Collected Short Fiction

by C. M. Kornbluth

  “Then remember, Train, nothing . . . nothing . . . can stop the fungus. As you say, one false move nearer my building, and I release the culture.”

  “The false move is made, Hardy,” said Train, with steel in his voice. “In case your man hasn’t told you, the car has started. We are on our way.”

  He snapped off the transmitter.

  “What was that all about?” asked Hogan, his eyes on the road.

  “Just Hartly. He thinks he has a final stymie to work on me. Plans to release a kind of mold that eats away all organic matter. Fire cannot destroy or injure it, nor can chemicals. Once he releases it, it’ll spread through the world, attacking all live wood, grass, and animal life.”

  “Yeah? What are you going to do about it?”

  “Can’t you guess? Hartly still doesn’t realize that any power of his is just a joke so long as Independent Fourteen is in my hands. Pull up!”

  THE CAR SKIDDED to a halt before the building that housed World Research. “Take it out tenderly, husband mine,” said Ann. “It means a lot to me.”

  There was a rattling from the pocket wherein Train had thrust his frequency inductor. He took it out, held it to his ear.

  Hartly’s voice was dry by now. “The bluff’s never been pushed this far by any man, Train. This is your last chance. I’m looking down at you, and I have the fungus in my hand. Train, I’m ready to drop this bottle.”

  “Are you, now?” The scientist’s voice bespoke amusement. “And what am I supposed to do about it?”

  “Abandon your machine and walk into the building. I’ll see that you are taken care of rightly. You’ll not regret it if you choose to compromise; you will if you do not.”

  Train laughed. “For once, Hartly, I’m holding every ace in the deck. Drop your little toy and see how useless it is to you.”

  There was a long, tense pause. Hogan and Ann watched, but could see nothing. Train swiftly manipulated the little instruments on the control board. There was a little tinkle in the street near them.

  “There, Barney, there!” Ann screamed, pointing a trembling finger at a scarcely visible splotch of green. Train swung the pointer of the machine on it even as it exploded upward into a bomb of poisonous vegetation that rustled foully as it spread serpentine arms outward and up.

  Train slammed down the button that flung the machine into action, swept the pointer right and left as the tubes sputtered angrily.

  “Glory!” muttered Hogan. The fungus had suddenly been arrested and now stood etched in silvery metal.

  “Free metallic magnesium,” said Train. “It works on a large scale and with one hundred percent efficiency.”

  “Elements transmuted at will,” breathed Ann. “And nothing went wrong!”

  “And the machine will do—that—to anything?” demanded Hogan. “It has the Midas touch.”

  “That it has,” agreed the scientist, swinging the needle and shifting the slide. “And, unless I’m mistaken, those men mean us harm.”

  He swung the pointer against a squad of uniformed militia that were running from the huge doors of the building. The button went down, and the police went transparent, then gaseous. They vanished in puffs of vapor that sought the nearest solid.

  “Fluorine,” said Train quietly. “Those poor devils are just so much salt on the street and portico.”

  “Let’s go in,” said Ann. They walked into the lobby, treading carefully around the white crusts on the pavement.

  “Easy, Hogan,” warned Train as they pushed Independent Fourteen into an elevator under the eyes of the horrified attendant. “Take us to the Hartly floor,” he snapped at the latter, “and no harm will come to you. Otherwise . . .” He drew a sinister finger across his throat.

  The doors of the elevator rolled open and they carefully pushed the machine before them. “Come out, Hartly,” called Ann at the bronze doors to the inner office.

  “Come in and get me,” sounded from the frequency inductor in her hand. Resolutely they swung open the doors and marched in. Hartly was alone behind the desk. Quietly he lifted his hands, displayed two heavy pistols.

  “I haven’t been too busy managing my affairs to learn how to use these,” he remarked. “Stand away from that machine.”

  Train tensed himself to leap, flinging Fourteen into operation, but Ann touched his arm and he relaxed, stepped aside with her and Hogan.

  Hartly strode over and glanced at the machine. He set the slide absently. “How does it work?” he asked.

  “Red end of the pointer directs the beam. Slide determines the element required. Button on the left starts the operation.”

