Treffry and Vinocur glanced at each other and laughed, more loudly than the remark called for, almost as if each were enjoying a private joke; Monte blinked in brief, bleary surprise at them as he turned to follow them off to the sleep tanks.
Five minutes later, Inspector General Mark Treffry heard the sharp click with which his sleeping tank sealed itself above him. He switched on the intercom connecting the three tanks. With no attendants left awake in the carrier, it was essential that he and his companions monitor one another through the steps required to ensure that they would awaken safely after the trip. Governor Vinocur acknowledged at once, and some seconds later, Dexter Monte also replied. The preparations were carried out, checked, and then Treffry settled back comfortably. He already felt a faint, not unpleasant numbness in legs and arms, which was the anesthetic’s first effect. By the time the sleep-cold touched him, he would not feel anything at all. But his mind was still awake and active; and the private joke which had made him laugh aloud a short while ago seemed too good now to keep to himself.
“Vinocur?” he said to the intercom.
“Yes, Treffry?” Vinocur’s voice responded.
“Before we drop off,” Treffry said, “I thought I’d thank you for a highly enjoyable experience.” He could hardly refrain from laughing again.
“You’re referring to your stay on Ridzin?” Vinocur asked politely. “We tried to make it as pleasant as possible, of course.”
“I’m sure you did!” And now Treffry did laugh, huffing and snorting helplessly for almost a minute before he was able to stop. He dabbed at his eyes, and sensed that the sleep-heaviness had “begun to edge into his hands.
“Why do you laugh, Treffry?” Vinocur’s voice asked.
That almost set Treffrey off again. But he choked the laughter down. If he kept giving way to it, he would be asleep before he made sure that whatever dreams came to Frank Vinocur during the long trip would not be pleasant ones. He said, “Let me tell you—”
While the Programmed Corps was being forged into a magnificent, automatically functioning weapon on Ridzin, it became obvious that its completion was awaited with as much anxiety as eagerness by a number of the worlds of the Terrestrial League. The question, of course, was who in the end would control it.
“We didn’t try to stop the plotting and bargaining that went on,” Treffry said. “And we didn’t become involved in it. We merely took measures to ensure that the central government and Great Xal would remain always one step ahead of the conspirators.”
“Conspirators?” Vinocur’s voice repeated carefully over the intercom.
“Hannaret and Lorcia from the beginning, naturally!” Treffry told him. “Then, during tie past two years, the governing body of Ridzin. We did our intelligence work thoroughly. Great Xal held the margin of power, so nothing else was needed. We could let the thing ripen.
“My dear fellow, that was what has made the final stages of this game so amusing! The ingenuity! The intricate patterns of deception! War fleets from Lorcia and Hannaret combining suddenly for ‘joint maneuvers’ in an open threat to Great Xal—and on Ridzin, in apparent desperation, ineffectual gestures at sabotage, including a series of attempted assassinations by mysteriously malfunctioning Programmed soldiers! They were not intended to succeed, of course; murdering me could not have held up the transfer of the Corps by a day. I imagine poor Ulbrand got killed by accident, or, more correctly, by the ineptness of his defenses.
“And to what end? Why, to divert our attention. Nothing more. To draw us away from the one plan which did, in fact, have a chance to succeed. But that plan has failed, too, Vinocur!”
Treffry paused a moment. When the intercom remained silent, he went on complacently. “The Hannaret warships which were to intercept and halt our carriers on their way to Great Xal have been allowed to take up position midway on our course. But they will be joined a few days from now by twice their number of central government ships. There will be no interception, Vinocur!
“And now, with the Programmed Corps to enforce its orders, Great Xal deals once and for all with the malcontent worlds! The Terrestrial League will be hammered into a unit. That is the corps’ only urgent and immediate task. Time enough later to turn to settling our score with the Skanders. Why we owe those obscene aliens some gratitude, as a matter of fact—if they hadn’t been such a visible threat to the League it would have been impossible to bring the Corps into existence. So now, as I bid you good-night, ‘General’ Vinocur, I shall leave it to you to picture for yourself the warm reception awaiting you on Great Xal!”
