Death's Demand

by Perry Rhodan

  "But they'll interrogate Thekus and probably examine him, won't they?" said Ron. "Our object with his resuscitation was to make a situation where the enemy wouldn't try a second time to just simply shoot him down. We wanted the opposition to become curious about the medical miracle involved so that Thekus would only be kidnapped instead of being killed. The abduction was supposed to lead us onto the enemy's trail. That was the whole idea."

  "Alright—and so... ?" retorted Quinto.

  "Well, now we've come to that. Thekus has been captured and taken away. The first thing they're going to do with him is have a couple of sharp medical men look him over. They'll want to know how it's possible to bring a deadman back to life. Aside from all political considerations, that's a secret that anybody would give a lot to know. And when they start to X-ray Thekus or to dissect him and take him apart for a regular autopsy, they'll darn soon find out what's fake about him."

  Nike Quinto nodded thoughtfully. Then he got up suddenly. "Come with me," he said.

  Ron followed him straight across the room to an adjacent chamber where the instruments had been installed that provided a linkup between this house and Thekus' house as well as to some extent with the robot itself. The room had been darkened so that the only illumination came from the lighted meters on the instrument panels. Ron caught a movement of Meech Hannigan in the semi-darkness.

  Nike came to a stop behind Meech. "What's happening now?" he asked.

  Meech answered dutifully but with seeming indifference. "He's slowly getting out of range of our instruments, sir. His ship is close to Arkon 2 and is apparently getting ready to land."

  "Any signs of special activity?"

  "None to speak of, sir. Ever since he was captured they've left him alone."

  Quinto nodded, satisfied. Then he turned and went out, Ron at his heels. "You see," he said, "so far they've left him alone. The landing will take at least an hour. They'll want to bring him to a safe place before they start working on him."

  Ron couldn't see what he was driving at but he waited in silence.

  "We should figure that they won't start questioning him for several hours yet—or certainly they won't start any medical examination before that. By that time, however, I hope to be close enough to their location to be ably to influence the course of the action."

  "You're flying to Arkon 2?" asked Ron, surprised.

  "I?" Nike Quinto shook his head and looked at Ron as though indignant. "We are flying to Arkon 2!"

  • • •

  The small ship was en route from one of the three Arkon central worlds to another. It held a course within the unbroken chain of robotships which were also on course between the two worlds. In this way the small ship avoided the danger of being hailed by other vessels manned by regular crews. Flying along among the larger robotships the smaller craft was thus so inconspicuous that there was little likelihood of being noticed—not even by the spacewatch stations on Arkon 1 and 2, which were responsible for the safety of the robotship traffic.

  There were five men on board the small ship. One was a captive, two were wounded men—one seriously and one with only minor injuries—in addition to two others who were pleased with both their freedom and their state of health. One of the latter two was in charge of the flight. The other was in a small chamber adjacent to the control room and was busy monitoring a number of special instruments. Next to him was the man who had been only slightly injured.

  They had turned out the ceiling lights and were observing a small view screen. A park-like terrain swept past their field of vision at a rapid rate. At the edges of the picture a plastic-metal framework could be seen. It was obvious that the camera pickup was transpiring inside the cabin of an aircar. Often the camera-eye would turn and reveal the inside of the vehicle. Here a blond, broad-shouldered man could be seen, who sat comfortably in the upholstered seat and was apparently immersed in thought.

  The man at the viewscreen nodded to his slightly-wounded companion. "He doesn't suspect anything," he said softly in Arkonide.

  "No, he's fallen for the trick," said the other.

  The picture suddenly changed radically. Apparently the aircar was lowering toward its destination. A high, wide-flanged funnel house appeared. The blond man got out. The picture held for a few more seconds on the interior of the vehicle and then the outer contours of the passenger cupola came into view as the camera-carrier also got out. He seemed to stand motionlessly for a moment in one spot and then the video pickup caught the automatic aircar as it glided away over the trees.

  The blond man entered the house, carrying a container that was filled with a reddish liquid. Both observers saw the wide entrance door coming toward them and shortly thereafter they caught sight of the antechamber. They heard a strange, high-pitched voice but could not understand what it said because the language was alien.

  The first observer became uneasy. "We'll have to listen to that again," he said. "I'd like to know what was said there."

  Next there was a view of an antigrav shaft while the blond man and the camera-carrier glided upward. Then came a terrace beyond which the plants of the garden could be seen. At the far end of the terrace was a door. The blond opened the door and stepped inside.

  After that, things began to happen all at once. The two observers saw the blond man stagger to one side but they couldn't make out what had caused him to do so because beyond the door was darkness. However, this seemed to make little difference to the camera-carrier, who continued forward.

  "Stand still, you fool!" shouted one of the observers angrily.

  But he had no influence on the course of events. The pickup eye seemed to pass the doorway and enter the darkness. At least the view screen went dark for a few seconds—then there was a brilliant flash of light. For a few moments the screen went wild with spraying and hissing fireworks. Then it was over with. Trembling streamers of color danced across the raster, indicating that at the other end there was no longer anything left that could receive the video and transmit it.

