H. Beam Piper - Paratime 01, page 8
Immediately, the nighthound, lured by the sudden movement of the principal source of the scent, jumped out of the jeep and bounded after the coat, and there was considerable noise in the brush on the lower side of the railroad grade at once, Verkan Vall swarmed into the jeep and snapped on the lights.
His stratagem had succeeded beautifully. The stinking coat had landed on the top of a small bush, about ten feet in front of the jeep and ten feet from the ground. The nighthound, erect on its haunches, was reaching out with its front paws to drag it down, and slashing angrily at it with its single-clawed intermediary limbs. Its back was to Verkan Vall.
His sights clearly defined by the lights in front of him, the para timer centered them on the base of the creature’s spine, just above its secondary shoulders, and carefully squeezed the trigger. The big .357 Magnum bucked in his hand and belched flame and sound—if only these Fourth Level weapons weren’t so confoundedly boisterous!—and the nighthound screamed and fell. Recocking the revolver, Verkan Vall waited for an instant, then nodded in satisfaction. The beast’s spine had been smashed, and its hind quarters, and even its intermediary fighting limbs had been paralyzed. He aimed carefully for a second shot and fired into the base of the thing’s skull. It quivered and died.
Getting a flashlight, he found his rifle, sticking muzzle-down in the mud a little behind and to the right of the jeep, and swore briefly in the local Fourth Level idiom, for Verkan Vall was a man who loved good weapons, be they sigma-ray needlers, neutron-disruption blasters, or the solid-missile projectors of the lower levels. By this time, he was feeling considerable pain from the claw-wounds he had received. He peeled off his shirt and tossed it over the hood of the jeep.
Tortha Karf had advised him to carry a needler, or a blaster, or a neurostat-gun, but Verkan Vall had been unwilling to take such arms onto the Fourth Level. In event of mishap to himself, it would be all too easy for such a weapon to fall into the hands of someone able to deduce from it scientific principles too far in advance of the general Fourth Level culture. But there had been one First Level item which he had permitted himself, mainly because, suitably packaged, it was not readily identifiable as such. Digging a respectable Fourth-Level leatherette case from under the seat, he opened it and took out a pint bottle with a red poison-label, and a towel. Saturating the towel with the contents of the bottle, he rubbed every inch of his torso with it, so as not to miss even the smallest break made in his skin by the septic claws of the nighthound. Whenever the lotion-soaked towel touched raw skin, a pain like the burn of a hot iron shot through him; before he was through, he was in agony. Satisfied that he had disinfected every wound, he dropped the towel and clung weakly to the side of the jeep. He grunted out a string of English oaths, and capped them with an obscene Spanish blasphemy he had picked up among the Fourth Level inhabitants of his island home of Nerros, to the south, and a thundering curse in the name of Mogga, Fire-God of Dool, in a Third-Level tongue. He mentioned Fasif, Great God of Khift, in a manner which would have got him an acid-bath if the Khiftan priests had heard him. He alluded to the baroque amatory practices of the Third-Level Illyalla people, and soothed himself, in the classical Dar-Halma tongue, with one of those rambling genealogical insults favored in the Indo-Turanian Sector of the Fourth Level.
By this time, the pain had subsided to an overall smarting itch. He’d have to bear with that until his work was finished and he could enjoy a hot bath. He got another bottle out of the first-aid kit—a flat pint, labeled “Old Oberholt,” containing a locally-manufactured specific for inward and subjective wounds—and medicated himself copiously from it, corking it and slipping it into his hip pocket against future need. He gathered up the ruined shoulder-holster and threw it under the back seat. He put on his shirt. Then he went and dragged the dead nighthound onto the grade by its stumpy tail.
It was an ugly thing, weighing close to two hundred pounds, with powerfully muscled hind legs which furnished the bulk of its motive-power, and sturdy three-clawed front legs. Its secondary limbs, about a third of the way back from its front shoulders, were long and slender; normally, they were carried folded closely against the body, and each was armed with a single curving claw. The revolver-bullet had gone in at the base of the skull and emerged under the jaw; the head was relatively undamaged. Verkan Vall was glad of that; he wanted that head for the trophy-room of his home on Nerros. Grunting and straining, he got the thing into the back of the jeep, and flung his almost shredded tweed coat over it.