  “The red end?” asked Hartly smiling. “You would say that. I’ll try the black end first.” He aimed the black end at the little group of three, thus bringing the red end squarely on himself.

  “This button—” he began, pressing a thumb on it. But his words were cut short. A wild glare suffused his face as he brought up one of the pistols, but it fell from his hand, exploding as it hit the floor. He tried to speak, but a choking gasp was all his yellowing tongue could utter.

  “He didn’t trust ye,” said Hogan sadly. “He thought ye meant him evil when ye told him the simple truth about the machine’s operation. And that’s why Mr. Hartly is now a statue of the purest yellow gold. The beast must weigh a ton at least.”

  “Hartly’s never trusted anyone,” said Train. “I knew that he’d never take my word, so took a chance for all of us. Now he makes a very interesting statue.”

  “It’s horrible,” said Ann. “We’ll have them take it away.”

  “No,” replied Train. “It must stay here. There’s a new life beginning now—at last the youth will be free to work at what they want and the era of Syndicate regimentation is over.

  “Let that statue remain there—as a picture of the old order and as a warning to the new.”

  The Reversible Revolutions

  J.C. BATTLE, late of the Foreign Legion, Red Army, United States Marines, Invincibles De Bolivia and Coldstream Guards, alias Alexandre de Foma, Christopher Jukes, Burton Macauly and Joseph Hagstrom—ne Etzel Bernstein—put up his hands.

  “No tricks,” warned the feminine voice. The ample muzzle of the gun in his back shifted slightly, seemingly from one hand to another. Battle felt his pockets being gone through. “Look out for the left hip,” he volunteered. “That gat’s on a hair-trigger.”

  “Thanks,” said the feminine voice. He felt the little pencilgun being gingerly removed. “Two Colts,” said the voice admiringly, “a police .38, three Mills grenades, pencilgun, brass knuckles, truncheons of lead, leather and rubber, one stiletto, tear-gas gun, shells for same, prussic-acid hypo kit, thuggee’s braided cord, sleeve Derringer and a box of stink bombs. Well, you walking armory! Is that all?”

  “Quite,” said Battle. “Am I being taken for a ride?” He looked up and down the dark street and saw nothing in the way of accomplices.

  “Nope. I may decide to drop you here. But before you find out, suppose you tell me how you got on my trail?” The gun jabbed viciously into his back. “Talk!” urged the feminine voice nastily.

  “How I got on your trail?” exploded Battle. “Dear lady, I can’t see your face, but I assure you that I don’t recognize your voice, that I’m not on anybody’s trail, that I’m just a soldier of fortune resting up during a slack spell in the trade. And anyway, I don’t knock off ladies. We—we have a kind of code.”

  “Yeah?” asked the voice skeptically. “Let’s see your left wrist.” Mutely Battle twitched up the cuff and displayed it. Aside from a couple of scars it was fairly ordinary. “What now?” he asked.

  “I’ll let you know,” said the voice. Battle’s hand was twisted behind his back, and he felt a cold, stinging liquid running over the disputed wrist. “What the—?” he began impatiently.

  “Oh!” ejaculated the voice, aghast. “I’m sorry! I thought—” The gun relaxed and Battle turned. He could dimly see the girl in the light of the merc lamp far
down the deserted street. She appeared to be blushing. “Here I’ve gone and taken you apart,” she complained, “and you’re not even from Breen at all! Let me help you.” She began picking up Battle’s assorted weapons from the sidewalk where she had deposited them. He stowed them away as she handed them over.

  “There,” she said. “That must be the last of them.”

  “The hypo kit,” he reminded her. She was holding it, unconsciously, in her left hand. He hefted the shoulder holster under his coat and grunted. “That’s better,” he said.

  “You must think I’m an awful silly,” said the girl shyly.

  Battle smiled generously as he caught sight of her face. “Not at all,” he protested. “I’ve made the same mistake myself. Only I’ve not always caught myself in time to realize it.” This with a tragic frown and sigh.

  “Really?” she breathed. “You must be awfully important—all these guns and things.”

