Standing in the passageway was Heller. A groomed, freshly bathed Heller in a powder blue lounge suit.
In front of him stood “the guardsman” taking off the riot helmet. A mass of silky hair tumbled out from under the helmet and there she was revealed: a laughing Countess Krak!
PART FIVE
Chapter 8
They hugged like they hadn’t seen each other for years! They hugged and rehugged.
Finally, Heller drew back from a long kiss. “Wait,” he said, “there’s lots of night left.” He stilled his mounting excitement; for a moment it had looked like they would get no further than the couch behind him tonight.
“Darling,” said Heller, still panting a bit, “I’ve got to show you this beautiful ship!”
For an instant, I thought he must be being sarcastic. I had had my eyes on them. I looked around. It was clean. But it seemed like the usual officers’ or crew quarters of any Fleet vessel.
“Up here,” and he led the way forward, “is the control deck.” It was shiny now and, although nothing was activated, it was well lit. Fancier than most flight decks, more controls, but, after all, just a flight deck.
He spent no time at all on that. The Countess Krak looked not quite as bright as she had. She was still beautiful even in her Apparatus black uniform but she seemed to see the control deck as something that would carry him from her—I could almost read her mind.
Heller pushed open a door just forward of the air lock. “This is the officers’ and crew’s eating salon.” It was quite small, only room enough for about eight. He saw her puzzlement. “Oh, this ship takes a very small crew. A captain, two astropilots and two machinery engineers. That leaves three extra places! I see you are thinking in terms of five-thousand-crew battleships.”
He guided her aft and opened a door between the passageway and the skin. “This is the captain’s cabin.” It was quite tiny, really, but well appointed. “There’s one just this size on the opposite side of the ship that’s a little crew library and reference room.”
She was standing there, swinging her riot helmet by its strap, looking interested for his sake. Perhaps she was, female-wise, trying to understand the suppressed enthusiasm he had for this ship. Maybe a rival to her?
Heller went a few feet aft and opened another door. “And this is the crew’s food-making area. It’s so tiny and still it has all the essential machines. Isn’t it cute?”
She allowed that it was cute.
“There’s another compartment this size on the other side of the ship. It’s a laundry and sewing room.”
Why don’t you tell her, I thought, that that bulkhead just behind you hides the deadly main drives—the drives that blow up when run by crazy people like yourself.
“And these next three doors,” said Heller, opening one, “are crew cabins.” They were very small, just a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree-swivel gravity bed and a locker and a hidden shower and toilet. “There are three more just like this on the other side of the ship. Lots of crew room.”
I could see she was wondering how anyone could ever get dressed in a space that small.
“Now, under our feet and over our heads are storerooms and lockers, entered by shifting these plates. It’s the same on the other side. Tons of storage space! Isn’t she cute?”
The Countess Krak allowed it was. She was looking a trifle restless.
We had progressed aft and we were now up against a big, airtight door. “Now we have seen the officer and crew area,” said Heller. “Close your eyes.”
She did, obediently. I didn’t. Heller gave a big manual wheel a spin and the passageway lock slid smoothly open.
For an instant I thought the current had surged, everything went so bright. What the Hells? I was looking at glitter so bright it hurt!
“Open your eyes,” Heller said.
The Countess Krak did. And she said, “Oooooooooooo!”
It was just more passageway but it had changed! The lock wheels on doors, the handholds, the rails were gleaming white metal. The inset lights were flooding down upon a gorgeous inset pattern of blue and black.
“What is that metal?” I said, hardly daring to ask. “I was along here this morning and it was all blackish.”
“Silver,” said Heller. “That’s all solid silver. When they put her in suspended activation, somebody neglected to paint her fittings with anti-tarnish. A few good coats of anti-tarnish tomorrow and they’ll never go black again.”
“Solid silver?” said the Countess Krak, staring down the passageway.
“Yes, indeed,” said Heller. “They don’t care about weight in a tug. In fact, they don’t have enough of it. From this part of the ship back, every fitting is solid silver.”
She knelt and felt the tile. “I can’t believe it. Isn’t this Astobol tile, the famous imperishable woven rock like in the Emperor’s palace?” She petted the floor and side walls.
“Right,” said Heller. “It won’t burn or chip or conduct current and it won’t reflect sound at all. No echoes from the drives. The whole rear half of the ship is totally sound insulated.” And it was true. When the door swung shut behind us, the noises of the hangar outside vanished.
“That’s how the admiral coped with the noise the main engines make. But I better tell you about this ship.” And he gave her a swift resume of Admiral Wince and his flagship tug, totally omitting any mention of Will-be Was drives or the fate of Tug One’s sister ship.
