No World of Their Own

by Poul Anderson

  “Yess. Two witaminss which seem to be lacking in Eart’ chemistry.” Saris drew diagrams on a sheet of paper. “Thesse iss the structural formulass in Langley’s symbology.”

  The spaceman re-drew them in modern terms, and Valti nodded. “They should be easy to synthesize. I have a molecule maker in my hideaway.” He tugged at his beard. “We must go there first, to make preparations for departure. I have a light-speed cruiser in a secret orbit. You’ll be put aboard that and sent to our base in the 61 Cygni system. That’s well outside the Solar and Centaurian spheres of influence. Then your abilities can be studied at leisure, sir, and your own payment rendered, Captain Langley.”

  Saris spoke up. He had his own bargain to make. He would co-operate if he was afterward returned to Holat with a crew of technicians and ample supplies. His world lay too far off to be in direct danger from the stars of this region, but some party of wandering conquistadors might happen on it—and Holat had no defenses against bombardment from space. That situation must be rectified. Armed robot satellites would not stop a full-dress invasion fleet—nothing would do that except possibly another fleet—but they would be able to dispose of the small marauding groups which were all that Holat really had to worry about.

  Valti winced. “Captain, does he realize what the bonuses for a trip of that length are? Does he know how much it would cost to set up those stations? Has he no sympathy for a poor old man who must face an audit of his books?”

  “’Fraid not,” said Langley with a grin.

  “Ah … what assurances does he want that we will keep our end of such an agreement?”

  “He’ll have control over your development of the nullifier—you can’t make it without him, both his empirical evidence and his theoretical knowledge—so that part’s taken care of. When he sees the project nearing the end, he’ll want your ships prepared for him, ready to go. And he’ll want a bomb planted on the one carrying him, under his control. Women and children will stay aboard while the work is being done for Holat, and at the first sign of treachery he’ll blow the whole thing up.”

  “Dear me!” Valti shook a doleful head. “What a nasty suspicious mind he has, to be sure. I should think one look at my honest face—Well, well, so be it. But I shudder to think what the expense is going to do to our cost accounting.”

  “Oh, hell, man, you can amortize that debt over 2000 years. Forget it. Now, where are we going first?”

  “We maintain a small hideaway in the Himalayas—nothing palatial; our tastes are humble. I must render a report to my chiefs on Earth, get their approval of the plan, and prepare documents for the Cygni office. It will only take a little while.”

  Langley went off to the ship’s sick bay. He’d taken a nasty gash in his leg, but treatment was routine these days: a clamp to hold the edges of the wound together, a shot of artificial enzymes to stimulate regeneration. In a few hours, the most radical surgery could be completely and scarlessly healed.

  Langley found Marin in the amidships saloon. He sat down beside her and took her hand. “It won’t be long now,” he said. “I think we’ve done what’s best—removed Saris’ power from the place where it could only cause destruction. Best thing for Sol, too. And now we’re bound on our own way.”

  “Yes.” She didn’t look at him. Her face was white, and there was a strained expression on it.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked anxiously. “Aren’t you feeling well?”

  “I—I don’t know, Edwy. Everything seems so odd, somehow, as if this were a dream.” She stared cloudily before her. “Is it? Am I sleeping somewhere and—”

  “No. What is the trouble? Can’t you describe it?”

  She shook her head. “It’s as if someone else were sharing my brain, sitting there and waiting. It came on me all of a sudden. The strain, I suppose. I’ll be all right.”

  Langley scowled. Worry gnawed at him. If she took sick …

  Just why was she so’ important to him? Was he falling for her? It would be very easy to do. Quite apart from her looks, she was brave and intelligent and witty. He could see himself spending a contented lifetime with her.

  Peggy … Jim … Bob … No, not her too. Not her, God, not again!

  There was a small jarring shock, and the engine drone died. Saris Hronna stuck his whiskered snout through the door. “We iss landed,” he announced. “Come out.”

  The ship lay cradled in a brightly lit cave; behind her was a huge concrete door which must lead to the mountain slope. It would be a high, wild land. There were probably snowfields and glaciers left here on the roof of the world—cold, windy, empty, a place where men could hide for years.

