Collected Short Fiction, page 266
“Hello, Earthman. There is trouble here.”
Maintaining his stiffness, Reese turned. He saw Kuhli, the addict. The pack he had been carrying was missing.
“Why are you back?” Reese asked.
“I need . . . I need . . .” Kuhli gestured to his back. “I lost my pack. I need . . .” He could not pronounce the name of the drug he craved but he had been drawn back to the colony by desperate need.
Reese began to say something—then he cut it short and started to run.
“Lois! Lois!”
The girl was walking across the clearing in the familiar stiff-legged stride. Reese caught up with her in a moment or two, his heart pounding. “Thank God you’re all right!” he exclaimed.
She stared at him. Her lovely face was void of all expression and her hazel-grey eyes looked blankly at him. “Who are you?” she asked, as if she were sleepwalking.
“Why—I’m Jim! Are you under this dreadful thing, too? Yes, yes, of course you must be. I . . .”
She interrupted him—speaking in a deep, grotesque voice that sounded more like Dr. Tersen’s than her own. “Somehow this Reese is not under control. He must be captured and put out of the way. get him!”
Reese realized that Tersen had been watching through Lois’ eyes. Half a dozen of the colonists were converging on him now. He turned and started to run.
They spread out in a loose ring around him and he saw that unless he could dodge past them and escape into the forest, he was trapped.
He dashed forward toward the nearest man—Chuck Hylan. Hylan was lean and agile but Tersen’s control left him stiff and awkward. He brought his fists up and aimed a few wild punches at Reese. Reese ducked them easily and smashed a hard right at Hylan.
It was a blow that could have toppled a tree—but Hylan merely staggered and stayed up. Reese saw that the control gave them extra endurance. He’d get nowhere by fighting with them. Pushing Hylan aside, Reese broke for the clearing.
And froze.
He heard Tersen’s dry voice saying, “. . . must have been a short in the wave canal. But that’s taken care of now.”
The voice was not loud. It was in his mind.
And he was unable to move.
IT WAS A STRANGE, unearthly experience co be a zombie. Part of Reese’s mind remained conscious. Part of him knew that Tersen had belatedly achieved control through the bracelet on his wrist and that Reese was no longer his body’s master. He felt a presence in his mind. Tersen. Tersen dictated his motions now.
Stiffleggedly—and it was no sham, now—he turned or was turned, and walked back toward the rest of the group. Tersen had appeared and stood there, icy eyes glittering at him.
“I made the mistake of not testing you before I freed you,” the scientist said. “But I think the control is in effect now. We’ll see.”
Raise your right hand! came a sudden mental command. Reese felt his right hand shoot above his head. He struggled to pull it down but it was impossible.
Left hand!
Both hands!
Kneel on your left knee!
Apparently Tersen was satisfied. He ordered Reese up and turned away. His control was complete.
“We march on Colony Seven tonight,” Tersen announced again.
The rest of that day was a dim blur for Jim Reese. He followed through a series of dictated tasks, preparing for the raid on the colony. He discovered now exactly what had happened to Colony Eight but there was nothing at all he could do about it.
Tersen had appeared about a week after Reese had quarrelled with Lois. He had announced he was here to perform some experiments and asked the Colony to let him stay for a month or so. The Colony had agreed.
Tersen had proceeded to set up a dome and build his generator. It operated on encephalographic principles and allowed him to control the brains of all within its field at the time it was turned on. The Colony had not discovered this until the day Tersen had switched the generator on. From then on all were slaves.
Since Reese had not been present when that happened he was not subject to the generator field nor was the generator set up to control him. Tersen had had a portable generator under experimental construction and it was that which he had used to control Reese. It had failed, at first, though Reese’s clever act had deceived Tersen. But when the scientist discovered Reese still was not under control he was able to make a trifling adjustment that altered the situation.
These things Reese found out by his contact with Tersen’s mind. Contact worked in two directions—but control in only one.
