“I’ll take my chances on that,” he said, “and I’ll take it alone. And if we are ever again subject to Earth laws, I shall exercise my legal rights.”
Lieutenant Neslor’s eyes narrowed. “Oh,” she said, you know about that. You did spend a great deal of time in the library, didn’t you?”
Maltby said quietly, “I probably know more about Earth laws than any other individual on the Star Cluster.” “And you won’t even listen to my plan, to use the thousand survivors to help in the rescue?”
“I’ve told you,” he said, “I cannot participate in the larger issues.”
The woman stood up. “But you are going to try to rescue Lady Gloria?”
“Yes.”
She turned without another word, and walked off. He watched her until she disappeared through a distant door.
Chapter
Twenty
GRAND CAPTAIN, the Right Honorable Gloria Cecily, the Lady Laurr of Noble Laurr, sat in the throne chair of her reception dais, and listened unsmilingly to the psychologist’s report. It was not until the older woman finished that the bleakness of the listener showed abatement. Her voice, however, was sharp as she said, “Then he definitely didn’t suspect the truth? He didn’t discover that the Star Cluster has never been captured. He didn’t realize that it was you who made him unconscious when he landed in the grove of trees?”
“Oh, he was suspicious,” Lieutenant Neslor said, “but how could he so much as guess the larger truth? In view of our silence, how could he suspect that Hunston’s triumphant announcement was only a part of the ever deadlier game he and we are playing, in our attempts to destroy each other? The very fact that Hunston has got an Earth battleship makes it particularly impossible for anybody to realize the truth.”
The young noblewoman nodded, smiling now. She sat for a moment, proud eyes narrowed with thought, lips parted, gleaming white teeth showing. That had not been the expression on her face when first she had learned that the Mixed Men also had an Earth battleship, and a marvelously new model at that, a ship whose type had been in the design stage for many years. Sitting there, all the knowledge she had on the subject of that new thundership, as it was called in the naval yards, was flashingly reviewed in her mind. How its nine hundred billion separate parts had gone into mass production seventy-five years before, with the expectation that the first ship would be completed at the end of seventy years, and additional ones thereafter on a mass production basis. Very few of the vessels would actually be in service as yet, but somewhere along the line one of them had been stolen.
Her feelings concerning the possession by the Mixed Men of such a battleship had been an imbalance of relief and alarm. Relief that the super-inventions of the Mixed Men were after all only stolen from the main galaxy. And alarm at the implications of such a capture.
What were Hunston’s intentions? How did he intend to get around the fact that Imperial Earth had more warships than there were men, women and children in the Fifty Suns?
She said slowly, “Undoubtedly the Mixed Men sent a ship to the main galaxy the moment they heard about us; and, of course, if enough of them ever got aboard one of our warships there would be no stopping them.” She broke off more cheerfully, “I’m glad that Captain Maltby did not question your account of how you and a thousand other crew members escaped when Hunston made his so-called seizure of the Star Cluster. I am not surprised that he refused to have anything to do with your harebrained scheme of recapturing the ship. The important thing is that, under cover of this pretty little story, you learned what we wanted to know: His love fixation for me is driving him to an attempt to board Hunston’s battleship. When the indicator we have had pointing at him since he left us at Atmion indicates that he is inside the ship, then we shall act.” She laughed, “He’s going to be a very surprised young man when he discovers what kind of clothes he is wearing.”
Lieutenant Neslor said, “He may be killed.”
There was silence, and the faint smile remained on the finely molded face of Lady Laurr.
Lieutenant Neslor said quickly, “Do not forget that your present antagonism towards him is influenced by your present comprehension of how deeply you had previously committed yourself to an emotional attachment.” “It is possible,” admitted the grand captain, “that your conditioning was over enthusiastic. Whatever the reason,
I have no desire to feel other than I do now. You may therefore consider this a command: Under no circumstances am I to be reconditioned into my former state. The divorce between Captain Maltby and myself, now that it has taken place, is final. Is that clear?”