  “Have you any defenses?” asked Langley as Valti led the way past the hull.

  “No. Why should we? They would only add more metal to be detected from above. As it is, every possible thing here is made of plastic or stone. I am a peaceful man, Captain. I rely more on my cerebral cortex than my guns. In five decades, this lair has been unsuspected.”

  They entered a hall off which several doors opened. Langley saw what must be a radio room, presumably for emergency use only. Valti’s men wandered off toward their own quarters. They spoke little; the Society people seemed to frown on idle chatter between themselves. But they seemed quite relaxed. Why not? They were safe now. The fight was over.

  Marin jerked, and her eyes widened. “What’s the matter?” asked Langley. His voice sounded hoarse and cracked.

  “I—I don’t know.” She was trying not to cry. “I feel so strange.” Her eyes were unfocused, he saw, and she moved like a sleepwalker.

  “Valti! What’s wrong with her?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t know, Captain. Probably just reaction; it’s been a trying time for a person not used to conflict and suspense. Let’s put her to bed and I’ll get the ship’s doctor to take a look at her.”

  Langley’s victory crumbled in his hands.

  “Come, Captain,” said Valti, taking his arm. “Let’s go make up Saris Hronna’s vitamin pills, and after that you could probably use some sleep yourself. In twenty-four hours you’ll be out of the Solar System. Think of that.”

  They were working in’ the laboratory when Saris stiffened. “She goess by,” he said. “She iss walking been around and her mind feelss wery strange.”

  Langley ran out into the corridor. Marin stood looking at him with clearing eyes. “Where am I?” she said weakly.

  “Come on,” he answered. “Back to bed with you.”

  “I feel better,” she told him. “There was a pressing in my brain, everything went dark, and now I am standing here—But I feel like myself again.”

  The drugged glass stood untouched by her bunk. “Get that down,” said Langley. She obeyed, smiled at him and went to sleep. He resisted a desire to kiss her.

  Returning, he found Saris putting a flask of pills into a pouch hung about his neck. Valti was gone to do his paperwork, they were alone among the machines.

  “I feeled her mind clearing ewen ass I … listened,” said Saris. “Hass your race often such failingss?”

  “Now and then,” said Langley. “Gears slip. I’m afraid we aren’t as carefully designed as your people.”

  “You could be so. We kill the weaklingss young.”

  “It’s been done by my race, now and then, but the custom never lasted long. Something in our nature seems to forbid it.”

  “And yet you can desstroy a world for your own ambitionss. I shall newer undersstand you.”

  “I doubt we’ll ever understand ourselves.” Langley rubbed his neck and yawned. He ached with weariness, now that the stimulant had worn off. “To hell with it. I’m for some sack time.”

  He was wakened hours later by the crash of an explosion. As he sat up, he heard blasters going off.

  XII

  Another blowup shivered through walls and into Langley’s bones. Somebody screamed, somebody else cursed, and there were running feet in the corridors. As he tumbled into his clothes and snatch
ed his energy gun out, he wanted to vomit. Somehow they had failed.

  He flattened himself against the archaic manual door of the room given him and opened it a crack. There was a stink of burned flesh outside. Two gray-clad corpses sprawled in the passage, but the fight had swept past. Langley stepped out.

  There was noise up ahead of him, toward the assembly chamber. He ran in that direction with some blind idea of opening up on the attackers from behind. A bitter wind was clearing smoke away and he gasped for breath. A remote part of him realized that the entry port had been blown open and the thin mountain air was rushing in.

  Now—the doorway! He burst through, squeezing the trigger of his blaster. There was no recoil, but the beam hissed wide of the back he wanted. He didn’t know how to aim a modern gun, how to outwit a modern mind, how to do anything. Understanding of the technique came just as someone spun around on a heel and kicked expertly with the other foot. Langley’s blaster was torn loose, clattered to the floor, and he stared into a dozen waiting muzzles.

  Valti’s crew was gathered around Saris Hronna. Their hands were lifted sullenly; they had been overpowered in the assault and were giving up. The Holatan crouched on all fours, his eyes a yellow blaze.