Reese and the others readied the Colony for the attack on its neighbors. Tersen planned to control all the 10 colonies on Damballa—and then, building more generators, he would spread his dominion to Earth, the planet that had driven him into exile.
BUT ONE PERSON in Colony Eight was free from Tersen’s control. One person came and went as he pleased.
Kuhli. The drug-sodden alien.
Reese was standing stiffly before the medical commissary later that day when Kuhli came out, his back once again laden with a packful of benzolurethrimine ampoules. The alien was smiling happily in his narcotic daze.
He approached Reese and peered at him curiously out of eyes clouded with drugs. “Earthman. Much trouble here. I leave again.”
Prisoner within his own skull, Reese longed to break Tersen’s iron control. But it was impossible. He stood stock-still while Kuhli stared at him.
The alien’s blubbery mouth split in a pleased smile. “Pretty,” he crooned. “Pretty. I take.”
Reese’s heart bounded in sudden hope.
Kuhli’s dim eyes were fixed on the shining bracelet on Reese’s wrist!
The alien was pawing his arm now, examining the trinket, exclaiming little wordless cries of pleasure over it. Reese felt his body breaking out in heavy sweat. If only Tersen wouldn’t notice—!
Kuhli began to slip the bracelet off.
And Tersen detected it. His sudden, urgent thought came to Reese: Stop him! Don’t let him remove the bracelet, Reese!
Unable to resist, Reese started to draw his hand back, to bring his other fist down on the alien’s skull. But halfway through the action he felt a shock like a heavy-voltage current ripping through him and knew that he was free. The alien had removed the bracelet!
Quickly Reese seized it, grabbing it from the alien’s paws. Despite Kuhli’s protests, Reese hurled the bracelet as far into the underbrush as he could.
He grinned and patted the blubbering alien on one scaly shoulder. “That’s all right, Kuhli. Good boy, Kuhli. When this thing is over remind me to get you a new bracelet.”
He began to run, moving with grim determination now He was free again—and now he knew where Tersen and his generator were located. He didn’t intend to fail a third time.
TERSEN HAD SET up his headquarters in one of the small domes near the stream that ran past the colony. Blaster in hand, Reese ran to the dome.
Someone stood in the door. Not Tersen.
Lois.
“Don’t go in there,” she said—in her normal voice. “Tersen’s in there.”
“I know.” He stared at her. She didn’t have the same zombielike appearance she had had earlier. “Get out of my way,” he told her. “I’m going in.”
She put her hand on his arm tenderly. “No Jim. Give me the gun. I’ve broken out of his control. He doesn’t know it yet. Let me go in there—and I’ll take him by surprise. He won’t expect it when I blast him down.”
A grin lit Reese’s features. The voice was unmistakably Lois’. “Okay. Great idea, darling. Here.”
He handed her his blaster and waited for her to go inside. But instead she levelled the gun at him.
“Lois! What is this—a trap?”
Words came from her mouth in reply—words spoken in a deep, distorted voice. “Well done. Now kill him.” It was the voice of Dr. Tersen.
Her finger tightened on the trigger as Reese stood frozen in utter horror. Tersen had used a shrewd ruse—by pretending to have let Lois escape his power he had gotten Reese to surrender his weapon.
But Lois stood facing him without firing. Sweat broke out on her face. She became deadly pale.
“Fire!” Tersen urged, speaking through her mouth. “Shoot him!”
“I—I can’t,” she said hesitantly. “I—love—him.”
The gun dropped from her hand. A moment later she fell in a crumpled heap at Reese’s feet.
There was no time to examine her. He snatched up the blaster, stepped over her fallen body and burst into the dome.
A purple blast of energy seared the air above him and blew a hole above the door. Instantly Reese dropped.
A compact, whirring pile of machinery confronted him—and, huddling behind an overturned bench, was Tersen aiming a blaster at him. Reese flattened himself against the floor.
Tersen fired and missed. Reese squeezed the stud of his own blaster and ashed part of the table behind which Tersen cowered.