“Yes, noble lady.”
Here were ships, ships, ships more than Maltby had ever seen in the Cassidor yards. The Fifty Suns navy was undoubtedly being demobilized as fast as the Mixed Men could manage it.
The ships stretched in ranks to the north, to the east, to the south, as far as the eye could see. They lay in their cradles in long, geometric rows. Here and there, surface hangars and repair shops broke that measured rhythm of straight lines. But for the most part the buildings were underground, or rather, under sheeted plains of metal, hidden by a finely corrugated sea of translucent steel alloy.
The Earth battleship lay about four miles from the western entrance. The distance seemed to have no diminishing effect on its size. It loomed colossal on the horizon, overshadowing the smaller ships, dominating the sky and the planet and the sections of the city that spread beyond it. Nothing in Cassidor, nothing in the Fifty Suns system, could begin to approach that mighty ship for size, for complication, for sheer appearance of power.
Even now, it seemed incredible to Maltby that so great a weapon, a machine that could destroy whole planets, had fallen intact into the hands of the Mixed Men, captured by a trick. And yet the very method he had used to free the Atmion was evidence that it could be done. With an effort, Maltby drew his mind from that futile contemplation, and walked forward. He felt cold, and steady and determined. The officer at the gate was a pleasant-faced non-Dellian, who took him through, saying: “There is an electronic matter transmitter focused from the ship’s hold into the doorway of that building.” He motioned a hundred yards ahead and to one side, and continued: “That will get you inside the battleship. Now put this alarm device in your pocket.”
Maltby accepted the tiny instrument curiously. It was an ordinary combination sending and receiving tube with a lock button to activate the signal.
“What’s this for?” he asked.
“You’re heading for the Grand Captain’s bridge, are you not?”
Maltby nodded, but there was a thought beginning in his mind; and he did not trust himself to speak. He waited. The man continued: “As soon as you can, make every effort to go over to the control board and nullify energy flows, force connections, automatic screens and so on. Then press the signal.”
The thought inside Maltby was an emptiness. He had a sudden sense of walking along the edge of an abyss. “But what’s the idea?” he asked blankly.
The answer was quiet, almost cool. “It has been decided,” said the young officer, “to try to take the battleship. We got hold of some spare transmitters, and we are ready to put a hundred thousand men aboard in one hour, from the various concentration centers. Whatever the result, in the confusion of the attack, your chances of escaping with your wife will be augmented.”
He broke off crisply, “You understand your instructions?”
Instructions! So that was it. He was a member of the Fifty Suns navy, and they took it for granted that he was subject to orders without question. He wasn’t of course. As hereditary leader of the Mixed Men, who had sworn allegiance to the Fifty Suns, and married the representative of Imperial Earth, his loyalty was a problem in basic ethics.
The wry thought came to Maltby that only an attack by the survivors of the Star Cluster was needed now. Led by Lieutenant Neslor, their arrival would just about make a perfect situation for a man whose mind was running around in circles, faster and
faster every minute. He needed time to think, to decide. And fortunately, the time was going to be available. This decision didn’t have to be made here and now. He would take the alarm device— and sound it or not according to his determination at the moment. He slipped the instrument into his pocket and said quietly, “Yes, I understand my instructions.”
Two minutes later he was inside the battleship.
Chapter
Twenty-One
THE storeroom, in which Maltby found himself, was deserted. The pleasurable shock of that staggered him. It seemed almost too good to be true. His gaze flashed over the room. He couldn’t remember ever having been in it when he was aboard the Star Cluster. But then, he had never had any reason to wander all over the mighty ship. Nor, for that matter, had he had time.
He walked swiftly over to the inter-room transmitter, reached up to press the toucher that would enable him to step from the hold into the grand captain’s bridge. But at the last instant, his fingers actually on the toucher, he hesitated.
