“Only one, and that a minor one. Only a few thousand inhabitants.”
“Must be a lot of Strumbermians in the galaxy.”
“A very lot. And they will do well enough as long as they can trick your kind into joining them.”
“They haven’t tricked mine yet!”
“Yes, they have. Fortunately, my action brought the police in time to save you from your folly.”
“Qumax, you brat—” But then Crog stopped the vehicle next to the needle-shaped police craft. The cab lowered; the steps came out and down. Nancy, Qumax and I got out. Qumax almost fell. He was still weak from the beating he had received. This time I did, in spite of myself, feel sorry for him, and I helped him down.
The cab elevated. The machine walked off at a good wind-bucking speed. So long, Crog, you smile-less excuse for a humanoid! I fired at him.
Farewell, Mobile-Face, Sucker!
We entered the empty police ship. We humans sat on small seats while Qumax stretched himself on a longer one. He groaned from the bruises he still had.
The lock shut. A light-colored gas infiltrated the compartment, making my head swim.
“Breathe deeply,” Qumax advised. “When we wake up we’ll be on Jamborango. And we’ll be much recovered, physically and mentally and emotionally.”
I doubt it, I thought, and realized that I was unreasonably scared.
“Have no fear, Harold Prodkins. You will not be allowed to die until you have stood trial—and even then, maybe not.”
I saw that Nancy’s eyes were glazed. It occurred to me that there was something unpleasantly suggestive about the way Qumax had phrased that. I wanted to think, but—
I felt the ship lurch under me. I drew a deep breath, not able to help myself. I let it out, seemingly only seconds later, and as I looked out the port I realized that the worm had known what he was talking about.
The streets looked like silver and the creatures using them were of every shape and color imaginable. Certainly this was not Strumbermia Six-O-Five.
Qumax was already opening the exit-port, Nancy beside him. The worm’s motions were vigorous, and he had no bruises or cuts; Nancy’s uniform was whole again. And I felt much better myself. As though it were the flick of a trebvee scene shift, our situation had changed. Instead of ending a grueling adventure, we were beginning one.
Well, such was Inner-Galactic technology. I joined them at the door.
The scene was a view from inside a kaleidoscope, and my senses reeled at even beginning to grasp it. I saw that our ship had landed in a cleared area somewhere in the heart of a great city, and I saw that there were streets going by on all sides, and they were stretched out overhead in loops and spirals and arches. I saw fantastically gossamer-winged creatures hovering everywhere, hardly needing the streets, and I marveled at their beauty. These could not be native Jams, for they were unlike Qumax.
“There’s Nitti, our old Earth host,” said Qumax. I followed the indication of his tentacles and spotted Warden Nitti. He stood on a podium not far out from our ship. He was, I swear, a thousand feet tall!
“It’s a projection of some kind,” Nancy said. “Something like our solidifilms—isn’t it, Qumax?”
“Closer to trebvee,” Qumax said. “It is being broadcast—to civilized cities throughout the galaxy.”
“Then he’s not here.” Momentarily I felt relief that I did not have the opportunity to destroy the traitor. “Or is he on this world?”
“He’s here in this city. This is the Jamborango capital.”
I stared at the towering projection. Nitti and his jowly face rotated toward us. He was dressed in an exact duplicate of his dress uniform, complete with cummerbund and Jupegas gun. He looked, I was forced to admit, just about the way a successful prison warden should.
“What’s the purpose of this?” I asked. “Don’t tell me they’re honoring this slob as a hero!”
“The purpose will soon be apparent,” Qumax said in that brattish way of his. And then he thought: I’m sorry, Harold Prodkins; I know how painful this will be for you.
“Painful! What do you—”
An amplified thought intruded. It seemed to press in from everywhere. GALACTIC CITIZENS—YOUR ATTENTION!
Instantly a change came over the street. Traffic stopped moving. Flying creatures folded their wings and settled gently and unobtrusively down among the pedestrians. There was no noise, no vocal or mental communication of any kind from the crowds. A city, a world, and perhaps tens of thousands, hundreds of millions of worlds—waited.