A last look around assured him that he had left nothing unaccountable or suspicious. The brush was broken where the nighthound had been tearing at the coat; a bear might have done that. There were splashes of the viscid stuff the thing had used for blood, but they wouldn’t be there long. Terrestrial rodents liked nighthound blood, and the woods were full of mice. He climbed in under the wheel, backed, turned, and drove away.
Inside the paratime-transposition dome, Verkan Vall turned from the body of the nighthound which he had just dragged in, and considered the inert form of another animal—a stump-tailed, tuft-eared, tawny Canada lynx. That particular animal had already made two paratime transpositions; captured in the vast wilderness of Fifth-Level North America, it had been taken to the First Level and placed in the Dhergabar Zoological Gardens, and then, requisitioned on the authority of Tortha Karf, it had been brought to the Fourth Level by Verkan Vall. It was almost at the end of all its travels.
Verkan Vall prodded the supine animal with the toe of his boot; it twitched slightly. Its feet were cross-bound with straps, but when he saw that the narcotic was wearing off, Verkan Vall snatched a syringe, parted the fur at the base of its neck, and gave it an injection. After a moment, he picked it up in his arms and carried it out to the jeep.
“All right, pussy cat,” he said, placing it under the rear seat, “this is the one-way ride. The way you’re doped up, it won’t hurt a bit.”
He went back and rummaged in the debris of the long-deserted barn. He picked up a hoe, and discarded it as too light. An old plowshare was too unhandy. He considered a grate-bar from a heating furnace, and then he found the poleax, lying among a pile of wormeaten boards. Its handle had been shortened, at some time, to about twelve inches, converting it into a heavy hatchet. He weighed it, and tried it on a block of wood, and then, making sure that the secret door was closed, he went out again and drove off.
An hour later, he returned. Opening the secret door, he carried the ruined shoulder holster, and the straps that had bound the bobcat’s feet, and the ax, now splotched with blood and tawny cat-hairs, into the dome. Then he closed the secret room, and took a long drink from the bottle on his hip.
The job was done. He would take a hot bath, and sleep in the farmhouse till noon, and then he would return to the First Level. Maybe Tortha Karf would want him to come back here for a while. The situation on this timeline was far from satisfactory, even if the crisis threatened by Gavran Sam’s renegade pet had been averted. The presence of a chief’s assistant might be desirable.
At least, he had a right to expect a short vacation. He thought of the little redhead at the Hagraban Synthetics Works. What was her name? Something Kara—Morvan Kara; that was it. She’d be coming off shift about the time he’d make First Level, tomorrow afternoon.
The claw-wounds were still smarting vexatiously. A hot bath, and a night’s sleep—He took another drink, lit his pipe, picked up his rifle and started across the yard to the house.
Private Zinkowski cradled the telephone and got up from the desk, stretching. He left the orderly-room and walked across the hall to the recreation room, where the rest of the boys were loafing. Sergeant Haines, in a languid gin-rummy game with Corporal Conner, a sheriff’s deputy, and a mechanic from the service station down the road, looked up.
“Well, Sarge, I think we can write off those stock-killings,” the private said.
“Yeah?” The sergeant’s interest quickened.
“Yeah. I think the whatsit’s had it. I just got a buzz from the railroad cops at Logansport. It seems a track-walker found a dead bobcat on the Logan River branch, about a mile or so below MMY signal tower. Looks like it tangled with that night freight up-river, and came off second best. It was near chopped to hamburger.”
“MMY signal tower; that’s right below Yoder’s Crossing,-” the sergeant considered. “The Strawmyer farm night-before-last, the Amrine farm last night—Yeah, that would be about right.”
“That’ll suit Steve Parker; bobcats aren’t protected, so it’s not his trouble. And they’re not a violation of state law, so it’s none of our worry,” Conner said. “Your deal, isn’t it, Sarge?”