He heard footsteps behind him. The colonists still under Tersen’s domination, were coming to their master’s aid.
“You’d better give up,” Tersen said. “They’ll tear you to pieces.”
Reese’s only reply was another bolt of energy that ripped away the wall above Tersen’s head. Tersen fired again; heat bathed Reese’s cheek.
The colonists were practically there now. He could hear them swarming up the path to aid Tersen. He fired again—
Squarely into the generator.
Livid blue flames flickered over the complex machinery for a moment. Tubes melted: connections shorted out. An agonized scream came from Tersen and he charged forward madly, blinded with rage.
Reese didn’t need to fire., He simply stepped into Tersen’s path and smashed him to the ground with a solid right. Then he turned and pumped his remaining three charges into the burning generator.
A moment later the colonists arrived—but not as Tersen’s rescurers, as his executioners. Reese got out of their way as the newly-freed colonists rushed in.
What was left of Tersen wasn’t pretty.
“It was awful,” Lois sobbed, outside. “I knew what he was planning to do and yet I couldn’t help myself. I was like a puppet on a string.”
“I know what it was like,” Reese said. “He had me under control a while too—until poor crazy Kuhli decided he liked the way my bracelet shone. But you did help yourself—you didn’t fire!”
“Yes,” the girl said weakly. “I struggled—and then somehow I won. I snapped his hold and collapsed. And then—and then—”
Reese smiled. “It’s all over now,” he said. “Tersen’s dead and his machine’s smashed. It had one flaw—it couldn’t control love.”
She looked up at him. “You won’t go away any more, will you, Jim?”
“That’s a silly question,” he said.
The Ambassador’s Pet
This diplomat had to be treated with kid gloves; my orders were dear on that. Trouble was my instructions from Earth didn’t cover—
I PICKED UP sealed orders at the Routing Desk of Space Service. They were addressed to Captain Johnny Martin of the spaceship 13-XV-1, which is my name and my ship.
They said:
Proceed to Aldebaran VII at once. You are to pick up an Aldebaranian ambassador and transfer him to Earth for high-level diplomatic talks.
You are to treat him with utmost courtesy. Relations between Earth and Aldebaran VII are in a very delicate state at this time.
The ambassador informs us he plans to bring a pet with him to Earth.
Pets, huh? I snorted a little and folded the orders away in my pocket. Well, I supposed it came in the line of duty. If they ordered me to ferry Aldebaranian pets, I’d ferry Aldebaranian pets. All in a day’s work, I told myself.
I stopped off and had a couple of beers before returning to the ship. Meersal, my First Officer, was waiting for me.
“Well? Pick up the orders?”
I nodded. “Yep. Got ’em right here.” I unfolded them and handed them over to him.
He ran his eyes over them quizzically. “Hokay,” he said. “I guess we go to Aldebaran, huh?”
Our instructions came in detail a little while later. We were to hover over Aldebaran VII and give a special signal; a transfer-tug would come up to us from the surface and hand the Ambassador and his pet over to us. Under no conditions were we to land on Aldebaran VII itself; the natives would regard it as a breach of the truce that currently existed between their world and ours.
Okay, I thought. I didn’t care. I gave the orders to the crew at nightfall and we left Earth a little past midnight. Meersal had already instructed the astrogator about our next destination and he had whipped up the course.
We did some hundred thousand miles on ion-drive and then, safely clear of the Earth’s grav-field, converted over and popped into warp. Aldebaran lay three weeks ahead of us through hyperspace.
Earth and Aldebaran had first contact about 10 years before. I didn’t know anything particular about the planet or its people—there are enough worlds in the galaxy so you don’t get to know each type of alien there is. We had a special cabin ready aboard the ship for the Aldebaranian ambassador and his pet. Instructions told us to prepare a special fluorine atmosphere, which meant the Aldebaranians couldn’t be much like us.
But they had agreed to negotiate a treaty of friendship with Earth and were sending an ambassador. That was good news, I thought.