  Brannoch dhu Crombar let out a shout of laughter. “So there you are!” he cried. “Greetings, Captain Langley!” He towered over the tight-packed fifty of his men. The scarred face was alight with boisterous good humor. “Come join the fun.”

  “Saris …” groaned the American.

  “Please.” Brannoch elbowed a way over to him. “Credit me with some brains. I had purely mechanical weapons made for half my party several days ago—percussion caps of mercury fulminate setting off a chemical explosion. Thunderish hard to shoot straight with ’em, but at close quarters we can fill you with lead and he’s powerless to stop it.”

  “I see.” Langley felt surrender rising in him, the buckling of all hope. “But how did you find us?”

  Marin entered. She stood in the doorway looking at them with her face congealed to a mask, the face of a slave.

  Brannoch jerked a thumb at her. “The girl, of course,” he said. “She told us.”

  Her inhuman composure ripped. “No!” she stammered. “I never—”

  “Not consciously, my dear,” said Brannoch. “But while you were under your final surgery, a posthypnotic command was planted by a conditioning machine. Very powerful, such an order—impossible to break it. If Saris was found, you were to notify me of the circumstances at the first opportunity. Which, I see, you did.”

  She watched him with a mute horror. Langley heard a thundering in his head.

  Very distantly, he made out the Centaurian’s rumble: “You might as well know, Captain. It was I who took your friends. They couldn’t tell me anything, and against my wishes they … died. I’m sorry.”

  Langley turned away from him. Marin began to weep.

  Valti cleared his throat. “A nice maneuver, my lord. Very well executed. But there is the matter of several casualties among my own people. I’m afraid the Society can’t permit that sort of thing. There will have to be restitution.”

  “Including Saris Hronna, no doubt?” Brannoch grinned without humor.

  “Of course. And reparations according to the weregild schedule set by treaty. Otherwise the Society will have to apply sanctions to your system.”

  “Withdrawal of trade?” snorted Brannoch. “We can do without your cargoes. And just try to use military force!”

  “Oh, no, my lord,” said Valti mildly. “We are a humane people. But we do have a large share in the economic life of every planet where we have offices: investments, local companies owned by us. If necessary, we could do deplorable things to your economy. It isn’t as rigid as Sol’s, you know. I doubt if your people would take kindly to … say … catastrophic inflation when we released several tons of the praseodymium which is your standard, followed by depression and unemployment when a number of key corporations retired from business.”

  “I see,” said Brannoch, unmoved. “I didn’t intend to use more force on you than necessary, but you drive me to it. If your entire personnel here disappeared without trace—I’ll have to think about it. I’d miss our gambling games.”

  “I’ve already filed a report to my chiefs, my lord. I was only waiting for their final orders. They know where I am.”

  “But do they know who raided you? It could be fixed to throw the blame on Chanthavar … Yes. An excellent idea.”

  Brannoch turned back to Langley. He had to grip the spaceman’s shoulder hard to attract his attention. “Look here,” he asked, “does this beast of yours speak any modern language?”

  “No,” said Langley, “and if you think I’m going to be your interpreter, you’ve got another think coming.”

  The heavy face looked pained. “I wish you’d stop considering me a fiend, Captain. I have my duty. I don’t hold any grudge against you for trying to get away from me. If you cooperate, my offer still stands. If not, I’ll have to execute you, and nothing will be gained. We’ll teach Saris the language and make him work anyhow. All you could do is slow us up a little.” He paused. “I’d better warn you, though. If you try to sabotage the project once it’s under way, the punishment will be stiff.”

  “Go ahead, then,” said Langley. He didn’t give a damn, not any more. “What do you want to say to him?”

  “We want to take him to Thor, where he’ll aid us in building a nullifier. If anything goes wrong through his doing, he’ll die, and robot ships will be sent to bombard his planet. They’ll take a thousand years to get there, but they’ll be sent. If, on the other hand, he helps, he’ll be returned home.” Brannoch shrugged. “Why should he care which party wins out? It’s not his species.”

