said the interpreter. He turned. A momentary further discussionamong the Huks. The interpreter turned back.
"There is a ship here," he said uneasily. "It is a human ship. There arehumans in it. The ship is disabled."
Sergeant Madden affected surprise.
"Yeah? How come?"
"It ar-rived two days ago," said the interpreter. Then he plunged. "Webr-rought it. We have a mine on what you call Pr-rocyron Three. Thehuman ship landed, because it was disabled. It discovered our ship andour mine there. We wished to keep the mine secret. Because the humanshad found out our secret, we br-rought them here. And the ship. It isdisabled."
"Hm-m-m," said Sergeant Madden. "I'll send a repair-boat down to fixwhatever's the matter with it. Of course you won't mind." He turnedaway, and turned back. "One of the solar systems we'd like you to takeover and defend," he observed, "is Procyron. I haven't a list of theothers, but when your ship comes over to Varenga it'll be ready. Talkour repair-boat down, will you? We'll appreciate anything you can do tohelp get the ship back out in space with its passengers, but ourrepair-boat can manage."
He waved his hand negligently and went back to the squad ship. He gotin. Patrolman Willis followed him.
"Take her up," said Sergeant Madden.
The squad ship fell toward the sky. Sergeant Madden said satisfiedly:
"That went off pretty good. From now on it's just routine."
* * * * *
There was a bubble in emptiness. It was a large bubble, as such thingsgo. It was nearly a thousand feet in diameter, and it was made ofmultipoly plastic which is nearly as anomalous as its name. The bubblecontained almost an ounce of helium. It had a three-inch small box atone point on its surface. It floated some twenty-five million miles fromthe Huk planet, and five million miles from another bubble which was itsidentical twin. It could reflect detector-pulses. In so doing itimpersonated a giant fighting ship.
Something like an hour after the squad ship rose from Sirene IV, adetonator-cap exploded in the three-inch box. It tore the box to atomsand initiated a wave of disintegration in the plastic of the bubble. Thehelium bubble-content escaped and was lost. The plastic itself turned togas and disappeared.
The bubble had been capable of exactly two actions. It could reflectdetector-pulses. In doing so, it had impersonated a giant fighting ship,member of an irresistible fleet. It could also destroy itself. In sodoing, it impersonated a giant fighting ship--one of a fleet--going intooverdrive.
In rapid succession, all the bubbles which were members of anon-existent fighting fleet winked out of existence about Sirene IV.There were a great many of them, and no trace of any remained.
The last was long gone when a small salvage ship descended to the Hukhome planet. A heavily accented voice talked it down.
The salvage ship landed amid evidences of cordiality. The Huks wereextremely co-operative. They even supplied materials for the repair jobon the _Cerberus_, including landing rockets to be used in case of need.But they weren't needed for take-off. The _Cerberus_ had been landed ata Huk spaceport, which obligingly lifted it out to space again when itsdrive had been replaced.
* * * * *
And the squad ship sped through emptiness at a not easily believablemultiple of the speed of light. Sergeant Madden dozed, while PatrolmanWillis performed such actions as were necessary for the progress of theship. They were very few. But Patrolman Willis thought feverishly.
After a long time Sergeant Madden waked, and blinked, and lookedbenignly at Patrolman Willis.
"You'll be back with your wife soon, Willis," he said encouragingly.
"Yes, sir." Then the patrolman said explosively: "Sergeant! There'snothing coming from the Coalsack way! There's nothing for the Huks tofight!"
"True, at the moment," admitted Sergeant Madden, "but something couldcome. Not likely--But you see, Willis, the Huks have had armed forcesfor a long time. They've glamour. They're not ready to cut down and haveonly cops, like us humans. It wouldn't be reasonable to tell 'em thetruth--that there's no need for their fighting men. They'd make a need!So they'll stand guard happily against some kind of monstrosities we'llhave Special Cases invent for them. They'll stand guard zestful foryears and years! Didn't they do the same against us? But now they'reproud that even we humans, that they were scared of, ask them to helpus. So presently they'll send some Huks over to go through the PoliceAcademy, and then presently there'll be a sub-precinct station overthere, with Huks in charge, and ... why ... that'll be that."
"But they want planets--"
Sergeant Madden shrugged.
"There's plenty, Willis. The guess is six thousand million planets fitfor humans in this galaxy. And by the time we've used them up,somebody'll have worked out a drive to take us to the next galaxy tostart all over. There's no need to worry about that! And forimmediate--does it occur to you how many men are going to start gettingrich because there's a brand-new planet that's got a lot of things wehumans would like to have, and wants to buy a lot of things the Hukshaven't got?"
Patrolman Willis subsided. But presently he said:
"Sergeant ... what'd you have done if they hadn't told you about the_Cerberus_?"
Sergeant Madden snorted.
"It's unthinkable! We waltzed in there, and told them a tale, and showedevery sign of walkin' right out again without askin' them a thing. Theycouldn't even tell us to go to hell, because it looked like we didn'tcare what they said. It was insupportable, Willis! Characters that maketrouble, Willis, do it to feel important. And we'd left them without athing to tell us that was important enough to mention--unless they toldus about the _Cerberus_. We had 'em baffled. They needed to saysomething, and that was the only thing they could say!"
He yawned.
"The _Aldeb_ reports everybody on the _Cerberus_ safe and sound, onlyfrightened, and the skipper said Timmy's girl was less scared than most.I'm pleased. Timmy's getting married, and I wouldn't want mygrandchildren to have a scary mother!"
He looked at the squad ship's instruments. There was a long way yet totravel.
"A-h-h-h! It's a dull business this, overdrive," he said somnolently."And it's amazing how much a man can sleep when everything's in hand,and there's nothing ahead but a wedding and a few things like that. Justroutine, Willis. Just routine!"
He settled himself more comfortably as the squad ship went on home.
THE END
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