Who had told him? Snelz! It must be Snelz! It made me feel surrounded by spies.
But Lombar was plunging on. “However, if she hasn’t killed him by his blastoff tomorrow, he won’t have long to run anyway.” He fished out a sheaf of papers. “As you already know, I have allocated to you our two best agents on Blito-P3, Raht and Terb. They are to shadow him at all times. And here is a project written for Raht to do at once. As soon as you land. It concerns the identity Heller will be given. I can think of a few ideas myself—somewhat more refined than Countess Krak ones.”
I opened the sheets. It was not easy to read in the moonlight coming through the windscreen. But what I saw stood my hair on end!
Blito-P3 is the only place anyone ever heard of where a gutter bum and criminal can rise by normal social processes to a point of absolute planetary control. It was probably this fact which had attracted Lombar to it in the first place, which had caused him to study all past surveys and its cultural and social patterns and even introduce them so thoroughly into his own work. On Earth, one man and his family had risen to such a position. He controlled the planet’s energy companies, he controlled its drug companies, he controlled its finances and he controlled many other things including, to all intents and purposes, its governments. We ourselves, although he didn’t know it, did business with him. His name was Delbert John Rockecenter. It was one of our operating maxims that we never upset anything connected with him.
And the birth certificate and credentials which Lombar was ordering Raht to procure were in the name of Delbert John Rockecenter, JUNIOR!
My Gods, this was taking risks!
Lombar must have seen my face. It amused him. “The difference between myself and other men is that I can very accurately predict what will really happen. The instant Heller shows up in the United States calling himself Delbert John Rockecenter, Junior, it will start a commotion. The name is too well known. The big one will hear of it instantly and have Heller put behind bars immediately. He has the power and the will to do things. Heller won’t get ten steps into the society before he is nabbed. Into a penitentiary and we’re rid of Heller. Maybe if he’s crazy enough to try to tell them he’s an extraterrestrial, they’ll put him in an insane asylum for life. It can’t miss.”
I understood it then. I’d have to be very sure Heller carried no other identity.
“So you have that,” said Lombar. “Now, there’s the matter of a crew for that tug. I said I’d handle that. And I certainly have. We were lucky. There were several Fleet subofficers on the galactic run. They were, of course, piloting and engineering the big Fleet freighters with the Will-be Was drives. They mutinied and stole a ship intending to go pirating. The Fleet patrols caught them and tried them. But just before they were executed some of our people did a body substitution.
“There are five of them, a captain, two pilots and two engineers, plenty for that tug. They are a race that calls themselves Antimancos—exiled long ago from Manco for ritual murders. They hate the Fleet. They hate Manco. And oh, will they hate Heller! I’ll see you’re told more about them. So there is your uncorruptible crew.”
He sat for a while, staring at the invisible hole of Palace City and just about the time I thought he had told me everything, he looked at his watch, frowned and began again.
“Now earlier, when I first heard about that (bleeped) tug, I ordered two warplanes to duty at the Earth base. The four pilots will not be under your orders. They will have their own orders. If that tug gets loose there or if Heller tries to use it locally, our planes have orders to shoot it down. Those planes will be arriving there shortly. So that takes care of that.”
I felt very cold. The moonlight was cold. His face was cold now. I hoped I wasn’t aboard that tug when they showed up. Our ship had no guns or defenses. It was just a tug.
“There’s only a couple things more,” said Lombar. I knew they wouldn’t be good, but I wasn’t prepared for what they really were.
He fixed me with a look. “If, at any time, it looks like Heller is going to succeed and you have no other way to stop him, you are to disregard any consequences and,” he pointed a finger at me and said the next words slowly, “you are to murder him!”
His attention had gone back to Palace City. He seemed to be waiting for something, but, of course, there was nothing there to wait for: it was just a zone of nothing.