There was silence again for a moment. Then Vinocur said, “Treffry?”
“Yes?” Treffry said, pleased. He had not really expected Vinocur to reply.
“You omitted mentioning one of our diversion attempts,” the intercom told him.
“I did?” Treffry said. “What was that?”
“The interception of the carriers, of course! Too many people knew of that plan. It was almost inevitable that your intelligence would get wind of it.”
Treffry started to speak, checked himself, suddenly chilled.
“To stay one step ahead in this game,” Vinocur’s voice told him blandly, “that, as you’ve indicated, was the great necessity here. To bedazzle, mislead, confuse with a variety of elaborate schemes and dodges—when, all the time, only some very simple plan, one known to the fewest possible planners, could be successful. And that plan has succeeded, Treffry! To this moment only four men have known about it. You will now be the fifth.
“The Programmed Corps is not on its way to Great Xal, you see. Instead, the course of the carriers will take them to transspace stations on Hannaret.”
Impossible, Treffry thought in instant, scornful relief. What was the fellow attempting to accomplish with such a lie? Only Ulbrand and Monte—
“Ulbrand’s death,” Vinocur’s voice was continuing, “was no accident. He and Dexter Monte controlled the master programs of the carrier fleet’s computers. We had to get Ulbrand out of the way.”
“Ridiculous!” Treffry realized he had shouted, his voice thick and distorted, wondered briefly whether it was the anesthetic which made his mouth feel numb and stiffened now—or fear. “Monte!” he shouted again at the intercom.
Some seconds passed silently, as Vinocur, too, waited for Dexter Monte to respond.
“MONTE!” Treffry bellowed once more. Slurred, mumbling noises issued from the speaker then, followed by a heavy belch.
“I couldn’t answer at once,” Dexter Monte explained in a weak, complaining voice. “I had to pull myself together. I don’t feel at all well! If you two hadn’t made me swallow those atrocious alcoholic concoctions—” He muttered indistinctly, added, “What is it?”
“You heard what that fool was saying?” Treffry demanded.
“You needn’t speak so loudly!” Monte protested. “Yes, I heard him.”
“Well?”
“Oh, I agreed almost a year ago to program the carriers to go to Hannaret when the time came. Is that what you want to know? It’s true enough. They guaranteed me wealth, power, influence. The usual approach. Including direct blackmail, I must say! Ulbrand, incidentally, wasn’t so stupid. I had to loosen his defenses to let the assassin get to him.” Dexter Monte belched explosively, groaned in polite dismay. “Excuse me, gentlemen! Your infernal alcohol . . .”
Vinocur was laughing now. Treffry’s thoughts seemed to whirl in confusion. Then he remembered something. He snorted.
“Monte, you’re a miserable coward and a monstrous liar!” he stated. “I can believe they blackmailed you into agreeing to do what they wanted. But you’re safe from them now, so you can give up the pretense! Because of course you didn’t go through with it.”
Vinocur abruptly stopped laughing. “He went through with it!” he growled.
Treffry chuckled. “He couldn’t, Vinocur! He simply couldn’t! Monte, like every other key man brought to Ridzin, was put through secret security tests once a
month—and I supervised that operation—always. So Monte couldn’t have harbored any real intentions to betray us. No human mind can deceive the testing machines . . . eh, Monte?”
Monte wearily mumbled a sentence or two.
“What did you say, Monte? Speak up!”
“I said I agree with you.” Dexter Monte’s voice was distinct again but quite faint. He sighed. “No human mind can deceive the testing machines.”
Treffry swallowed with difficulty. The anesthetic definitely was affecting his tongue and throat now. “Are you listening, Vinocur?” he demanded. “So the Programmed Corps isn’t going to Hannaret, is it, Monte?”
