She looked at him from the side of her eyes, a mocking quality still there.
Ronny said dryly, “Like magic, isn’t it? On Mother Earth, a lowly Interplanetary News reporter, sneaking into places she’s not wanted. Being grabbed, manhandled, mauled, battered around, and then memorywashed. But now a veritable princess, the niece of the Supreme Commandant.”
“What! Manhandled, mauled, battered around! Who dared?”
He looked at her as though in surprise. “Oh. That’s right, you wouldn’t remember.”
She had stopped. Now she stood there, fists on boyishly slim hips, glaring at him. “You… you…” Then she caught his grin.
“Ha!” she snapped. “The last time you told me I had a bottle of guzzle, was drenched, and in trouble with a traffic coordinator.”
He continued to grin, the mockery was in his face now.
She spun and marched on. “Someday, I’m going to find out what happened to me during that twenty-four hours,” she snarled. “And when I do…”
They reached a wide entryway which led off toward the gates down the ramp. Rita snapped something to one of the guards, who then spoke into a screen set in the wall. In moments, a low slung auto-car approached them. It was a two seater, and Rita slid under the controls. She dropped the manual lever and took the stick, waiting for him.
Ronny got in beside her and they started down the ramp. He said, “I’ve got an official car waiting for me at the main gate.”
“Let them follow. I want to talk to you.”
“All right. My suite’s at the United Planets Building.”
When they passed the UP limousine with the marines, he gestured to them to follow.
Rita said, “What did you think of Uncle Max?”
“Uncle Max? Oh, the Baron.”
“Maximilian, and a whole lot of other names and titles.”
Ronny said warily, looking out over the countryside, “He surprised me.” This whole area had been landscaped, all the way to the city. Phrygia evidently spared no expense in aggrandizing her Supreme Commandant.
She said, conversationally, “Have you ever noticed the extent to which man can delude himself when considering persons of whom he doesn’t approve?”
“Such as strongmen?” he said dryly.
“Exactly. Evidently, few consider that men such as Alexander didn’t stand alone. Actually, he was the leader of a team. A team of military and political geniuses so capable that they were able to pull down the world’s greatest empire. Men like Parmenion, Ptolemy, Antipater, Antigonus, Seleucus and all the Companions. Can you see the charm he must have radiated, the strength, the ability to draw men of great capability into his service? He must have indeed been like a god. Or Napoleon. Can you imagine the personality that man must have had, the charm, to draw together his team? Men like Ney, Marat, Bernadotte, Lannes, Soult and Massé na.”
She shook her head so that the ponytail she affected flounced back and forth. “No, Ronny Bronston, your strongmen of history weren’t dark villains with a mean glint in eye and dastardly deeds in mind. They were men of exceeding charm and strength, and they became strongmen because of their superiority.”
“How does Hitler fit into this theory?” Ronny said mildly.
“He’s come down to us as the arch villain of all time. And I have no doubt that his victims saw him in that light. But his immediate team evidently worshipped him. Even men of the caliber of Churchill admitted his personal charm, his strength of personality. Without it, he would never have swayed the people as he did.”
They were proceeding toward the capital city at full tilt now, the marines in the car behind having their work cut out trying to keep up with the speedy two seater the girl drove.
Ronny looked over at her, not failing to note the spray of freckles dusted over her slightly upturned nose. “You seem to have read up quite a bit on history, especially the history of strongmen.” He paused, before adding, “Could it be because you see another strongman, Uncle Max, coming along?”
“Obviously, Ronny Bronston. And I want to be part of his team. Don’t you?”
Ronny said, “I thought I’d think about it a bit. I don’t change coats as easily as all that.”
She slowed the car’s pace a trifle and put a hand on his sleeve. She said, an element of inspiration in her voice, “Of course you don’t. But man has come as far as he can, Ronny, along the path as it is now. We need a strongman. What a glorious race we could become, if, under the banner of Maximilian Wyler, we united to march together into the future.”
^What future?”