He glanced at his watch and then turned to me again. “There is one final thing.” His tone was very unfriendly. “I have given secret instructions to someone in your vicinity. You will never suspect who it is. And those instructions are this: if you fail to handle Blito-P3, if you fail to keep our ammunition coming, if Heller gets loose and messes things up, if, in any way, you play me false, that someone has explicit orders to murder you!”
I felt like the moonlight had just turned into ice.
But Lombar was again looking at his watch. Then he held up a finger to me. Suddenly the most beatific expression came over his face. “There it was! Oh, there it was! Didn’t you hear it?”
I had heard nothing. There was just the empty hole of Palace City out there, just the hateful moonlight. The ship was even soundproof.
I must have looked a trifle frantic. Lombar said insistently, “The voice, the voice! I brought you here so you could hear the voice!” He sat up, listening intently. “There! There it is again: ‘Lombar Hisst! Come be Emperor! The destiny of Voltar pleads for you to take the Crown!’”
He sank back in relief. “Now that you have heard it, you know that everything I have had to do is true, is destined. I am so glad you were here to vouch for it.”
A conviction drove through me like a blastgun bolt. Like the pieces of a puzzle spinning about on a board and suddenly assembling, all my experience with Lombar Hisst and tonight came together in a single vivid fact. All the psychology textbook psychopathic symptoms of a paranoid schizophrenic, complete with megalomania and tonight, aural hallucinations, were there.
I was scared spitless!
Lombar Hisst was insane!
I was under the control of a complete lunatic!
And there was no possible way to escape it!
PART ELEVEN
Chapter 6
I actually was a pretty sick Soltan Gris when the Apparatus guard bus dropped me at my office. It was very late. I knew I ought to be packing and getting moved in aboard the tug for blastoff. But I sat at my desk for nearly half an hour, just looking into nothingness.
Somehow, I felt, there must be some mistake. Nothing could be quite as horrible as being the pawn of a madman. With sudden inspiration, I dug some of my psychology textbooks out of what I call my “Carrot Hole,” a code name for a cavity under the planking.
For another half-hour I pored over the Earth texts. Schizophrenia, I verified, is schizei: “to split” plus phren: “mind.” It was defined as a split or detachment from reality. Paranoia is a chronic psychosis, characterized by well-rationalized delusions of persecution or of grandeur. Megalomania often takes the form of a desire to rule the world. Aural hallucinations means hearing voices that aren’t there. These terms, excepting the last, are called the Hitler syndrome: Hitler was a defunct military ruler on Earth. He and several of his chieftains were labeled in the texts as paranoid schizophrenics to explain their genocidal practices (they worked hard to kill off whole races).
Yes! I had the terms right. Aural hallucinations was the right label for hearing voices. So Lombar Hisst was insane.
It brought no comfort at all.
If he started taking those amphetamines, a drug called speed, and particularly the heart-shaped orange tablets called methedrine, that I knew were in that bottle he had displayed, he really would go crazy!
I sat there for another hour, glooming.
What could I do?
Nothing!
No, not nothing!
If I didn’t get going and push this mission through to the end, I would be a dead man. That had been made too vivid to be mistaken.
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The realization alone made me leap up. It was way past midnight. I hastily rushed down the hill to my room to pack. I had even forgotten Ske had been outside the office with the airbus until he, alerted no doubt by the way I came crashing out of my office, took off and landed in the side courtyard.
Frantically, I began to scoop up things and throw them into bags. I was about to stuff the Heller monitors in with old broken canisters when I realized I had to get a grip on myself. I carefully packed them in a disguised case marked Fragile Heirlooms.
Ske was leaning against the door. I said, “Give me a hand! I’ve got to move out of here and move aboard. I won’t get any sleep at all tonight if I don’t hurry.”
“You mean you’ll be gone for a real long time?” said Ske. “Years and years? Oh, great. I’ll help you like fury!” And he pitched right in. He needn’t have been so nasty. The bandages were off his hands. Every bruise I’d given him was healed except maybe for a broken tooth or two.
And then another voice cut in. “You will get plenty of sleep on a bench in the debt court if you don’t pay your back rent!” It was, of course, Meeley.