“Yeah. Wait a minute.” The sergeant got to his feet. “I promised Sam Kane, the AP man at Logansport, that I’d let him in on anything new.” He got up and started for the phone. “Phantom Killer!” He blew an impolite noise.
“Well, it was a lot of excitement, while it lasted,” the deputy sheriff said. “Just like that Flying Saucer thing.”
Introduction to “Last Enemy”
In “Last Enemy,” the only Paratime story set on the Second Level, Piper introduces us to the fascinating Akor-Neb civilization and the Society of Assassins. While reincarnation is an accepted scientific fact on this time-line, no one is prepared for the consequences of communication with the unreincarnated dead-reverberations of which reach even to the First Level and threaten the Paratime secret.
“Last Enemy” has my own personal nomination as the best Paratime story in this volume.
Last Enemy
Along the U-shaped table, the subdued clatter of dinner-ware and the buzz of conversation was dying out; the soft music that drifted down from the overhead sound outlets seemed louder as the competing noises diminished. The feast was drawing to a close, and Dallona of Hadron fidgeted nervously with the stem of her wineglass as last-moment doubts assailed her.
The old man at whose right she sat noticed, and reached out to lay his hand on hers.
“My dear, you’re worried,” he said softly. “You, of all people, shouldn’t be, you know.”
“The theory isn’t complete,” she replied. “And I could wish for more positive verification. I’d hate to think I’d got you into this—”
Gamon of Roxor laughed. “No, no!” he assured her. “I’d decided upon this long before you announced the results of your experiments. Ask Girzon; he’ll bear me out.”
“That’s true,” the young man who sat at Garnon’s left said, leaning forward. “Father has meant to take this step for a long time. He was waiting until after the election, and then he decided to do it now, to give you an opportunity to make experimental use of it.”
The man on Dallona’s right added his voice. Like the others at the table, he was of medium stature, brown-skinned and dark-eyed, with a wide mouth, prominent cheekbones and a short, square jaw. Unlike the others, he was armed, with a knife and pistol on his belt, and on the breast of his black tunic he wore a scarlet oval patch on which a pair of black wings, with a tapering silver object between them had been super-imposed.
“Yes, Lady Dallona; the Lord Gamon and I discussed this, oh, two years ago at the least. Really, I ‘m surprised that you seem to shrink from it, now. Of course, you’re Venus-born, and customs there may be different, but with your scientific knowledge—”
“That may be the trouble, Dirzed,” Dallona told him. “A scientist gets in the way of doubting, and one doubts one’s own theories most of all.”
“That’s the scientific attitude, I’m told,” Dirzed replied, smiling. “But somehow, I cannot think of you as a scientist.” His eyes traveled over her in a way that would have made most women, scientists or otherwise, blush. It gave Dallona of Hadron a feeling of pleasure. Men often looked at her that way, especially here at Darsh. Novelty had something to do with it—her skin was considerably lighter than usual, and there was a pleasing oddness about the structure of her face. Her alleged Venusian origin was probably accepted as the explanation of that, as of so many other things.
As she was about to reply, a man in dark gray, one of the upper-servants who were accepted as social equals by the Akor-Neb nobles, approached the table. He nodded respectfully to Garnon of Roxor.
“I hate to seem to hurry things, sir, but the boy’s ready. He’s in a trance-state now,” he reported, pointing to the pair of visiplates at the end of the room.
Both of the ten-foot-square plates were activated. One was a solid luminous white; on the other was the image of a boy of twelve or fourteen, seated at a big writing machine. Even allowing for the fact that the boy was in a hypnotic trance, there was an expression of idiocy on his loose-lipped, slack-jawed face, a pervading dullness.
“One of our best sensitives, “a man with a beard, several places down the table on Dallona’s right, said. “You remember him, Dallona; he produced that communication from the discarnate Assassin, Sirzim. Normally, he’s a low-grade imbecile, but in trance-state he’s wonderful. And there can be no argument that the communications he produces originates in his own mind he doesn’t have mind enough, of his own, to operate that machine.”
Garnon of Roxor rose to his feet, the others rising with him. He unfastened a jewel from the front of his tunic and handed it to Dallona.