PEOPLES OF WORLDS RICH IN TECHNOLOGY AND COMMERCE. IT IS FITTING THAT WE HONOR ACTS OF HEROISM. WARDEN NITTI, REHABILITATION OFFICIAL OF A DISTANT PRIMITIVE PLANET NAMED EARTH, BELIEVES HIMSELF TO BE THE SYMBOL OF COURAGE AND DEVOTION TO DUTY, IN THE CYNOSURE OF HIS PLANET’S INHABITANTS. WHEN THE CARGO SHIP, COMET’S TAIL, WAS RECENTLY ATTACKED AND PLUNDERED BY STRUMBERMIANS, HE PERFORMED A FEAT THAT MUST BE UNDERSTOOD WITHIN THE FRAMEWORK OF HIS PSYCHOLOGY. BECAUSE NO ONE ELSE APPEARED TO BE WILLING TO DEAL REALISTICALLY WITH THE STRUMBERMIAN RAIDERS, BY THIS MAN’S DEFINITIONS, HE FORCED HIMSELF TO PORTRAY THE TRAITOR WHILE BELIEVING HIS ACT TO BE THE SENSIBLE AND HEROIC ONE. HE OFFERED HIS TRAVELING COMPANIONS, NANCY DILSMORE OF EARTH AND QUMAX OF JAMBORANGO, IN EXCHANGE FOR HIS OWN FREEDOM AND THE LIVES OF OTHERS. HE DID NOT KNOW THAT THIS MIGHT WELL COST THE SECURITY OF HIS HOME PLANET. HE FELT HIS ACT WOULD PRESERVE A GREATER PROPORTION OF THE SHIP’S COMPLEMENT THAN WOULD OTHERWISE BE POSSIBLE. SUBSEQUENT ANALYSIS SUGGESTS HE WAS CORRECT IN THIS SINGLE CASE. THE STRUMBERMIANS WERE MORE INTERESTED IN CONVERTS THAN IN PLUNDER.
There was a pause in the amplified thought. The projection of Warden Nitti bowed its head slightly as though acknowledging.
WE WHO HAVE THE ADVANTAGE OF ADULTHOOD IN A HIGHLY EVOLVED SOCIETY REALIZE THAT SUCH THINKING VIOLATES THE CODES OF INTERSPECIES MORALITY. NO NEGOTIATIONS SHOULD HAVE BEEN ATTEMPTED WITH THE COMPLETELY AMORAL STRUMBERMIANS. BUT IN HIS OWN MIND, AND BY THE DICTATES OF HIS OWN CULTURE, THERE WAS HEROISM IN WARDEN NITTI’S ACTION. THUS WE HAVE HONORED HIS INTENT WHILE DISAVOWING HIS METHOD.
Again the thought broke off. The lofty image of Warden Nitti seemed to take on new solidity. Behind his head appeared a huge black circle.
ONE THOUGHT HAD BEEN PROMINENT IN WARDEN NITTI’S MIND SINCE HIS RESCUE AND THE START OF HIS INSTRUCTION. HE WISHES, ABOVE ALL ELSE, TO BE FORGIVEN BY THOSE HE HAS WRONGED. THE THREE INDIVIDUALS WHO WERE HELD CAPTIVE ON NEW STRUMBERMIA SIX-O-FIVE NOW HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO FORGIVE, OR TO REFUSE TO FORGIVE, THIS GUILT-BOWED FIGURE.
A gossamer-winged being turned its fine-featured face our way. With stately stride and flutter it advanced to our open airlock. In tentacles, very similar to Qumax’s, it carried a fragile-seeming pink crystal. It halted before us—tall, phenomenally beautiful. It held out the crystal.
Qumax knew what to do. He took the crystal and held it in his own tentacles.
From the crystal there came a thought. Nitti’s. Will you forgive me, Qumax?
I forgive you, Qumax thought. As naturally as though he had been doing this every day, he turned and handed the crystal to Nancy.
Will you forgive me, Nancy Dilsmore?
Nancy hesitated. Her fair brow wrinkled. She raised her eyes to the winged alien and then looked beyond it to the gigantic, now perfectly immobile image. She frowned.
Mr. Nitti, she thought, I understand why you did what you did, even though I cannot approve of it. I do not know what possible benefit it can be to you—but yes, because I understand, I forgive you.
Nancy handed me the crystal. It was warm and as delicate in shape as a single huge snowflake. I stared down into the intricate three-dimensional design—and down inside myself.
And you, Harold Prodkins? Do you also forgive?
In an alien’s eye! Filled with righteous indignation, I let him have some of my mind: Nitti, you are a contemptible excuse for an Earthian. Nothing that I could possibly think now would be adequate to fully express my disgust for you. You are ev
erything a human being should not be, plus a few things that nothing should be. You have a hell of a nerve to beg my forgiveness now—I, whom you betrayed along with Qumax and Nancy. Why didn’t you think about forgiveness then, when you weighed our lives against—
And right there I stopped. Nitti had gambled two or three lives in the hope that many more would be saved. I had gambled lives also—the same ones. Viewed this way, wasn’t my “crime” as contemptible as his? Couldn’t he claim just as logically that he had, indeed, acted heroically?
Please go on, Nitti thought, and I was amazed by the servile aspect of it. I must know whether you can forgive me.