It had been wise, of course, to do everything boldly. The whole history of warfare taught that planned boldness, tempered with alertness, weighed heavily in the balance of victory. Only, he hadn’t really planned. Consciously he let his secondary, Dellian mind—tilt—forward. He stood very still, mentally examining his actions from the moment that Hunston had projected the globe of force into his bedroom, through the trip to Cassidor, the talk he had had with Lieutenant Neslor, and the suddenly announced attack plan of the Fifty Suns navy.
Thinking about it, it struck him sharply that the overall, outstanding effect was of complication. The Dellian part of his brain, with its incisive logic, usually had little difficulty organizing seemingly unrelated facts into whatever unity was innate in them. Yet now, it was slow in resolving the details. It took a moment to realize why. Each was a compound of many smaller facts, some of them partially resolvable by deduction, others though undoubtedly there, refused to come out of the mist. There was no time to think about it now. He had decided to enter the grand captain’s cabin and there was only one way to do it. With an abrupt movement, he pressed the toucher. He stepped through into a brightly lighted room. A tall man was standing about a dozen feet from the transmitter, staring at it. In his fingers he held an In-no gun.
It was not until the man spoke that Maltby recognized Hunston. The leader of the Mixed Men said in a ringing voice: “Welcome, Captain Maltby, I’ve been waiting for you.”
For once, boldness had failed.
Maltby thought of snatching his own In-no gun from its holster. He thought of it but that was all. Because, first, he glanced over the control board, to the section that governed the automatic defenses of the interior of the ship. A single light glowed there. He moved his hand slowly. The light flickered, showing awareness of him. He decided not to draw his weapon. The possibility that that light would be on had made it highly inadvisable to enter the main bridge, weapon in hand.
Maltby sighed and gave his full attention to the other. It was several months since he had seen Hunston. Like all men with Dellian blood in them, like Maltby himself, Hunston was a superbly well-proportioned being. His mother must have been a blonde and his father a very dark brunette, because his hair had come out the curious mixture of gold and black that always resulted from such a union. His eyes were gray-blue. In their earlier meeting Hunston had been slenderer, and somehow immature in spite of his confidence and personality. That was all gone now. He looked strong and proud, and every inch a leader of men. He said without preamble:
“Briefly the facts are these: This is not the Star Cluster. My statement about that was political maneuvering. We captured this battleship from a naval yard in the main galaxy. A second battleship, now in process of being captured, will soon be here. When it arrives, we shall engage the Star Cluster in a surprise attack.”
The change of Maltby’s status from rescuer to dupe was swift as that. One instant he was a man tensed with determination, geared to withstand any danger; the next a fool, his purpose made ludicrous.
He said: “B-but—”
It was a sound, not a reaction. A word expressing blankness, a thoughtless state, which preceded the mind storm, out of which grew understanding. Before Maltby could speak, Hunston said:
“Someone advised us that you were coming. We assume it was your wife. We assume furthermore that there is hostile purpose behind every move she is making. Accordingly, we prepared for any emergency. There are ten thousand Mixed Men inside this ship. If your arrival here is to be a signal for an attack, it will have to be well organized indeed to surprise us.”
Once more, there were too many facts. But after a moment, Maltby thought of the Fifty Suns navy men, waiting to enter the battleship, and flinched. He parted his lips to speak, and closed them again as his Dellian mind projected into his primary the memory of his meeting with Lieutenant Neslor. The logic capacity of that second mind was on a plane that had no human parallel. There was a flashing connection made between the meeting with the psychologist and the blackness that had struck him down at the moment of his landing on Cassidor. Instantly, that marvelous secondary brain examined a thousand possibilities, and since it had enough clues at last, came forth with the answer.
The suit he was wearing!!! He must have been made unconscious, in order to substitute it for the one he had been wearing. Any minute, any second, it would be activated. Sweating, Maltby pictured the resulting clash of titans: Ten thousand Mixed Men versus a major portion of the crew of the Star Cluster versus one hundred thousand men of the Fifty Suns navy.