“I didn’t know she was even over in Emergency Fleet Reserve,” said Heller. “I was hoping to find a flagship of a patrol flotilla, as they’re pretty fancy sometimes. And here sat Tug One! What luck. Oh, but you haven’t seen anything yet. Wince spent two million on her and she’s only about ten years old and hardly ever spaceward. Come along.”
He was not touching things now. At the next door, he simply said, “Open.” And it opened. “Food makers,” he said. “There’s a uniform maker and reprocessor on the other side of the hull.” He went to the next door. He said, “Open.” And it opened. “Equipment storage. The one on the other side contains data banks.”
We had come to another airtight door. It had been open when we had clambered about earlier and I had seen just a dark, dusty, black-metaled cavern. Heller said, “Close your eyes.”
She did. I didn’t. “Open,” said Heller.
The wheels silently spun, the door swung back. I couldn’t believe it. “Open your eyes,” said Heller.
And if the Countess Krak had said “Oooooo!” before, she certainly shouted it now. For before us lay a large, spacious eating room. It had gyrotables and chairs and couch, swivel bookcases and what must be food warmers and servers. It was all done in fantastic taste. But that wasn’t what was astonishing. The plates and canisters, the vases, even the corners of the table and chairs were gold. “Gold?” I said.
“Solid gold,” said Heller. “Now you can see why I posted guards today. All her service plate was in her lockers and they could have been opened then.”
Heller said a word, “Reflect!”
I hadn’t seen the mirrors. They instantly lit up and crisscross reflected the whole room so that it seemed to go on forever. Then Heller said, “Lights!” And immediately color music in changing patterns began to flow in the mirrors.
“Oooooo!” said the Countess Krak.
“Oh, you haven’t seen it all yet,” said Heller. “This rear section is built around the traction beam generators and they don’t take up near the space of the main drives. So the admiral built here what is called in architecture a ‘circle of boxes.’ You’ll see in each one of these rooms what will appear to be a step which goes up or over to the next room. That covers the return cables to the generators. He used all this space. Wasn’t that clever of him? Come on!”
We walked along the wall and stepped down into another spacious room. It was a very ornate gold and silver bedroom with a large gravity bed. It had wood nymph scenes on the walls.
It had new sheets all turned back.
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Heller and the Countess looked at each other knowingly. “But come on,” said Heller. “The night has long to go.”
We stepped up on a ledge and we were in a gymnasium! It wasn’t very big and you’d crack your head if you jumped too high but it was certainly a gym.
“Exercise!” barked Heller.
Smoothly out from the bulkheads slid some bars and exercise machines.
“Sunlight!” said Heller. A table unfolded that could be lain upon and sunlight glowed from the ceiling. “Massage,” said Heller. And a massage machine slid out and approached the table, already vibrating. “Fight!” said Heller. The machine and table folded back.
I don’t know what I expected to happen but it was not what happened. A cupboard popped open and what seemed to be a real live duelist leaped out. I felt the Countess instinctively go into combat posture. The thing looked vicious enough. Heller reached out and gave it a fast, expert chop and it dodged aside!
Then I saw what it was: a three-dimensional illusion. I could see other parts of the room through it. It was just a complex light pattern and now I could see little beams glowing in the ceiling. I had heard of these before. They were used for dueling practice.
Heller gave an expert kick. There was a small flash. The thing seemed to fall down on the floor and a voice from somewhere—it?—said, “Spare me. Oh, master!”
“Enough!” barked Heller. The illusion vanished. “It duels with electric daggers, swords, bludgeons and just bare hands. I never saw one before that fell down. They usually just flash when you hit a vital spot. Now, you may wonder why that massage table wasn’t on gimbals. Well, all this afterpart of the ship,” he patted the bulkhead behind us, tapped the floor and pointed at the ceiling, “has automatic adjusting gravity-simulation coils. They usually take so much power that they don’t install them but Tug One has power to spare.”
And if you don’t burn it—and more, I thought sourly, it also blows you up!
“So she’s quite safe to exercise and move around in,” said Heller to the Countess. “The enormous gravity surges you get with tugs get canceled out. You don’t ever have ‘space float’ back here. You don’t bump your head.”
“That’s good,” said the Countess.
I wondered what she’d do if she knew he were telling her a one-tenth truth. Then I realized she would use every bit of her influence with him to get him off this dangerous ship. I vowed fervidly she was not going to find out this was a deathtrap for her darling.
Heller whispered to us, “I don’t dare say the next word aloud. That entrance closes and the place becomes a steam bath!” He led us up on the next level.
It was an ornate bathroom. He lifted a towel off the rack and simulated multicolored fish began to swim in three dimensions around all the walls and ceilings. It was like being at the bottom of the sea. It certainly would change a spacer’s mind about where he was! Heller put the towel back and the fish vanished.
We went up a little stair. We were up in what must be the top of the stern.