I raised my eyes to the distant image. I felt that I should be enjoying the traitor’s agony, that I was entitled to some self-righteousness. But somehow—well, in the long run, what could I do? What could any imperfect Earthian do? In the end, we have to forgive the Warden Nittis in order to be free of them.
Nitti, I got out in mental chunks, I know that you are contemptible, but I also know that I—that . . . Oh, let me forgive you and let it go at that.
In my hands the crystal shimmered and fell apart and dissolved into vapor and was gone. On the face of Nitti’s image a faint smile formed. You have made me happy, came the thought from the dissipating mist. I thank each of you . . . whom I have wronged . . . for forgiving me. Now if you will watch the projection. .. .
We watched. For a moment, nothing. Then the black circle haloing the image seemed to catch fire. A bright green flame enveloped the imaged head, providing it a striking glory. Then the flame was all.
Taut muscles relaxed. Slowly, emptily, the headless body toppled. As it fell it became less distinct. Slower, slower, fainter, fainter—drifting and gaseous, like the remnant of the crystal. Just before it would have struck our ship it vanished. I was relieved, for though I knew it to be only an optical effect, I did not want to be engulfed by the corpse of Warden Nitti.
I had had no idea this was going to happen. Suicide! The guy must really have been serious!
PEOPLE OF THE GALAXY, YOU HAVE JUST WITNESSED THE MERCY-KILLING OF WARDEN NITTI, AN EARTHIAN. IN ACCORDANCE WITH INNER-GALACTIC CUSTOM AND ETHICAL PRINCIPLE, THE DECEASED WAS NOT SUBJECTED TO EXTERNAL PUNISHMENT BUT WAS MADE AWARE OF THE FLAWS IN HIS THINKING AND THE FULL IMPLICATIONS OF HIS BEHAVIOR. HE WAS THEN REQUIRED BY THE DICTATES OF HIS NEWLY AWAKENED CONSCIENCE TO OBTAIN FORGIVENESS FROM HIS CHIEF VICTIMS. HAD WARDEN NITTI BEEN UNSUCCESSFUL IN OBTAINING SUCH FORGIVENESS HE WOULD HAVE BEEN REQUIRED BY THAT SAME CONSCIENCE TO LIVE WITH HIS GUILT AND KEEP TRYING FOR FORGIVENESS FOR AS LONG AS GALACTIC SCIENCE COULD SUSTAIN HIS LIFE. HIS VICTIMS HAVE BEEN MERCIFUL AND HAVE GRANTED HIM THE GIFT OF EUTHANASIA. JUSTICE HAS BEEN DONE.
The thought ceased. Music, part sound, part thought, part direct emotion, played. It was the funeral march for Warden Nitti. The theme swelled to an almost unbearable intensity, then faded.
The gloom of death descended.
I stood there, reliving that episode in the perspective of its termination. I had supposed it to be some commendation, some ceremony of undeserved recognition that Nitti had promoted for himself. Then I had supposed it to be a formality, a Welcome, Sinner, to the True Path, where the only penance to be done was the admission of prior guilt. Finally I had realized that it was more than that—but still underestimated the denouement.
HAROLD PRODKINS, NEPOTISTIC OFFICIAL FROM EARTH, BELIEVED HIMSELF TO BE THE SYMBOL OF COURAGE . . . SUCH CONDUCT VIOLATES THE CODES OF INTERSPECIES MORALITY . . . WE HONOR NEITHER HIS INTENT NOR HIS METHOD . . . WRONGED INDIVIDUALS MAY FORGIVE OR REFUSE TO FORGIVE. . . . YOU HAVE JUST WITNESSED THE MERCYKILLING OF HAROLD PRODKINS . . . JUSTICE HAS BEEN DONE.
I heard it all, heard it all, in my mind’s ear.
Chapter 13
Slim, graceful, the gossamer-winged creature took my hand. Was it male or female? Could its species be evolutionary cousins to Qumax’s own? Incredible . . . yet, with those tentacles and antennae, not beyond the bounds of possibility.
I saw that others of its kind had alighted outside the ship. They waited for us.
Qumax said: “We are going to my Swarm Tyrant. We will be carried there by wing-power.”
I was drawn with the others out into the open. Three baglike litters lay ready. Qumax got into the largest; Nancy and I into the two lesser ones.
Our litters were gently raised around the edges. Wings beat. A downdraft of air washed against the vegetation of the park. We were borne upward.
I peered cautiously down at the level streets and the pedestrians. I did not want to lose my balance or disturb the flight in any way, lest my hammock spin over and send me crashing down. Then I looked overhead at the wonderful pink-silver, silver-pink flash that were the great wings abeat in mild sunlight. None of it seemed strange, none really frightening. It was as though I had been on similar flights over similar cities in a life and time long forgotten.