She marched straight over and picked up the box I’d marked Fragile Heirlooms. She picked it up and held it to her chest. I was going to snatch it back when I saw the butt of a blastpistol sticking out of her apron pocket.
Ske had scooped up the remainder of my things along with copious quantities of floor dirt and marched out with them.
Meeley and I stood glaring at each other. That is to say, she glared. I was frantic. I couldn’t leave without the one set of Heller monitors I had.
“Fifty credits,” she said.
Beaten, I got out my wallet. I didn’t have all that much left. And the thought of being bested yet again by this tyrant brought in a flood of bitter memories. I owed her. I really owed her. Oh, what wouldn’t I give to. . .
I had a counterfeit hundred. It had some blood on one end from the hypnotist. I suddenly had to fight to keep a glorious grin from coming onto my face.
I shoved the counterfeit hundred at her. “I am giving you this in memory of my pleasant stay here,” I said. “If you want to reserve this room for my return, that is up to you. But you deserve what you have earned.” They would seize and execute her when she tried to present it.
She looked at the bill. She was no trained cashier. Then she looked at me with a strange twist of her head.
“Goodbye, Meeley,” I said. “May you really enjoy your immediate future.”
I strode out with the box.
We flew through the moonlit night. Voltar’s second moon was rising now and the Apparatus hangar was a weird patchwork of thin double shadows.
I was amazed how late it was. Nearly 4:00 AM. I felt awful for more reasons than no sleep but no sleep was adding to the depression.
Ske refused to help me get my baggage to the ship. I found a hand dolly by myself, loaded it and pushed it to the air lock. When I started to pick it up and carry it in, I was infuriated to see that Ske had just been sauntering along behind me, hands in pockets.
“Carry this stuff aboard!” I demanded.
He just stood there. I could have killed him.
Suddenly I decided on something. I dissembled. Now was the time to get even with him for his nastiness these past weeks.
“Ske,” I said, “you feel aggrieved that I did not make you rich. Actually I am very sorry I have not helped your career along to the place it should go.” Into the maw of Hells, I privately added.
I reached into my pocket and got out my wallet. “You know that I came into some money lately. It will be no real use to me where I am going.” Indeed it wouldn’t, or here either. “You should be rewarded for your service. I should not be miserly about it.” I fished out the remainder of the counterfeits. Bloodstains would not deter Ske and he sure was no trained cashier. I handed him the wad.
He looked at it, he looked at me. First he used one eye and then he used the other, as though he was not seeing right.
“Well, carry the baggage into the ship,” I said. “Come on, come on!”
He put the money in his pocket and started to pick up baggage. I myself cradled the Heller monitors and went aboard.
A fresh temporary sign on the last cabin down the passage before the voice-operated door said:
OFFICER GRIS
Ske dumped my things on the floor and, after a couple more loads, finished up.
I followed him back to the air lock.
“Goodbye, Ske,” I said. “Whatever happens to you, I hope it is what you truly deserve.”
He just walked off across the hangar without looking back.
How is it, I wondered, that Heller can give people money and they are happy and I give them money and they look at me so oddly? I’d have to study up on it in the psychology texts.
PART ELEVEN
Chapter 7
I did not have any inkling whatever that I was about to begin what will rank as one of the most awful days of my life.
I went back into the ship. I was tired, I was depressed. I felt all rumpled up, inside and out. If I could only get some sleep!
And there was Heller in the passageway outside my door. He had on a clean blue Fleet work-jumper, unwrinkled and creased just so. He had his inevitable red racing cap on the back of his neatly combed blond hair. He looked, despite the hour, rested and glowing with health. I hated him.
His first words increased the intensity of my emotion. “What the blast crash is this horrible stink?” Then he was staring into my cubicle.
I edged past him into my room. “It’s my baggage.” True, it was literally thrown all over the place. True, Ske had even packed decayed, broken, disposable dishes.