  Langley translated into English, almost word for word. Saris stood quiet for a minute, then:

  “Iss grief in you, my friend.”

  “Yeah,” said Langley. “Reckon so. What do you want to do?”

  The Holatan looked thoughtful. “Iss hard to say. I hawe little choice at pressent. Yet from what I know of today’ss uniwerse, iss not best to aid Sol or Centauri.”

  “Brannoch has a point,” said Langley. “We’re just another race. Except for the Society offering you a little better deal, it doesn’t affect your people.”

  “But it doess. Wrongness in life, anywhere in all space, iss wrongness. Iss, for instance, chance that someday someone findss out a for traweling faster than light met’od. Then one race on the wrong pat’ iss a general menace. Also to itself, since other outraged planetss might unite to exterminate it.”

  “Well … is there anything we can do, now, except get ourselves killed in a fit of messy heroism?”

  “No. I see no out-way. That doess not mean none exists. Best to follow the scent ass laid, while snuffing after a new track.”

  Langley nodded indifferently. He was too sick of the whole slimy business to care much as yet. Let the Centaurians win. They were no worse than anybody else. “Okay, Brannoch,” he said. “We’ll string along.”

  “Excellent!” The giant shivered, as if with a nearly, uncontrollable exuberance.

  “You realize, of course,” said Valti, “that this means war.”

  “What else?” asked Brannoch, honestly surprised.

  “A war which, with or without nullifiers, could wreck civilization in both systems. How would you like, say, the procyonites to come take over the radioactive ruins of Thor?”

  “All life is a gamble,” said Brannoch. “If you didn’t load your dice and mark your cards—I know blazing well you do, tool—you’d see that. So far the balance of power has been pretty even. Now we will have the nullifier. It may tip the scales very far indeed, if we use it right. It’s not a final weapon, but it’s potent.” He threw back his head and shook with silent laughter.

  Recovering himself: “All right. I’ve got a little den of my own, in Africa. We’ll go there first to make preliminary arrangements—among other things,
a nice convincing synthetic dummy, Saris’ corpse, for Chanthavar to find. I can’t leave Earth right away, or he’d suspect too much. The thing to do is tip my hand just enough to get declared persona non grata, leave in disgrace—and come back with a fleet behind me!”

  Langley found himself hustled outside, onto a slope where snow crackled underfoot and the sky was a dark vault of stars. His breath smoked white from his mouth; breathing was keen and cold, and his body shuddered. Marin crept near him, as if for warmth, and he stepped aside from her. Tool!

  No … no, he wasn’t being fair to her, was he? She had not been responsible when she had betrayed him, with less will of her own than if someone had held a gun at her back. But he couldn’t look at her now without feeling unclean.

  A spaceship hovered just off the ground. Langley walked up the ladder, found himself a chair in the saloon and tried not to think. Marin gave him a glance full of pain and then took a seat away from the others. A couple of armed guards, arrogant blond men who must be Thorians themselves, lounged at the doors. Saris had been taken elsewhere. He was not yet helpless, but his only possible action would be the suicidal one of crashing the ship. And Brannoch seemed willing to chance that.

  The mountains fell away under their keel. There was a brief booming of sundered air, and then they were over the atmosphere, curving around the planet toward central Africa.

  Langley wondered what he was going to do with himself, all the remaining days of his life. Quite possibly Brannoch would establish him on some Earth-type world as promised. He wouldn’t see the war, but all his life there would be nightmares in which the sky tore open and a billion human creatures were burned, flayed, gutted and baked into the ground. And yet what else could he have done? He had tried and failed. Wasn’t it enough?

  No, said some distant New England ancestor in him.

  Time slipped by. He was getting so many minutes closer to his death, he thought wearily. Although Africa was on the dayside now, Brannoch’s ship went down. Langley supposed that something had been flanged up, fake recognition signals maybe, to get it by the sky patrols. There was a viewscreen, and he watched a broad river which must be the Congo. Neat plantations stretched in orderly squares as far as he could see, and scattered over the continent were medium-sized cities. The ship ignored them, flying low it reached a small cluster of dome-shaped buildings.