“Eventually, the complete domination of the galaxy, no matter what other life forms we run into as we progress.”
“That’s quite an order,” Ronny said mildly.
“Don’t be silly. I don’t mean within our lifetimes. But only that can be the eventual destiny of man.”
Ronny said, “Suppose I granted that the race could use a strongman along here, a man on horseback, as the term goes. What leads you to believe that Uncle Max is the man?”
She frowned at him. “But isn’t that obvious? If he isn’t, he’ll never form his team, he’ll never come to power. History is strewn with the wrecks of would-be strongmen, who didn’t really have what was required.”
He nodded agreement. “You’re right, there. If Baron Wyler isn’t the man he thinks himself, he’ll land on the rocks, too.”
She drew up before the UP Building and brought the vehicle to a halt, although without setting it down. Her hand was on his arm again.
“Think it over, Ronny. My uncle evidently wants you on his team.”
“All right,” he said. “I’m thinking. Thanks for the ride.” He turned and taking two levels at a time, started up the stone steps. He didn’t turn when he heard her sporter whisk away from the curb.
In the small apartment which had been assigned him, he immediately went to his bag. He brought forth a small object looking something like a woman’s compact or a cigar case. He sat down at the table and propped it before him, activating it.
“Phil Birdman,” he clipped out. “Soonest.”
Birdman’s mahogany face faded into the miniature screen. “I’ve been waiting for you to call.”
“Get over here,” Ronny rapped. “I’m at the UP.”
“Right.” The Indian’s face faded.
Ronny said, “Irene Kasansky. Soonest.”
Irene’s perpetually harrassed face faded in, and twisted into her version of a smile, when she saw who it was. “Hi, Ronny, what’s the urgency?”
“I’ve got to talk to the Old Man, immediately.”
“No can do. Another big conference. He’s browbeating fifty or more presidents, kings, patriarchs and what not.”
“Give me Sid, then. And let the chief know I have to talk to him.”
“All right, but Supervisor Jakes is busy, too.”
Sid Jakes faded in, grin wreathed as usual. “Ronny! Plenipotentiary Extraordinary! Frankly, in spite of that imposing tag, I thought the Baron’d have you into his deepest dungeon by now.”
“Knock it!” Ronny clipped. “This is highest emergency. Everybody, but everybody, has been underestimating Uncle Max.”
Sid Jakes’ eyes widened slightly and his grin was a bit less bright. Not even in the seemingly lax Section G did an agent customarily tell Ross Metaxa’s right-hand man to shut.
“Who?” he asked.
Ronny briefed him on what had transpired.
The feisty Section G supervisor ran a hand over his mouth thoughtfully. “Hmmm. I wonder how it’d work out if you told the Baron you’re signing up with him? Then we’d have you on the inside of his organization.”
Ronny said plaintively, “I keep telling you, this Wyler is no cloddy. The moment I told him that, he’d slip me some Scop, just to see if I was lying. Then, when he found out my passion for him and his ambitions wasn’t exactly overwhelming, he’d see I had a few holes blasted in me.”
Sid said, “Yeah. Possibly, w
e’d better pull you out of there, Ronny. When you turn him down, the Baron isn’t going to be very happy about the fact that he’s revealed so much to you.”
“You can’t pull me out,” Ronny said. “There’s nobody else here but Phil Birdman, and the Baron is about to send his expedition to the Dawnworlds. If it succeeds, and he gets some of those ultra-ultra devices the Dawnmen have, the fat’s really in the fire. That matter converter. If I get a clear picture, with it he could duplicate himself a fleet of space cruisers that would outnumber everything UP has combined.”
“You have no idea where these Dawnworlds—where in Zen did that name ever come from?—are located?”
“None at all. The Baron learned through some of the things his people found on the little aliens’ planets.”
Jakes muttered, for once unsmiling, “Without coordinates, it could take us a millenium looking.” He looked up again. “Listen, I’ll get to Ross. Call you back.”