And once again the Countess said, “Oooooo!” And well she might. For it was a huge room! It was exquisitely carpeted in dark flowing patterns. It was furnished in some glowing black wood. It had what must be a desk on black gimbals and a chair to match. But the place was not an office. It had black leather settees. Leather? Yes, real leather! And every wall was just a big black expanse that looked like shining glass.
“Sit down,” said Heller. “Now you are going to see something!”
I wondered what in the heavens there could be left to see? The Countess sat down in a chair, expectant, her riot helmet dangling from her hand.
Like a master of ceremonies, Heller raised his hand. “Autumn forest!” he said.
Instantly, on every wall around us, in brilliant three-dimensional color, totally real to the eye, there appeared a landscape in the brilliant hues of autumn. The trees were even moving. There was a gentle sigh of wind. Good heavens, there was even the scent of fields. It looked so real!
“Oooooo!” said the Countess, delighted.
“Now watch,” said Heller. “Winter!” And a totally different landscape appeared, majestic mountain peaks, snowy fields, stark trees. And the low moan of a winter wind. It made me feel so cold, suddenly, that I had to verify that the salon temperature had not changed.
“Spring!” said Heller. And the whole area seemed to become a blossoming of color: orchards, a young animal frisking in a field. The smell of fresh earth and buds.
“Summer!” said Heller. There was a burst of birdsong, the sweet fragrance of flowers, the sigh of a gentle zephyr. Leaved trees shaded the ground. A pair of lovers went hand in hand down a path.
“Oh, I like those,” said the Countess.
“There are lots more seasons on lots more planets. I just chose Manco for tonight to please you.”
“Oh, it does. It does!” But she looked like she was going to cry and Heller comforted her quickly, all contrite. “No, no,” she said, dabbing at her eyes. “It’s just that aside from today’s trip, I haven’t seen the sky or fields for three years!” She cried a little and then she dried her eyes. “I’m spoiling your show.”
He made certain she was all right now. Then he said, “Space!”
I jumped slightly. I do not really care for space. I do not look out spaceports even when they’re available. The vast, brutal violence of elemental force, the unimaginable distances, the cruel, lonely black of it, when you’re in it, inspires worse than awe. To me, it is overpowering.
All around us was space. Studded with stars and nebulae, a near planet and moon of some system, it felt exactly like a real look at space while sitting on a suspended floor. Only the furniture made me keep my composure.
I said aloud, using the same voice volume Heller did, “Autumn!” I thought it would change back. It was only a voice-activated projector. Nothing happened. “Winter!” I said. Nothing happened. Space still gaped around us as though hungry for our lives. Cruel, pitiless space. I looked at Heller. “Why doesn’t it change?”
“The whole rear section of this ship, cupboards, everything,” said Heller, “is keyed only to my voice frequencies and harmonics. No two voices are alike, ever.” He turned to the Countess. “There is a capacity to key it all to two or more tones. I’ll put yours into the bank.”
“What about me?” I said. “You’ll have to show me how to set and change the voice keys. I’ll be on this ship, too!”
He just looked at me. He never showed me or anyone else where or how to change the voice response keys on that ship. And I never was able to open or close or operate a single thing in the rear of that ship. I think he changed the process so that not even a technician from Fleet could do it. But at that moment I felt a surge of anger. When I got him off this planet . . . I felt sick at my stomach. It must be this cursed scene which suspended me in space, supported only by a rug.
“Now,” said Heller to the Countess gently, “I have a little surprise for you. This was something that was popular about fifty years ago but the driver managed to find a strip of it.” He removed a little rod from his pocket and reached down to the underedge of the settee he was sitting on and slid it in. At least I knew where the projector feed was!
Space vanished! What a relief!
In its place, all about us, appeared a theater as though we were just spectators along with a couple hundred others. The people seemed live.
Directly before us was the stage. It was a woods scene, totally artificial. There were trees like cardboard cutout trees and a path. There were footlights.
Music started up. An actor in an animal suit, a lepertige, came out of the wings. He had spats on and a hat and was carrying a cane. He pretended he was peeking into the woods. Then, in a little dance, still looking about him into the woods, he began to sing and as he sang the trees all began to wave in rhythm to the music.
Down on a path in the forest today,
I saw a sight that took my breath away,
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nbsp; The charms I beheld, that were on such display,
Made my poor empty paws just itch to stray.
Oh, Lepertige Lady,
Come out and play,
Come out and play,
Come out and play!
Oh, Lepertige Lady,
Come out and play!
We’ll dance our whole lives away!
Oh, Lepertige Lady,
Do not depart,
Do not depart,
Do not depart.
Oh, Lepertige Lady,
Do not depart!
For you’ve stolen my heart today!
And then, amongst the trees, an enormous pair of phosphorescent eyes showed, blinked twice and a coquettish voice said, like an animal purr, “Why not?”