We popped out of warp right on schedule and there was the giant hazy red sun that was Aldebaran, staring us right in the face. It seemed to fill the entire sky.
Our astrogator plotted a course rapidly for Aldebaran VII, which was then at perihelion and a good ways across the heavens from where we were. The Aldebaran system is a huge one—31 planets spread out over six or seven billion miles of space.
Most of them were dead worlds, though. It was only Aldebaran VII that had any sort of intelligent life, or so our survey teams reported.
IT TOOK THREE MORE to get within hailing distance of the seventh planet. It spun beneath us, a pretty blue-green ball about the size of Earth.
We came within about a million miles and set up an orbit as per instructions. No sooner had we done that than we found ourselves surrounded by a flock of alien warships.
I went to the radio room and made contact.
“State name and object here,” I was ordered in a crisp, businesslike voice.
“I’m Johnny Martin, Captain of the Terran vessel 13-XV-1, with no hostile intent. We’re here to pick up an ambassador from Aldebaran to Earth, along with his pet.”
I heard some hasty conferring going on and then someone said, “Hold on, Terran ship. We’ll check with the home planet.”
Five tense minutes passed—minutes in which I half expected to be blown out of the sky by a sudden attack. You never can tell with aliens. They’re likely to do almost anything; their psychologies are unpredictable in Terran terms—as, I guess, ours are in theirs.
But finally my receiver crackled and the alien voice said, “Everything is clear, X 13-XV-1. Remain in orbit and ambassador will he transferred to your ship. Any suspicious move on your part will bring immediate attack by our defense fleet.”
“Don’t worry. I’m not going any place. I’ll wait right here.”
I watched in the viewscope as a small ship bellied upward from the blue-green world below and approached us. They matched velocities with us, airlock to airlock.
“Get that fluorine room ready,” I ordered my men. “The Ambassador’s coming aboard.”
The two ships hung side by side in space. Of course, there was no apparent relative motion since we had the same velocity. It was possible to walk back and forth from their ship to ours.
“Prepare to receive Ambassador,” came the message from the other ship. “His excellency, Quelf Tharkol, Minister Plenipotenitary—and his pet.”
“I’m ready,” I said. “Our airlock’s open.”
Slowly the lock of the other ship slid back and two spacesuited figures appeared—the Ambassador, Quelf Tharkol, and his pet. The Ambassador was invisible within his spacesuit but he stood upright and looked to be about the size of a man. I was happy about that; it’s always a lot easier to negotiate with a humanoids-type alien than with something totally bizarre.
I chuckled when I saw the spacesuited cat—for so I thought of it. It was cat-size, in a little formfitting spacesuit, and it scampered after its master on four legs, spacesuited tail wagging behind. It was sort of a cute little thing, I thought; no wonder its master didn’t care to leave it behind.
“Everything all set?” I asked.
“Transfer is completed,” said the captain of the other ship. He closed his lock and pulled away from us.
“Close the lock!” I ordered.
I gestured to a crewman standing by. “Show the Ambassador to his room,” I said.
When the Ambassador and his pet were in their special fluorinated stateroom I called them on the special television hookup I had set up between them.
They had taken their spacesuits off and were lying sprawled out in their green murky atmosphere, the Ambassador in his bunk and the pet in his. I could hardly see into the room over my circuit but I could see that the Ambassador was very human and that the pet was pretty much like a cat, except that he had sharp-clawed fingers instead of the soft little pads a cat has.
“Everything all right in there?” Tasked.
“Fine, just fine. How long will it take to get to Earth?”
“About three weeks,” I said. “We’ll be going into warp any minute.”
“Very well,” came the reply.
I DIDN’T EXPECT to have many dealings with the Ambassador. I had been told that he would have his own food supply and naturally he was confined to his fluorinated stateroom. So we settled down to a pleasant return trip.
But on the second day of warp I was awakened from sweet dreams by Whitey Durbin, the Night Engineer. He shoved me around in my bunk until I opened one eye and said “Whatsamatter?”
“It’s the cat, Chief!”