While he had been talking, Phil Birdman had entered the room. Ronny deactivated the Section G communicator and turned to his colleague.
The Indian said, “Well, at least, you’re still with us.”
“But how long that will be, I couldn’t guarantee,” Ronny told him.
The older agent sank into an auto-chair and dialed. “Pseudo-whiskey?” he asked. “I have a sneaking suspicion I’m going to need a bit of firewater before I’ve heard all your story.”
They’d got through two highballs apiece before Ronny had finished bringing him up to date.
When he had ended, Birdman grunted. “There’s only one answer,” he submitted.
“What?”
“Let’s go down to the recruiting station and join up with Uncle Max.”
“Oh great, you overgrown funker. Funnies, I get.”
The communicator hummed. Ronny went over to the desk, sat down before it and activated the device. It was Ross Metaxa, at least as rumpled and weary as usual. He minced no words.
“That madman is taking a gamble, in his bid for power, that could destroy us all. Our big chance was to put off for as long as possible first contact with these aliens. To stall for time. Now he’s planning to set down on one of their planets, right now—to make immediate contact. He’s drivel-happy! Well, there’s nothing for it. Ronny, find out where those damned Dawnworlds are located.”
“Yes, sir. How?”
“How in the devil would I know? You and Agent Birdman are there. I’m not. The nearest other agents to Phrygia are a good week’s trip away. It’s all in your lap.”
Ronny Bronston looked at him.
His ultimate superior looked back, his eyes level.
On an impulse, Ronny blurted, “Was my becoming a Section G agent an engineered deal, not of my own choosing?”
The moist eyes looked deeply into his own, without flicker. “Yes.”
Ronny took a deep breath.
Ross Metaxa said, “Report through Irene as soon as you have anything.” His face faded.
Ronny turned to Phil Birdman, who had come up behind him to listen in on the conversation, but had missed even the final sentences. “You better dial us another drink, Phil. We’re going to need it.”
Phil, his expression passive, got the drinks, then sat down across from Ronny Bronston.
Ronny said slowly, “Phil, the Baron’s working on a full time basis on this project. That means somewhere, on or very near his person, is the information we need—the location of the Dawnworlds.”
The Indian said nothing.
Ronny said slowly, “Phil, the Baron isn’t quite as well informed on Section G as he’d like to think he is. There’re a few little items that come out of the gimmick department that—I’m willing to bet my life—he hasn’t heard about.”
Phil Birdman put down his glass.
Ronny said, “Phil, one of us has got to go in.”
“You mean…” The older man ran his tongue over suddenly dry lips. He said, his tone a blend of protest and apology, “I’m forty-five, Ronny. There aren’t many of the good years left.”
“Metaxa would undoubtedly retire you immediately, on full pay, of course.”
The other said slowly, “I don’t want to retire. I like this work. Some day I look forward to making supervisor.”
Ronny said, “All right. I’m only thirty-two.”
Birdman looked up at him, his handsome Indian face working. “It’s fifteen years off your life, Ronny.”
Ronny Bronston nodded, a weary aspect in the gesture. “When I joined up with Section G, I figured I was expendable. This isn’t as bad as copping a slug from some secret police goon on some backward planet, where we’re trying to upgrade their government, or some such.”
He thought of something and said, “By the way, Phil. How’d you get into Section G? What led you to apply?”
“Oh, I didn’t. Sid Jakes looked me up one day while I was still living back on Piegan. I was in the local police. We jawed around a little and before I knew it, I was in.”
“Kind of got jockeyed in, eh?” Ronny said bitterly.
Phil looked at him. “I wouldn’t put it that way.”
Ronny got up and went over to the order box on the desk. He said into it, “I want the biggest whale of a meal you can concoct. Very concentrated, rich food, high calorie content.”
Later, they retraced the route the marines had driven him earlier in the day. Phil Birdman was driving now, his own speedy hovercar.
Ronny was pensive. He said, after a long silence, “How close do you figure we can get? That’s important. It’ll cut time.”