  “Tools of the trade,” he said noncommittally. “My card.” He handed her a simple pasteboard bearing the crest of the United States Marines and the legend:

  “LIEUTENANT J.C. BATTLE

  SOLDIER OF FORTUNE REVOLUTIONS A

  SPECIALTY”

  She stared, almost breathless. “How wonderful!” she said.

  “In every major insurrection for the past thirty years,” he assured her complacently.

  “That must make you—let’s see—” she mused.

  “Thirty years, did I say?” he quickly interposed. “I meant twenty. In case you were wondering, I’m just thirty-two years old.” He tweaked his clipped, military moustache.

  “Then you were in your first at—”

  “Twelve. Twelve and a half, really. Shall we go somewhere for a cup of coffee, Miss—er—ah—?”

  “McSweeney,” she said, and added demurely, “but my friends all call me Spike.”

  “CHINA? Dear me, yes! I was with the Eighth Route Army during the celebrated long trek from Annam to Szechuan Province. And I shouldn’t call it boasting to admit that without me—”

  Miss Spike McSweeney appeared to be hanging on his every word. “Have you ever,” she asked, “done any technical work?”

  “Engineering? Line of communication? Spike, we fighters leave that to the ‘greaseballs,’ as they are called in most armies. I admit that I fly a combat fighter as well as the next—assuming that he’s pretty good—but as far as the engine goes, I let that take care if itself. Why do you ask?”

  “Lieutenant,” she said earnestly, “I think I ought to tell you what all this mess is about.”

  “Dear lady,” he said gallantly, “the soldier does not question his orders.”

  “Anyway,” said Miss McSweeney, “I need your help. It’s a plot—a big one. A kind of revolution. You probably know more about them than I do, but this one seems to be the dirtiest trick that was ever contemplated.”

  “How big is it?” asked Battle, lighting a cigarette.

  “Would you mind not smoking?” asked the girl hastily, shrinking away from the flame. “Thanks. How big is it? World-scale. A world revolution. Not from the Right, not from the Left, but, as near as I can make out, from Above.”

  “How’s that?” asked Battle, startled.

  “The leader is what you’d call a scientist-puritan, I guess. His name’s Breen—Dr. Malachi Breen, formerly of every important university and lab in the world. And now he’s got his own revolution all planned out. It’s for a world without smoking, drinking, swearing, arguing, dancing, movies, music, rich foods, steam heat—all those things.”

  “Crackpot!” commented the lieutenant.

  She stared at him grimly. “You wouldn’t think so if you knew him,” said Spike. “I’ll tell you what I know. I went to work for him as a stenographer. He has a dummy concern with offices in Rockefeller Plaza and a factory in New Jersey. He’s supposed to be manufacturing Pot-O-Klutch, a device to hold pots on the stove in case of an earthquake. With that as a front, he goes on with his planning. He’s building machines of some kind in his plant—and with his science and his ambition, once he springs his plans, the world will be at his feet!”

  “The field of action,” said Battle thoughtfully, “would be New Jersey principally. Now, you want me to break this insurrection?

  “Of course!” agonized the girl. “As soon as I found out what it really was, I hurried to escape. But I knew I was being followed by his creatures!”

  “Exactly,” said Battle. “Now, what’s in this for me?”

  “I don’t understand. You mean—?”

  “Money,” said Battle. “The quartermaster’s getting shorthanded. Say twenty thousand?”

  The girl only stared. “I haven’t any money,” she finally gasped. “I thought—”

  “You thought I was a dilettante?” asked Battle. “Dear lady, my terms are fifty percent cash, remainder conditional on the success of the campaign. I’m sorry I can’t help you—”

  “Look out!” screamed the girl. Battle spun around and ducked under the table as a bomb crashed through the window of the coffee shop and exploded in his face.

  “OPEN your eyes, damn you!” growled a voice.

  “Stephen—the profanity—” objected another voice mildly.

  “Sorry, Doc. Wake, friend! The sun is high.”

  Battle came to with a start and saw a roast-beef face glowering into his. He felt for his weapons. They were all in place. “What can I do for you, gentlemen?” he asked.