“Look,” said Heller, “if you were to step aboard a Fleet vessel with gear like this, dirty as you are, they’d execute you! A spacevessel operates on a closed atmosphere system. This grit would clog the air recirculation filters and I don’t think the deodorizers would handle it.” He was being patient. “There’s a crew laundry and cleaner in the opposite passageway. Throw this stuff in there and get it all washed quickly. You haven’t got much time: the groundside water and sewage and power connections will be disconnected in an hour. So speed it up.”
The thought of packing this gear anywhere appalled me. I wanted some sleep. Just a little sleep. Then a horrible thought hit me. The electronics of the monitor equipment would be ruined. Threat provokes fast thought. “I can’t,” I blurted out. “I’ve got guns, blasticks in this gear!” It had to work.
It didn’t. A shocked look came over his face. “Hey, don’t you know this whole ship will be awash with excess electrical charge? It could set them off!”
“I thought you fixed that.”
He shook his head. But he wasn’t thinking about that. Apparently, all he was registering was my objections. He stepped over to me and, in a fast frisk, began to remove blasticks, stun guns, the bladegun from my pockets. “You’re a walking arsenal! If that stuff went off, you could blow us out of space!”
He stepped over to the wall and gave a knob a spin. A locker opened. “This is a shielded, antiexplosion repository.” He started throwing my weapons into it. “Now get any other explosives out of your baggage and throw them in there.”
Thankfully, I shoved the Fragile Heirlooms box in after them.
Heller was looking at my gear again. “It’s full of just plain dirt!”
(Bleep) that Ske for packing even floor sweepings!
Heller had gone to a passageway locker and gotten some things. “This is a cleaning sheet roll. You pack your uniforms into the slots, roll it up and stuff it in the cleaning machine. They’ll come out washed and pressed. Next, this is a dirty clothes and linen cleaning sheet roll. Stuff your underclothes and socks and so on in that, roll it up and put it in the washing machine. These are waterproof bags: put all your papers and notes and so forth in them.”
He was about to leave when he turned back and looked. “I don’t see a
ny dress uniform in that gear.”
I had never bought a General Services dress uniform. “They don’t wear them on Earth!” I meant to be scathing.
“You’ll need one for launching.”
I was too sleepy and roughed up to comprehend why in Hells you needed a dress uniform to launch a ship. (Bleep) these Fleet guys. They were crazy!
“Your driver is still out there. I’ll give him some money and he can rush over and get a shop open and bring one back.”
I groaned. I couldn’t cope with all this mania for looking nice. My reluctance must have provoked him.
He stood back and pointed toward the air lock. “You take all that baggage back outside the ship and sort it out into these rolls and bags, take the rolls over to the laundry. And include that uniform you’ve got on. Then take a shower. You’ve got to be quick. You won’t have facilities much longer!”
I nearly wept. All I wanted was some sleep. I actually ached. (Bleep) these Fleet guys. He wasn’t in the Fleet now! Who cared if the air filters of the ship all clogged up?
I carried all my baggage outside the ship and began to sort it on the hangar floor.
When I had discarded the broken canisters, old newssheets and piles of just plain dirt that Ske had packed, I didn’t have too much gear, after all. The discards filled two hangar garbage cans.
I neated up the boots and caps and uniforms in the cleaning roll and then belatedly remembered I was wearing one. I emptied all my pockets into the waterproof paper-preservation bags and got my other papers into them. I stripped and put the uniform I was wearing into the cleaning roll and the dirty underthings into the washing roll.
I was standing there naked in the hangar, trying to see if I had everything straight when I heard somebody giggling. The Countess Krak was somewhere about. I didn’t wait to see where. I grabbed the rolls and bags and sprinted back into the ship.
The incident didn’t help my already rattled state. In the crew’s cleaning and laundry room I was faced with huge discs that said this thing and that on them: typical Fleet jargon, typical Fleet lightning bolts pointing at this thing and that. (Bleep) the Fleet. I jammed the rolls into what I thought were the proper doors and then carried the bags of papers back to my room.