If only that last group would wait for his signal, then he could save them by not sounding it. Sharp consciousness came that he ought to speak, but first—
He must find out if the suit had been energized.
He put his arm behind his back, and pushed his hand cautiously into his back. It went in four inches, six inches; and still there was only emptiness. Slowly, Maltby withdrew his arm.
The suit was activated all right.
Hunston was saying: “Our plan is to destroy the Star Cluster, then Earth itself.”
“W-what?” said Maltby.
He stared. He had a sudden feeling that he had not heard correctly. He echoed, his voice loud in his own ears, “Destroy Earth!”
Hunston nodded coolly. “It’s the only logical course. If the one planet is destroyed, on which men know of the Star Cluster’s expedition to the Lesser Magellanic Cloud, then we shall have time to expand, to develop our civilization; and eventually, after a few hundred years of intensive breeding of Mixed Men, we shall have enough population to take over the control of the main galaxy itself.”
“But,” Maltby protested, “Earth is the center of the main galaxy. All the government is there, the Imperial symbol. It’s the head of the planets of 3000 million suns. It—” he stopped. The fear that came was all the greater because it was not personal.
“Why, you madman!” he cried angrily. “You can’t do a thing like that. It would disorganize the entire galaxy.” “Exactly,” Hunston nodded with satisfaction. “We would definitely have the time we need. Even if others knew of the Star Cluster expedition, no one would connect it with the catastrophe, and no other expedition would be sent.”
He paused, then continued, “As you see, I have been very frank with you. And you will not have failed to note that our entire plan depends on whether or not we can first destroy the Star Cluster. In this,” he finished quietly, “we naturally expect the assistance of the hereditary leader of the Mixed Men.”
Chapter
Twenty-Two
THERE was silence in the great room. The bank on bank of control board remained impassive, except for the solitary anti-light that glowed like a faint beacon from its deep-inset tube. Standing there, Maltby grew aware of a thought. It had only an indirect relation to the request Hunston had just made, and it wasn’t new. He tried to fight it, but it remained strong, and grew stronger, a developing force in his mind. It was the convic
tion that he would yet have to take sides in this struggle of three powerful groups. He couldn’t allow Earth to be destroyed!
With a terrible effort, he finally forced the thought aside, and looked at Hunston. The man was staring at him with narrowed-eyed anxiety that abruptly startled Maltby. He parted his lips to make a sardonic comment about a usurper who had the gall to ask help from the man he was striving to displace.
But Hunston spoke first: “Maltby—what is the danger? What is their plan in having you come here? You must know by this time.”
Almost, Maltby had forgotten about that. Once more he was about to speak. But this time he stopped himself. There was another thought forming in the back of his mind. It had been there for many months, and in its more detailed conception it was actually his solution to the whole Fifty Suns problem. In the past, the knowledge that the solution required one man to convince three groups, actually to control the three hostile groups at a given hour, and to force them to yield to his will, had made the whole idea ridiculous and impractical.
Now, in one mental jump, he saw how it could be done. But hurry, hurry! Any instant, the suit he was wearing would be used. “It’s this room!” he said violently. “If you value your life, get out of it at once.”
Hunston stared at him, bright eyed. He seemed unafraid. He asked in an interested tone: “This room is the danger point because you’re in it?”
“Yes,” said Maltby, and held his arms out slightly, and his head up. so that the energy of Hunston’s In-no gun would not hit him. His body tensed for the run forward.
Instead of shooting, Hunston frowned. “There’s something wrong,” he said. “Naturally, I wouldn’t leave you in charge of the control room of this battleship. Accordingly, you’re practically asking me to kill you. It’s obvious that if you’re in danger, then you must die. Too obvious.” He added sharply, “That anti-light watching you—the moment I fire, its automatic defenses are nullified; and you can use a gun too. Is that what you’re waiting for?”’
A. E. Van Vogt - Novel 18 - Mission to the Stars Page 14