“No,” Monte said. He added peevishly, “But you gentlemen must excuse me now! I really can’t keep myself together any longer.”
“Treffry—” Vinocur’s voice had thickened, sounded heavily slurred.
“Yes?”
“Ask him—ask him whether the Programmed Corps is . . . going to Great Xal.”
“What?”
“We . . . had him on . . . testing machines, too, Treffry!”
A monstrous thought swam up slowly in Treffry’s mind.
“Monte!” he cried. “Monte!”
Odd watery whistling noises responded for some seconds from the intercom. Nothing else.
Could it be? Could the most awesome weapon ever devised, the irresistable Programmed Corps, be hurtling now, not toward Great Xal but, out of control, toward some immensely distant point in space? From which it presently would return, under new instructions, to wipe out the race which had created it?
“Monte!” This time, only Treffry’s mind formed the word. The sound that came from his mouth was a heavy groan—the cold-sleep process was moving along its irreversible course. Moaning noises in the intercom indicated Vinocur was experiencing similar difficulties. Treffry’s thoughts began to swirl in slow and awful confusion, revolving about one fact repeatedly mentioned in the speeches that day: the Skanders’ repulsive amebic quality, their ability to force themselves out of their basic shape into another of their choosing and to maintain it for an indefinite period . . .
Perhaps for as long as fifteen or twenty years? Long enough to—
That thought, all thought, faded. The moaning in the intercom went on for almost another minute. Then it, too, stopped. In a silence which would remain unbroken for many months the great carrier fleet rushed toward its destination.
AURA OF IMMORTALITY
Better by far to enter a den of serpents than a scientist’s laboratory uninvited!
COMMISSIONER Holati Tate had been known to state on occasion that whenever there was a way for Professor Mantelish to get himself into a mess of trouble, Mantelish would find it.
When, therefore, the Commissioner, while flicking through a series of newscasts, caught a momentary view of Mantelish chatting animatedly with a smiling young woman he stopped the instrument instantly, and with a touch of apprehension spun it back to locate the program in question. The last he had heard of Mantelish, the professor had been on a government-sponsored expedition to a far-off world, from which, the Commissioner had understood, he would not be returning for some time. However, Commissioner Tate had just got back to Maccadon from an assignment himself; for all he knew Mantelish might have changed his plans. Indeed, it would seem he had.
He caught the program again, clicked it in. One good look at the great, bearlike figure and the mane of thick white hair told him it was indeed his old friend Mantelish. The dainty lady sitting across the table from Mantelish was a professional newscaster. The background was the Ceyce spaceport on Maccad on. The professor evidently had just come off his ship.
His sense of apprehension deepening, Commissioner Tate began to listen sharply to what was being said.
PROFESSOR Mantelish ordinarily was allergic in the extreme to newscasters and rebuffed their efforts to pump him about his projects with such heavy sarcasm that even the brashest did not often attempt to interview him on a live show. On the other hand he was highly susceptible to pretty women. When a gorgeous little newshen spotted him among the passengers coming off a spaceliner at Ceyce Port and inquired timidly whether he would answer a few questions for her viewers, the great scientist surprised her no end by settling down for a friendly fifteen-minute chat during which he reported on his visit to the little-known planet of the Tang from which he had just returned.
It was a fine scoop for the little newshen. Professor Mantelish’s exploits and adventures were a legend in the Hub and he was always good copy—when he could be persuaded to talk. On this occasion, furthermore, he had something to tell which was in itself of more than a little interest. The Tang—who could be called a humanoid species only if one were willing to stretch a number of points—had been contacted by human explorers some decades before. They tended to be ferociously hostile to strangers and had a number of other highly unpleasant characteristics; so far little had become known of them beyond the fact that they were rather primitive creatures living in small, footloose tribes on a cold and savage planet.
