“I can’t predict,” Lupov said, half to himself in a drab mutter, “what Ferry will do, if you and I are—”
The back of the bunker burst in a shower of murdering white and green sparks. Jaimé Weiss shut his eyes.
Studying the page before him, Theo Ferry, engrossed, failed to hear the buzzer at his neck-com the first time. At last, however, he became aware of it, grasped the fact that von Einem was attempting to reach him.
“Yes,” he said brusquely. “What is it, Sepp?”
“You are in extreme danger,” the distant faded voice came to him, a tinny, gnat-like dancing whisper from many light-years off. “Throw away that thing you have, whatever it is; it’s a Lupov invention—the ’wash technique structured for you, sir! Hurry!”
With unbelievable effort Theo Ferry managed to close the book. The page of print vanished . . . and as soon as it did so he felt strength return to his arms; volition flooded back and he at once jumped up, dropping the book. It tumbled wildly to the ground, pages fluttering; Theo Ferry at once jumped on it, ground his heel into the thing—hideously, it emitted a shrill living cry, and then became silent.
Alive, he thought. An alien life-form; no wonder it could deal with my recent activities; the page actually contained nothing—it was no book at all, only one of those awful Ganymede life-mirrors that Lupov was supposed to use. That entity that reflects back to you your own thoughts. Ugh. He winced with aversion. And it almost got me, he said to himself. Close.
“The report back by the foil,” von Einem’s far-off voice came to him, “indicates that Lupov and Weiss built up over a long period of time, perhaps even years, an intricate structure of subworlds of a hypnotic, delusional type, to trap you when you made your crucial trip to Whale’s Mouth. Had they fully concentrated on that and left Greg Gloch alone they might very well have been successful. This way—”
“Did you get Weiss and Lupov?” he demanded.
Von Einem said, “Yes. As near as I can determine. I’m still waiting for the certified results, but it seems hopeful. If I may explain about these mutually exclusive delusional worlds—”
“Forget it,” Ferry broke in harshly. “I have to get out of here.” If they could come this close, then he was hardly safe, even now; they had spotted him, prepared for him—Lupov and Weiss might be gone, but that still left others. Rachmael ben Applebaum, he thought. We didn’t get you, I suppose. And you have done us a good deal of harm already, harm that we know of. Theoretically you could do much, much more.
Except, he thought as he groped in his clothing for the variety of miniaturized weapons he knew were there, we’re not going to let you. Too much is at stake; too many lives are involved. You will not succeed, even if you have outlasted Mat Glazer-Holliday, Lupov and Weiss and possibly even that Freya girl, the one who was Mat’s mistress and now is yours—you still don’t stand a chance.
Thinly, he smiled. This part I will enjoy, he realized. My taking you out of action, ben Applebaum. For this I will operate out of my own ship, Apteryx Nil. When I’m finally there, I’ll be safe. Even from you.
And you, he said to himself, have no place equal to it; even if the Omphalos were here at Whale’s Mouth it would not be enough.
Nothing, ben Applebaum, he thought harshly, will be enough. Not when I’ve reached Apteryx Nil. As I enter it your tiny life fades out.
Forever.
FIFTEEN
To Freya Holm the flapple repeated in high-pitched anxiety, “Sir or madam, you must evacuate at once; all living humans must leave me, as my meta-battery is about to deteriorate. Due to various punctures in my hull, which punctures having been caused by the demolition of the simulacrum of Mr. Ferry, or rather because of which—in any case I am no longer able to maintain homeostasis, or whatever the phrase is. Please, sir or madam; do heed me: your life, sir or madam, is being risked each moment!”
Furiously, Freya grated, “And go where, once I leave here?”
“Down to the surface of the planet,” the flapple said, in a tone of voice suggesting ultimate mechanical smugness; as far as the flapple was concerned it had solved everything.
“Jump?” she demanded. “Two thousand feet?”
“Well, I suppose your point is well-taken,” the flapple said in a disgruntled tone; it evidently was displeased to have its solution dealt with so readily. “But the enormous inter-plan and -system ship which I am now attached to; why not hie yourself there? Or however the expression goes.”
“It’s Ferry’s!”