Phil said thoughtfully, “On that diagram you drew: You know that ramp this Rita Daniels mopsy took you to, when you were leaving the palace?”
“Yes, sure.”
“I can take you to the top of that.”
“I think that’s the private entry of the Supreme Commandant and his family.”
“I know. As soon as I get to the top, they’ll order me to drive down again. That’s perfect for us. Every split second can count, Ronny. It could be seventeen or eighteen years, you know…”
Ronny Bronston said nothing. For that matter, it had been known to be twenty. Beyond that point, you inevitably died. You starved to death.
The hovercar bore diplomatic identification. The guards did no more than present their spears in a salute as they roared through the palace gates. Phil Birdman kept up a good speed. Not so high as to be conspicuous, but fast enough that their faces were unlikely to be spotted.
They got to the foot of the ramp and started up.
“You’d better take it,” the Indian said tightly, from the side of his mouth.
Ronny took a syrette from a small compartment in the dash and pushed it home in the back of his neck. He reached immediately for some of the energy pills.
Things were jerking frantically by the time they reached the head of the ramp and the entrada there—jerking frantically and already beginning to slow up.
A guard officer moved sluggishly toward them, more sluggish still. As he approached the car, his mouth, slowly, slowly, began to open. But before sound issued forth, he had stopped completely, one foot held in the air, his body in such position that it seemed impossible for him not to fall forward, out of balance.
Ronny Bronston vaulted over the side of the car and darted into the interior. He had done this but once before, in training, and had been under for less than ten seconds, pseudo-time. But this was the real thing. He darted a hand into his jacket pocket and gulped down more pep pills.
All was frozen.
He had no time to waste observing the utterly fantastic phenomenon. The world had stopped .
X
He retraced the route Rita Daniels had brought him along only a few hours earlier, dodging around the frozen statues that had—moments before—been soldiers and officials, clerks and secretaries, in all their bustling activities.
He came to the private elevator that led into the depths that housed the apartments of the Supr
eme Commandant. This was his first serious barrier. There was no manner in which he could operate the machinery, nor any other machine, save the equipment he carried.
He whipped out a laser gun, flicked the stud to cut and began beaming a hole through the elevator shaft door. Pure luck was involved now. He grabbed the door handle, and when he had largely cut the door away, pulled it toward him. It was a fantastically thick door. Evidently, Phrygia security took care that it was not easy to get at their Supreme Commandant.
Finally, the door began to fall toward him, slowly, sluggishly, but sped up by the effort he was exerting. It was as though he were pulling it through water, or even a thicker fluid. Before it had half reached the floor, he gave up his efforts and peered into the shaft beyond.
Luck was with him. Built into the metal wall of the shaft were ladder steps, obviously meant for repairmen, and possibly as a last method of emergency exit from the quarters below in case of some extreme disaster.
He vaulted over the falling door, now arrested in its drop, and scurried down the ladder.
Ronny tried to remember how long it had taken him to get down to the Baron’s apartments, when he had been there before, and couldn’t. This was the crucial thing. If the other maintained his rooms five or ten stories down, that was one thing. If they were a hundred stories, that was disaster. He would starve to death in this shaft.
Which brought his needs to mind. He darted a hand into one of his pockets for another handful of energy pills, even as he descended.
Luck was with him still.
His feet hit the top of the elevator cab.
He pulled the gun again, even as he gobbled pep pills, and cut a hole through the top of the elevator cage. He jumped on the circular, cut away a section so that it would fall. As soon as it had fallen sufficiently for him to jump off onto the elevator cage floor, he did so, and turned the gun to the door, cutting that away, too.
Ronny pushed hard against the great inertia, forcing the door inward into the room beyond. He wedged himself through as soon as there was sufficient way.
He was within the Baron’s apartments. Now he needed fortune’s kiss, indeed. Suppose the Baron wasn’t here. Suppose, even though he was, he didn’t have the information on him. Suppose he did have it, but in such form that it was impossible to decipher.
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