Professor Mantelish, however, had spent several months among them, accompanied by a team of specialists with whose help he had cracked the language barrier which previously had prevented free communication with the Tang. He had made copious recordings of their habits and customs, had even been permitted to bring back a dead Tang embalmed by freezing as was their practice. From the scientific viewpoint this was a very valuable specimen, since the Tang appeared to die only as a result of accident, murder, or in encounters with ferocious beasts. They did not suffer from diseases and had developed a means of extending their natural life span almost indefinitely . . .
The young newscaster latched on to that statement like a veteran. Wide-eyed and innocent she slipped in a few leading questions and Mantelish launched into a detailed explanation.
It had taken some months before he gained the confidence of the Tang sufficiently to induce them to reveal their secret: they distilled the juice of a carefully tended and guarded plant through an involved procedure. The drug they obtained in this way brought about a reversal of the normal aging process so that they retained their youthful health and vigor for a length of time which, though it had not been precisely determined, the Tang regarded as “forever”.
COULD this drug, the little newswhen asked, perhaps be adapted for human use?
Mantelish said he could not be definite about that, but it seemed quite possible. While the Tang had not let the members of his expedition know what plant they cultivated for the purpose, they had obligingly presented him with several liters of the distilled drug for experimentation which he had brought back with him. Analysis of the drug while still on the Tang planet had revealed the presence of several heretofore unknown forms of protein with rather puzzling characteristics; the question was whether or not these could be reproduced in the laboratory. To settle the question might well take a number of years—it could not of course be stated at present what the long-term effect of the drug on human beings would be. It was, however, apparently harmless. He and several other members of his group had been injected with significant quantities of the drug while on the planet, and had suffered no ill effects.
Big-eyed again, the newscaster inquired whether this meant that he, Professor Mantelish, was now immortal?
No, no, Mantelish said hastily. In humans, as in the Tang, the effects of a single dose wore off in approximately four months. To retain youth, or to bring about the gradual rejuvenation of an older body, it was necessary to repeat the dosage regularly at about this interval. The practice of the Tang was to alternately permit themselves to age naturally for about ten years, then to use the drug for roughly the same length of time or until youthfulness was restored.
To protect both the Tang and their miracle plant from illegal exploitation, the Federation, following his initial report on the matter, was having the space about the planet patrolled. What the final benefits of the discovery to humanity would be was still open to question.
It was, however, his personal opinion that the Tang drug eventually would take its place as a very valuable addition to the various rejuvenation processes currently being employed in the Hub . . .
“The old idiot!” Commissioner Holati Tate muttered to himself. He swung around, found a redheaded young woman standing behind him, large, gray eyes intently watching the screen. “Did you hear all that, Trigger?” he demanded.
“Enough to get the idea,” Trigger said. “I came in as soon as I recognized the profs voice . . . After those remarks, he’d be safer back among the Tang! He doesn’t even seem to have a bodyguard around.”
Commissioner Tate was dialing a ComWeb number. “I’ll call the spaceport police! They’ll give him an escort. Hop on the other ComWeb and see his home and lab are under guard by the time he gets there.”
“I just did that,” Trigger said.
“Then see if you can make an emergency contact with that newscaster female before Mantelish strays off . . .”
Trigger shook her head. “I tried it. No luck! It’s a floating program.”
She watched the final minute and a half of the newscast, biting her lip uneasily, while the Commissioner made hasty arrangements with the spaceport police. To hear Professor Mantelish blabbing out the fact that he might have the answer to man’s search for immortality in his possession was disconcerting. It was an open invitation to all the criminal elements currently on Maccadon to try to get it from him. The prof simply shouldn’t be allowed to wander around without tactful but efficient nursemaiding! Usually, she or Holati or somebody else made sure he got it, but they’d assumed that on a Federation expedition he’d be kept out of jams . . .
When the Commissioner had finished, she switched off the newscast, said glumly, “You missed something, Holati. Mantelish just showed everybody watching on umpteen worlds the container he’s got that drug in!”
Complete Short Fiction (Jerry eBooks) Page 259