“Ferry’s, Schmerry’s,” the flapple said. “This way you’ll perish when I do. You want THAT?”
“All right,” she snarled, and made her way unsteadily toward the entrance hatch of the flapple, the link between it and the huge ship blowing its ceaseless wisps of fuel vapor, obviously ready to take off at an instant’s command.
“My meta-battery has nowwwaaaa fooooof,” the flapple intoned hazily; its expiration had accelerated by leaps and bounds.
“Goodbye,” Freya said, and passed out through the entrance hatch, cautiously following the shorter of the two THL agents.
Behind her the flapple murmured in its dim fashion, “Tttturnnn uppp yrrrr hearing aaaaaaiddddd, misssszzzz.” And drifted into oblivion.
Good riddance, she decided.
A moment later she had entered the great ship—Theo Ferry’s post from which he—obviously—operated when on Fomalhaut IX.
“Kill her,” a voice said.
She ducked. A laser beam cut past her head; instantly she rolled, spun to one side, thinking, They did it to Mat, but not to me; they can’t do it to me. A second last try for us, she thought desperately; if Rachmael can do anything. I can’t. “Ferry,” she gasped. “Please!”
The prayer proved worthless. Four THL agents, in military brown, deployed strategically at several compass points of the ship’s central cabin, aimed at her emotionlessly, while at the controls, his face a dull mask of almost indifferent concentration, sat Theodoric Ferry. And, she realized, this was the man himself; this did not constitute a simulacrum.
“Do you know,” Ferry said to her quietly, “where Rachmael ben Applebaum is at this moment?”
“No,” she gasped. Truthfully.
At that Ferry nodded toward the four THL agents; the man to his immediate right caustically grimaced—and squeezed the button that controlled his laser tube.
I made a mistake, Freya realized. The flapple tricked me; it deliberately made me come here—it’s a THL flapple and it knew who I was and what I wanted to do. It was my enemy . . . and I failed to identify it as such—in time. Now it was too late, far too late.
The laser beam came once more, narrow and alit with strength; it scraped past her, created its own escape-hole in the wall behind her.
“I’m very much interested in this Rachmael individual,” Ferry informed her. “If you could possibly recall where he might be—”
“I told you,” she said in a tight, almost inaudible whisper. “I have no idea.”
Again Ferry nodded at his employee, an expression of resignation on his face. The laser beam howled, then, in Freya’s direction.
Once more she prayed. And this time not to Theodoric Ferry.
The eye-eater said pleasantly, “Mr. ben Applebaum, reach inside me and you will find a slightly different edition of Dr. Bloode’s Text. A copy of the twentieth edition, which I ingested some time ago . . . but as far as I can determine, not already dissolved by my gastric juices.” The idea seemed to amuse it; the lower portion of its face split apart in a peal of excruciatingly penetrating laughter.
“You’re serious?” Rachmael said, feeling disorganized. And yet the eye-eater was correct; if it did possess a later edition of the text he most certainly had reason to seek it out—wherever it lay, even within the body of the offensive eye-eater.
“Look, look,” the eye-eater exclaimed; it held in one of its longer pseudopodia several remaining unchewed eyes, and these it had placed close to its stomach in order to see properly. “Yes,
it’s still in there—and you can have it, free! No, but seriously, folks, the twentieth edition is worth a lot more to a collector than the seventeenth; get it while the getting’s good or this free money-back offer expires forever.”
After a pause Rachmael shut his eyes and reached his hand gropingly into the midsection of the cephalopodic life-form.
“Fine, fine,” the eye-eater chortled. “That feels really cool, as the ancients said. Got hold of it yet? Reach deeper, and don’t mind if the digestive juices destroy your sleeve; that’s show biz, or whatever it was they formerly said. Tee-hee!”
His fingers touched something firm within the gelatinous, oozing mass. The edge of the book? Or—something else. It felt very much as if—incredibly—it consisted of the crisp, starched, lower edge of a woman’s bra.
“For god’s sake!” a female voice declared furiously. And at the same instant a small but wildly intent hand grabbed his, forced it back toward him.