I threw a thought at Qumax. What are our litterbearers?
Cops.
Police? Shades of Warden Nitti! From what planet?
Jamborango, naturally.
I lay back in the comfortably padded litter, reflecting that I had been right for once. Qumax’s people were related to these others, if only in the sense that all life on a single planet had to be related. It was gratifying to see my perceptiveness rewarded occasionally.
Minutes later I became aware that we were climbing steadily higher. The buildings seemed endlessly tall, and there was a fragile beauty about them—like the spunglass towers and turrets and interconnecting walkways of some child’s imaginative wonderland. I marveled that the members of any species here could live and grow up—really grow up—into hard, mean, cynically ruthless adults. Perhaps in a sense the natives here never had.
We passed over the last of the city and flew above a field of forty-foot-high Earth-sky-blue flowers with blossoms so big that a full grown man might walk inside with room to spare. They might even make decent houses, I thought dreamily. I watched the winged Jams going in and out of the big blue bells with what appeared to be harvesting baskets.
That must be our destination, Nancy thought. There on the hill.
I looked up the side of the small mountain that was thickly terraced with more of the giant blue plants. There was a castle on the crest, or what seemed like one. Walls of smoky-azure filled with endlessly moving pink and silver lines; roof of sparkling amethyst; windows of a bright ocher and saffron. Where the castle on the Strumbermians’ world had been all-dark, this one was all-light. The other had been pungent nightmare; this was sugared daydream. But each, unfortunately, was too much: too much poignancy dulled the taste, and too much sugar was sickening.
We ascended the hill and dipped over the castle. We circled, traced rings in the sky, and finally sailed in through a casement. We landed and were let off in a room curtained round with liquidescent silver drapes. The police escort departed with a rush of wings. We were alone, with only a giant-sized backless chair confronting us.
“Qumax—” I began.
Shhhhhhh-hh-h! the worm thought at me, as though I had broken wind during a prayer. HE is about to give us an audience.
He was really apprehensive. But what about? I wanted to know.
He didn’t answer. Through the drapes at the back of the room flowed an unusually large Jamborang. This Jam’s wings were deeper hued than the others I had seen. His bearing was confident, proud. There was a manner about him that was decidedly different. A quality I could only think of as intense masculinity.
Qumax’s Swarm Tyrant moved to the throne. He fluffed his wings back, formed a sleek bodily arch and settled into the throne. His head turned. Bright, all-seeing eyes stabbed at Qumax, Nancy, me. The eyes rested. The Great One spoke, using the language I had grown up with.
“Harold Prodkins, Minister of the Planet Earth’s nonexistent Inner-Galactic World Affairs—you have a mission that the President of your world may or may not choose to recognize as official, depending on expedience. I know
these things because my errant offspring has communicated them, together with your language. I have not, naturally, read your mind.”
“Yes, Swarm Tyrant,” I said. Suddenly my bold plan to wrest an apology from this creature seemed rather foolish.
“You may address me as Qubuc. I am normally referred to as the Qu Swarms’ Tyrant, but Qubuc has connotations in your language that you may someday find entertaining. I am in a sense the head buck.”
“I find that amusing right now, Qubuc,” I said. Why did the great always inflate the value of their droll humor?
“Harold Prodkins, your avowed mission had to do with Qumax’s unscheduled visit to your planet and his behavior while staying there. You desire—I believe ‘demand’ was your actual term—to have official apology from the Jamborang government.
You feel that the Jamborangs should make good on all damages as a matter of principle, and that Qumax’s Swarm Tyrant should be reprimanded. Have I stated your case, Minister?”
I was sure he had been peeking into my mind. Then I realized that had he done so, he would have picked up my extreme present uncertainty and known that he needed to make no concessions. I swallowed. “You have, Qubuc.”
The Swarm Tyrant twined his tentacles together. “I have taken this matter up with the representatives of the Jamborang government, of which I am one. It has been agreed unanimously that you do have justice in your claim. An official apology will be made to the Earth government, demands for damages will be satisfied . . . and you should know that I, the vexed parent who momentarily reverted to the behavior of his larval stage, have already been justly and severely reprimanded.”
My knees felt like overcooked noodles. Had the President of Earth walked in I would not have been more astonished. Nor more certain that there was a catch the size of the Grand Canyon involved.
“However,” Qubuc continued, and I knew it was coming now, “it is only fair to point out that the way Earthians are treated henceforth will depend on whether the Minister of Earth’s In-ner-Galactic World Affairs proves himself to be as concerned with personal integrity as was Warden Nitti—an individual who, I understand, was not particularly enamored of such concepts prior to the Strumbermian crisis.”
E. S. P. Worm Page 13