  The man in front of the receiver jumped up. "Damn!" he exclaimed in sudden rage. "They did catch on... !"

  He turned, shoved his chair back, and took three steps to the bulkhead door leading to the control room. The hatch reacted to his presence and automatically rolled aside.

  "Arfar!" he cried out. "They've seen through our trick!"

  A tall, lean Arkonide sat before the main flight console. In contrast to the alarming tone of the announcement he turned with a slow deliberation. "How?" he asked succinctly.

  "I haven't any idea! They've simply shot the robot to pieces!"

  Arfar took another look at his instruments. The way the colored lines danced across the bright-green scopes, alternately thickening and thinning out in a steady cadence, was apparently satisfying to him. He stood up. "The auto-pilot takes a few moments to get its bearings," he said. "I want to see that video."

  He went with the other man into the adjacent chamber. Their wounded companion was still sitting by the receiver which was still displaying a colorful pattern of jittery lines. Arfar watched the screen for awhile. Then he turned it off and depressed a series of buttons on a nearby panel, after which he waited expectantly. The receiver began to work again but this time with a replay from a video tape recording of what had transpired before. Thus Arfar was able to observe the same scenes as the other two had witnessed them only several minutes previously.

  When the antechamber of Thekus' house was shown and the strange voice was heard, Arfar stopped the tape. He ran it back a short way and then listened once more to the words. "As I thought," he said, "it's Terran. Somebody said: "Shaft three, please!"

  "Terran?" repeated one of the other two. "Who could it have been?"

  Arfar stared thoughtfully into space. "Terra has agents everywhere," he said softly. "It's quite possible we've seen them before. They may be members of the Terran Embassy staff, who knows?" He seemed to take the matter lightly.

  "You don't seem to be very w
orried about it," commented the unwounded man in some surprise.

  Arfar shrugged. "No. The important thing is that we have Thekus in our hands—and also, of course, that they don't know where we're taking him." He nodded with satisfaction and went back to his flight controls.

  • • •

  At the last moment Nike Quinto had changed his plans. A new point of suspicion had turned up. As a result, Ron Landry did not accompany Quinto and the rest of the team to Arkon 2. Instead, he found himself on his way under shadow of night toward the big dispatch center where the automatic aircars for this district were kept.

  It was the first time Quinto had been somewhat nebulous about his instructions. He had been in a hurry.

  "I know I'm not much help to you, Larry," he had said at the last moment. "All I have is a couple of guesses. But do me a favor for my poor blood pressure: keep it down for me by acting intelligent!"

  This was typically Nike Quinto. Supplied with such advice, Ron was supposed to find out which employee of the dispatch center had installed a listening device in the vehicle which he himself and the robot Thekus had used this afternoon for their outing. After a little thought it had become obvious that such a device had been in operation. The attack in the Laurelian's aquarium store had taken place about an hour after the car had left Thekus' house. The trip from the house to the shopping center had lasted about a quarter of an hour. Then Ron and Thekus had taken half an hour to push through the throngs of shoppers. After that they had turned into the side street and gone into the Laurelian's establishment. If there had been no listening device, the enemy would only have known at that moment where he should strike. But the attack had come 10 minutes later. If one were not to assume that the enemy had people stationed everywhere on Arkon in readiness for an attack, then it could only mean that the conversation between Thekus and Ron before the start of their trip had been overheard or somebody had been able to pick up a transmission of the code address that Thekus had selected.

  It was a fairly obvious clue. Somebody in the dispatch center must have wired the car. Who was he? And what might one be able to learn from him concerning the opposition forces?

  Ron had set down his own vehicle within ½ km of the station. Without being observed he hoped to learn something about the car rental's operation before deciding his next step. It was still a few hours before midnight and business was at a peak at the distribution center. Customers were calling for cars from all directions. Ron could see the automatic vehicles emerging continuously from the long row of garages, where they would rise from the ground and disappear into the night.

  Each garage was a black box, just large enough to contain an aircar. There were no doors. The boxes were arranged in double rows facing each other, with about 100 entrances on a side. Ron counted 50 such double-row installations. They were laid out on an asphalted area that was as smooth as a landing field. It wasn't exactly the best kind of territory for anybody who wanted to sneak around and not be seen.

  Ron kept up his observations for half an hour. From his location at the edge of the area he could see the eastern end of five double rows of garages. Only twice during this time did he notice any special activity. Each time a robot came along the alleyway between two facing rows. It drove a car out of a shelter in both cases, worked on it for a few minutes and then guided it back in again. No doubt some small defect had been involved that had to be corrected in a hurry.

  This was the way the aircar of the previous afternoon could have been prepared. It only required one willing robot—and all of them were willing—plus one quick manoeuvre.

  Ron discovered that there were individual I.D. legends on each garage. The ones he could see carried the inscriptions A-82, A-84, A-86, or B-91, B-93, and similar series with C, D and E. He suddenly recalled that the vehicle he and Thekus had used bore the identification G-1. The garages in the low number series appeared to be at the other end of the compound. Ron had to assume that somewhere there must be some kind of administration building. The station could not be taken care of exclusively by robots. Back of such operations there always had to be an organic head man. Perhaps this building lay on the other side—for example in the area where the low-numbered garages were.