Immediately he opened his eyes. The eye-eater glowered at him in indignation. But—it had changed. From it long strands of women’s hair grew; the eye-eater had a distinctly female appearance. Even its pawful of eyes had altered; they now appeared elongated, graceful, with heavy lashes. A woman’s eyes, he realized with a thrill of terror.
“Who are you?” he demanded, almost unable to speak; he jerked his hand back in revulsion and the pseudopodium released him.
The pseudopodia of the eye-eater, all of them, terminated in small, delicate hands. Like the hair and the eyes, distinctly female.
The eye-eater had become a woman. And, near the center of its body, it wore—ludicrously—the stiff white bra.
The eye-eater said, in a high-pitched voice, almost a squeal of indignation, “I’m Gretch Borbman, of course. And I frankly don’t believe it’s very funny to—do what you did just now.” Breathing hotly, the eye-eater glowered even more darkly.
“I’m—sorry,” he managed to say. “But I’m lost in damn paraworld; it’s not my fault. So don’t condemn me.”
“Which paraworld is it this time?” the eye-eater demanded. “The same one as before?”
He started to answer . . . and then noticed something which froze him into silence where he stood. Other eye-eaters had begun to appear, slowly undulating toward him and Gretch Borbman. Some had the distinct cast of masculinity; some obviously were, like Gretch, female.
The class. Assembling together in response to what Gretch had said.
“He attempted to reach inside me,” the eye-eater calling itself Gretchen Borbman explained to the rest of them. “I wonder which paraworld that would indicate.”
“Mr. ben Applebaum,” one of the other eye-eaters, almost certainly Sheila Quam by the sound of her voice, said. “In view of what Miss Borbman says, I think it is virtually mandatory for me to declare a special emergency Computer Day; I would say that beyond a reasonable doubt this situation which you’ve created calls for it.”
“True,” the eye-eater named Gretch agreed; the others, to varying degrees, also nodded in unison. “Have his paraworld gestalt fed in so it can be examined and compared. Personally I don’t think it’s like anyone else’s, but of course that’s up to the computer to determine. Myself, I feel perfectly safe; I know that whatever he saw, or rather sees, bears absolutely no resemblance to anything I ever perceived.”
“What did he do just now,” an eye-eater which reminded him of Hank Szantho said, “that made you yip like that?”
The Gretch Borbman thing said in a low, sullen voice, “He attempted to diddle me.”
“Well,” the Hank Szantho eye-eater said mildly, “I don’t see where that alone indicates anything; I might even attempt that myself, some day. Anyhow, as long as Sheila feels it’s called for—”
“I’ve already got the forms ready,” the one whom he had identified as Sheila Quam said. To Rachmael she said, “Here is 47-B; I’ve already signed it. Now, if you’ll come with me—” She glanced toward the Gretchen Borbman eye-eater. “Miss Borbman already knows her paraworld . . . I hope her confidence is vindicated; I hope that what you perceive, Mr. ben Applebaum, is not congruent with hers.”
“I hope so, too,” the Gretchen Borbman thing agreed faintly.
“As I recall,” the Sheila Quam eye-eating entity declared, “Mr. ben Applebaum’s initial delusional experience, set off by the LSD dart, consisted of involvement with the garrison state. Do you remember clearly enough to voluntarily testify to that, Mr. ben Applebaum?”
“Yes,” he said huskily. “And then the aquatic—”
“But before that,” Sheila interrupted. “When you first crossed by Telpor. Before the dart—before the LSD.”
Hazily, he said, “It’s a blur to me, now.” Reality, for him, had slipped and floundered too much; he could not be absolutely sure of the sequence of events. With a vast final effort he summoned his waning attention, focussed on his past—it seemed a billion light-years ago, and yet in actuality the experience with the garrison state had been reasonably recent. “It was before,” he said, then. “I perceived the garrison state, the fighting; then a THL soldier shot me. So the experience with the garrison state came first; then, after the LSD, the aquatic nightmare-shape.”
Hank Szantho said thoughtfully, “You may be interested to know, Mr. ben Applebaum, that you are not the first person among us to live with that hallucination—I refer to the prior one, that of the garrison state. If your delusional gestalt, when you present it to the computer, comes out on those lines, I can assure you that a true bi-personal view of a paraworld will have been established . . . and this, of course, is what we fear, as you well know. Do you want to see the garrison state world established as the authentic reality?” His voice lifted harshly. “Consider.”
