"Because you loved me? Orbecause you wanted me to be your ace in the hole, if you failed tomanage Eric Young the way you thought you could?"
"That doesn't matter now, Max, dear. I thought Eric had what Ineeded. But I was misjudging you all along."
"You're still misjudging me, Ann. I'm going to smash this machine andafterward--"
"No you aren't, Max," she said coldly. "I'll kill you first."
Calmly she turned the dial on the blaster. He lifted the chair again,watching her face, still unable to accept what he knew was true. Thiswas Ann Saymer, the woman he had loved. It was the same Ann whoseambition had driven her from the general school to a First inPsychiatry.
With a fighting man's instinct, Hunter calculated his chances as heheld the chair high above his head. It was Ann who had to die. Hewould accomplish nothing if he smashed her transmitter. She knew howto build another. If he threw the chair at her rather than theExorciser and if he threw it hard enough--
From the door a fan of flame blazed out, gently touching Ann. Shestood rigid in the first muscular tension of paralysis. Hunter droppedthe chair, shattering the transmitter. He turned and saw Dawn in thedoorway. Somewhere deep in his subconscious mind he had expected her.He was glad she was there.
"We've known for a long time we would have to break up their littlepartnership," Dawn explained. "After I talked to you this morning,Captain, I persuaded the others to hold off for another day or so. Aclinical experiment of my own.
"It was unkind of me, I suppose, to make you the guinea pig. But Iwanted to watch your reactions while you fought your way to the truth.Now you know it all--more than you bargained for. And you know whatwe're trying to do. Are you willing to join us?"
He looked at her.
"In your third alternative--the cautious, rational rebuilding?"
"After men understand themselves. When we're able to answer onequestion: why did you and Ann Saymer, with identical backgrounds, andintelligence, and an identical socio-economic incentive, become suchdifferent personalities? What gives you a zero-zero adjustment indexthat nothing can shake? Not the psychiatric shock of war, Captain. Notphysical pain alone or the treachery of the girl you love. We needyou, Captain. We need to know what makes you tick."
"That 'we' of yours. Just what does that embrace?"
"A cross-section of us all," she told him. "Psychiatrists, executivesin both cartels, union officials. We've been working at this for agood many years. We want to make our world over, yes. But this timewith reason and without violence--without sacrificing the good wealready have."
"And you yourself, Dawn. Who are you?"
"I represent that nonentity called the government, Captain."
"A nonentity wouldn't make you what you are, Dawn."
"My name, Captain--" She drew a long breath. "My name is Dawn Farren.The rest of my family is dying out as the Von Rausches are. Unlimitedpower has a way of poisoning the human mind. If wealth is our onlyethical goal, what do we really have when we possess it all? Madness.Both cartels are shams, Captain Hunter, just as your frontier wars areshams.
"Yes, you may as well know that, too. Neither fleet has actuallyfought the other for a good many years. The planets you blast arehulks already long dead. It's all a sham, but we have to keep italive. We have to make it _seem_ real--until we're sure we've foundsomething better and more workable for all of us."
The tension in Ann Saymer's muscles started to relax. Very slowly herbody began to slump, in the secondary stage of paralysis.
"What about her?" Hunter asked. "She can still make anotherExorciser--"
"The dream of enslaving mankind is _always_ insanity. We'll put her ina public clinic, of course. We may have to use her own machine oncemore to erase the memory of its structure from her mind. After thatthe patent drawings will be destroyed. It's not a superficial cure formaladjustment that we're after, Captain Hunter, but the cause. All ofAnn's research was up a blind alley--a brilliant waste."
Suddenly Dawn screamed a warning and leveled her blaster at EricYoung. Hunter sprang back as Dawn fired. But her timing was a secondtoo late. In a last, blazing agony of life-before-death Young hadregained consciousness long enough to hurl the scalpel at Hunter'sback. Ebbing strength distorted his aim. The blade plunged into Ann'sheart as she slumped against the wall.
After a long pause, Max Hunter moved toward Dawn and took her arm. Heclenched his jaw tight and drew her quickly into the hall. "I wantout, Dawn. There's no healing here. I won't feel free again until Ican look up at the stars."
"The stars. Then you're going back to the service, Captain? You'rerunning away?"
He didn't answer her until they stood in Eric Young's garden.
"Sham battles for shadow cartels," he said. "That's a child'ssubterfuge for the Tri-D space heroes. No, Dawn, the real war is herein the struggle for information about ourselves so that we can build anew world of freedom and human dignity. You say you need me. Allright, Dawn, you've enrolled a recruit."
"It will be a long, slow war, Captain," she said, her eyes shining."We may never see a victory, and--we can never make a truce. But atleast we've learned how to go about solving the problem--after tenmillennia of trial and error."
* * * * *
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