  “Ah,” said the second voice gently. “Our convert has arisen. On your feet, Michael.”

  “My name is Battle,” said the lieutenant. “J.C. Battle. My card.”

  “Henceforth you shall be known as Michael, the Destroying Angel,” said the second voice. “It’s the same name, really.”

  Battle looked around him. He was in a kind of factory, dim and vacant except for himself and the two who had spoken. They wore pure white military uniforms; one was a tough boy, obviously. It hurt Battle to see how clumsily he carried his guns. The bulges were plainly obvious through his jacket and under his shoulder. The other either wore his more skillfully or wasn’t heeled at all. That seemed likely, for his gentle blue eyes carried not a trace of violence, and his rumpled, pure white hair was scholarly and innocent.

  “Will you introduce yourselves?” asked the lieutenant calmly.

  “Steve Haglund, outta Chi,” said the tough.

  “Malachi Breen, manufacturer of Pot-O-Klutch and temporal director of Sweetness and Light, the new world revolution,” said the old man.

  “Ah,” said Battle, sizing them up. “What happened to Miss McSweeney?” he asked abruptly, remembering.

  “She is in good hands,” said Breen. “Rest easy on her account, Michael. You have work to do.”

  “Like what?” asked the lieutenant.

  “Trigger work,” said Haglund. “Can you shoot straight?”

  In answer there roared out three flat crashes, and Battle stood with his smoking police special in his hand. As he reloaded he said, “Get yourself a new lathe, Dr. Breen. And if you’ll look to see how close together the bullets were—”

  The old man puttered over to Battle’s target. “Extraordinary,” he murmured. “A poker chip would cover them.” His manner grew relatively brisk and businesslike. “How much do you want for the job?” he asked. “How about a controlling factor in the world of Sweetness and Light?”

  Battle smiled slowly. “I never accept a proposition like that,” he said. “Twenty thousand is my talking point for all services over a six-month period.”

  “Done,” said Breen promptly, counting out twenty bills from an antiquated wallet. Battle pocketed them without batting an eyelash. “Now,” he said, “what’s my job?”

  “As you may know,” said Breen, “Sweetness and Light is intended to bring into being a new world. Everybody will be happy, and absolute freedom will be the rule and not the exception. All carnal vices will be forbidden and peace will reign. Now, there happens to be an enemy
of this movement at large. He thinks he has, in fact, a rival movement. It is your job to convince him that there is no way but mine. And you are at absolute liberty to use any argument you wish. Is that clear?”

  “Perfectly, sir,” said Battle. “What’s his name?”

  “Lenninger Underbottam,” said Breen, grinding his teeth. “The most unprincipled faker that ever posed as a scientist and scholar throughout the long history of the world. His allegedly rival movement is called ‘Devil Take the Hindmost.’ The world he wishes to bring into being would be one of the most revolting excesses—all compulsory, mark you! I consider it my duty to the future to blot him out!”

  His rage boiled over into a string of expletives. Then, looking properly ashamed, he apologized. “Underbottam affects me strangely and horribly. I believe that if I were left alone with him I should—I, exponent of Sweetness and Light!—resort to violence. Anyway, Lieutenant, you will find him either at his offices in the Empire State Building where the rotter cowers under the alias of the Double-Action Kettlesnatcher Manufacturing Corporation or in his upstate plant where he is busy turning out not only weapons and defenses but also his ridiculous Kettlesnatcher, a device to remove kettles from the stove in case of hurricane or typhoon.”

  Battle completed his notes and stowed away his memo book. “Thank you, sir,” he said. “Where shall I deliver the body?”

  “HELLO!” whispered a voice.

  “Spike!” Battle whispered back. “What are you doing here?” He jerked a thumb at the illuminated ground glass of the door and the legend, Double-Action Kettlesnatcher Manufacturing Corp., Lenninger Underbottam, Pres.

  “They told me where to find you.”

  “They?”

  “Mr. Breen, of course. Who did you think?”

  “But,” expostulated the lieutenant, “I thought you hated him and his movement.”

  “Oh, that,” said the girl casually. “It was just a whim. Are you going to knock him off?”

  “Of course. But how did you get here?”