“Here, my dear Lady Dallona; I want you to have this,” he said. “It’s been in the family of Roxor for six generations, but I know that you will appreciate and cherish it.” He twisted a heavy ring from his left hand and gave it to his son. He unstrapped his wrist watch and passed it across the table to the gray-clad upper-servant. He gave a pocket case, containing writing tools, slide rule and magnifier, to the bearded man on the other side of Dallona. “Something you can use, Dr. Harnosh, “he said. Then he took a belt, with a knife and bolstered pistol, from a servant who had brought it to him, and gave it to the man with the red badge.” And something for you, Dirzed. The pistol’s by Farnor of Yand, and the knife was forged and tempered on Luna.”
The man with the winged-bullet badge took the weapons, exclaiming in appreciation. Then he removed his own belt and buckled on the gift.
“The pistol’s fully loaded,” Garnon told him.
Dirzed drew it and checked—a man of his craft took no statement about weapons without verification—then slipped it back into the holster.
“Shall I use it?” he asked.
“By all means; I’d had that in mind when I selected it for you.”
Another man, to the left of Girzon, received a cigarette case and lighter. He and Garnon hooked fingers and clapped shoulders.
“Our views haven’t been the same, Garnon,” he said, “but I’ve always valued your friendship. I’m sorry you’re doing this, now; I believe you’ll be disappointed.”
Garnon chuckled. “Would you care to make a small wager on that, Nirzav?” he asked. “You know what I’m putting up. If I’m proven right, will you accept the Volitionalist theory as verified?”
Nirzav chewed his mustache for a moment. “Yes, Garnon, I will.” He pointed toward the blankly white screen. “If we get anything conclusive on that, I’ll have no other choice.”
“All right, friends,” Garnon said to those around him. ‘Will you walk with me to the end of the room?”
Servants removed a section from the table in front of him, to allow him and a few others to pass through; the rest of the guests remained standing at the table, facing toward the inside of the room. Garnon’s son, Girzon, and the gray-mustached Nirzav of Shonna, walked on his left; Dallona of Hadron and Dr. Harnosh of Hosh on his right. The gray-clad upper-servant, and two or three ladies, and a nobleman with a small chin-beard, and several others, joined them; of those who had sat close to Garnon, only the man in the black tunic with the scarlet badge hung back. He stood still, by the break in the table, watching Garnon of Roxor walk away from him. Then Dirzed the Assassin drew the pistol he had lately received as a gift, hefted it in his hand, thumbed off the safety, and aimed at the back of Garnon’s head.
They had nearly reached the end of the room when the pistol cracked. Dallona of Hadron started, almost as though the bullet had crashed into her own body, then caught herself and kept on walking. She closed her eyes and laid a hand on Dr. Harnosh’s arm for guidance, concentrating her mind upon a single question. The others went on as though Garnon of Roxor were still walking among them.
“Look!” Harnosh of Hosh cried, pointing to the image in the visiplate ahead. “He’s under control!”
They all stopped short, and Dirzed, bolstering his pistol, hurried forward to join them. Behind, a couple of servants had approached with a stretcher and were gathering up the crumpled figure that had, a moment ago, been Garnon.
A change had come over the boy at the writing machine.
His eyes were still glazed with the stupor of the hypnotic trance, but the slack jaw had stiffened, and the loose mouth was compressed in a purposeful line. As they watched, his hands went out to the keyboard in front of him and began to move over it, and as they did, letters appeared on the white screen on the left.
Garnon of Roxor, discarnate, communicating, they read. The machine stopped for a moment, then began again. To Dallona of Hadron: The question you asked, after I discarnated, was: What was the last book I read, before the feast? While waiting for my valet to prepare my bath, I read the first ten verses of the fourth Canto of “Splendor of Space,” by Larnov of Horka, in my bedroom. When the bath was ready, I marked the page with a strip of message tape, containing a message from the bailiff of my estate on the Shevva River, concerning a breakdown at the power plant, and laid the book on the ivory-Maid table beside the big red chair.