  Ron had an idea. He drew back from his observation spot, went to his car and drove in a wide loop around the center. Then he approached it from the western side. He had not yet reached the edge of the asphalted area before he saw that he was right. Lying at an oblique angle to the symmetrical rows of garages was a long, low building with brightly-lit windows. Ron recognized the cabinet consoles of small positronicomputers and the hurrying figures of men inside. Everybody was still at work—and one of them in there probably knew what had happened this afternoon to rental unit G-1.

  Ron tried to figure his next move. At one hour after midnight the ship would take off that was to bring him behind Nike Quinto to Arkon 2! He didn't have another minute to lose.

  When he rose up from his concealment and started toward the barracks-like building, he heard a noise in front of him. He ducked back quickly and waited. Almost at the edge of the asphalt strip to his left was a mass of undergrowth and shrubbery. The sound had come from there. It sounded as if a large animal were trying to free itself from the thorns and branches. Ron waited tensely.

  Then he saw a dark shadow emerge from the bushes. It was some kind of vehicle, of that there could be no doubt. Ron watched it in fascination as it began to move along the ground and rapidly picked up speed, finally disappearing into the night. Just at the last moment, under the field lights he saw a long, narrow view-slot in the car light up. Behind it was a blood-red glow.

  Ron stood rooted to the spot for a moment, struck by a strange idea. He rejected the thought quickly but it returned. Nor could he get rid of it.

  He began to run, convinced at last. He sprinted across toward the west wall of the low building. Then he dropped down and crept along under the long row of windows. From time to time he would rise up to take a quick look into some of the windows. The rooms he saw did not interest him at the moment because all they contained was desks, calculators, registers and similar equipment. What was unusual was that he didn't see any people anywhere—yet only 10 minutes ago he had seen the whole building filled with activity.

  He knew that something had happened. He hurried farther along under the windows and finally found what he was looking for. The room he furtively looked into was small. The door was open and a crowd of people was trying to push their way in. A medium-sized but powerful man stood at the door and held his arms out, blocking the rest from entering. Apparently nobody was to come in except for the three who were already there. That included the man at the door and a thin, white-haired Arkonide who was kneeling on the floor in the middle of the room over the prone body of the third man.

  The prone figure lay there motionlessly with a distorted face and fear-widened eyes. The man was dead. There could be little doubt of it. His head lay in a pool of reddish liquid but it wasn't blood. It was a red-glowing something that contained sulphur-dioxide, chlorine and cyanide salts.

  • • •

  In some stupefaction, Ron went back to where he had left his car and drove home.

  The planet Laurel was 40,000 light-years from Arkon and 60,000 from Terra yet there was a greater abyss between Laurelians, Arkonides and Terrans in their way of thinking. What had motivated the Laurelian to kill the man at the dispatch center? Did he know something about what was behind Thekus' assassination? Did he know the masterminds who pulled the strings? Had the dead man at the rental station been one of them?

  Ron knew very little about the Laurelians but basically that was just as much as anybody else knew. They were known to be loyal to the Imperium and they had never been involved in activities which were in any way hostile to the government.

  So where did that get him?

  Ron shook his head and gave up trying to figure it out. He still had 50 minutes before the departure of the spaceship but he had
to be on board at least 10 minutes before takeoff. Which left him 40 minutes. He went back to the rented house by a roundabout way because he wanted to take the Mokoki with him. A Mokoki was far too valuable an animal to just leave it somewhere to die.

  He left his motor running in front of the cone-shaped dwelling and went up to the terrace level again. The fluid container was still there on the floor where he had left it. The Mokoki was still swimming about contentedly in the red-glowing liquid inside.

  Just as he grasped the carrying handle he heard the intercom buzz. For a second or so he wondered if he should take the call. Finally he released his grip on the container and went over to the desk, where he turned on the receiver.

  He stood there nonplussed when he saw that no picture, came through on the small screen. The raster merely glowed with a steady dark red light. Before he could figure out what this might mean, an impersonal voice came from the speaker. "I've saved you a little work, Terran. I hope that I can do more for you."

  Ron started when he recognized the voice. It was being generated mechanically from a speech transformer. This particular device was either old or of poor quality but that was why he recognized the voice. He had heard it before—in the establishment of the merchant from Laurel!

  "Keep talking," Ron answered. "I hear you."

  "Tonight you were a few moments too late," the voice continued. "I got there ahead of you and it was just as well. I don't think you could have accomplished much anyway. How were you expecting to locate the right man among all the others there?"

  Ron answered with a counter-question. "How did you find him?"

  "We who are from Laurel possess certain special faculties. When the man entered my store he was thinking how relieved he felt that the listening device installed in your rental car was finally producing some results. It wasn't difficult for me to pick that up from him. And if you know anything about the structure of thought impulses you'll no doubt understand how easily I could perceive that it was he, himself, who had installed the device."