“The choice,” Sheila Quam said, “is not his; it’s mine. I therefore officially declare this late Wednesday afternoon and Computer Day, and I order Mr. ben Applebaum to accept this form I hold here, to fill it out, and then return it to me, as Control, to sign. You understand, Mr. ben Applebaum? Can you think clearly enough to follow what I’m saying?”
Reflexively, he accepted the form from her. “A pen?” he asked.
“A pen.” Sheila Quam, plus all the other eye-eating quasi-forms, began to search about their bulb-like bodies—to no avail.
“Chrissake,” Rachmael said irritably, and searched his own pockets. Not only to be compelled to fill out the 47-B form, but to come up with his own pencil—
In his pocket his fingers touched something: a flat, small tin. Puzzled, he lifted it out, examined it. The eye-eaters around him did so, as well. In particular the Gretchen Borbman one.
MORE FUN
AFTER DONE!
“How disgusting,” Gretchen Borbman said. To the others she said, “A tin of Yucatán prophoz. The worst kind possible—fully automated, helium-battery powered, good for a five-year life span . . . is this what you had in mind, Mr. ben Applebaum, when you diddled me a moment ago?”
“No,” he said. “I forgot I had these.” Chilled, he thought, Have I had this all along? The cammed, hyperminned UN weapon: the personnel variation of the time-warping construct which constituted the major device in Horst Bertold’s arsenal. Naturally he retained it; the effectiveness of the camouflage lay beyond dispute—and had now been tested and ratified in practice . . . it had even seemed to him, during the first moment of discovery, that this was exactly as it appeared to be: a box of prophoz and nothing more.
“Out of respect for decency and the women present here,” the Hank Szantho eye-eater said, “I believe you should put that obnoxiously specific tin away, Mr. ben Applebaum; don’t you, on second thought, agree?”
“I suppose so,” he said. And opened the tin.
Acrid smoke billowed about him, stinging his nostrils. He halted, dropped into an instinctive crouch of self-defense. Matson saw gray barracks.
Beside him. Freya appeared. The air was cold; she shivered and he, too, quaked, drew against her, stared and stared at the b
arracks; he saw row after row of them, and—charged, twelve-foot-high wire fences with four strands of barbed wire at the top. And signs. The posted restrictive notices; he did not even need to read them.
Freya said, “Mat, have you ever heard of a town called Sparta?”
“ ‘Sparta,’ ” he echoed, standing holding his two suitcases.
“Here.” She released his fingers, set the suitcases down. A few people, drably dressed, slunk by, silently, carefully paying no attention to them. “I was wrong,” Freya said. “And the message of course to you, the all-clear, was spurious. Mat, I thought—”
“You thought,” he said, “it was going to be—ovens.”
She said, with quiet calmness, tossing her heavy dark mane of hair back and raising her chin to meet his gaze, look at him face-to-face, “It’s work camps. The Soviet, not the Third Reich, model. Forced labor.”
“Doing what? Clearing the planet? But the original authentic monitoring satellites reported that—”
“They seem,” she said, “to be forming the nucleus of an army. First starting everyone out in labor gangs. To get them accustomed to discipline. The young males go into basic training at once; the rest of us—we’ll probably serve in that.” She pointed and he saw the ramp of a subsurface structure; he saw the descent mechanism and he knew, remembered from his youth, what it meant, this prewar configuration.
A multi-level autofac. On continuous schedule, hence not entirely homeo. For round-the-clock operations, machines would not do, could not survive. Only shifts, alternating, of humans, could keep the belts moving; they had learned that in ’92.
“Your police vets,” Freya said, “are too old for immediate induction; most of them. So they’ll be assigned to barracks, as we will be. I have the number they gave you and the one they gave me.”
“Different quarters? We’re not even together?”
Freya said, “I also have the mandatory forms for us to fill out; we list all our skills. So we can be useful.”
“I’m old,” he said.
“Then, Freya said, “you’ll have to die. Unless you can conjure up a skill.”