Space 1999 #8 - Android Planet

by John Rankine

Paul Morrow broke in angrily, ‘You know damn well they’re not.’

  Menos ignored him and kept his eyes fixed on Koenig. ‘They can not be far away, Commander. Women have a natural curiosity. It is likely that they were up before you and decided to look around. I will make enquiries. The duty staff may have seen them. We will go downstairs. Come with me.’

  In the lounge area, there was some negative evidence. Four of Bergman’s degaussing helmets were on a table where they had been placed the night before. Two were gone. Menos said nothing and let the discovery speak for itself. He gathered a crowd of Copreons and spoke rapidly in gobbledygook. Actors to a man, the Copreons looked all astonishment and one girl answered with frank, open gestures as though she were all agog to help the fuzz with their enquiries.

  Menos said, ‘It is as I thought. Cilla believes she saw them. She was one of the first to come down. She says they took their helmets and walked out towards the entrance. She assumed they intended to look at the valley or perhaps to walk as far as your ship.’

  ‘Through the sealed hatch?’

  ‘There would be no problem in that, Commander. The opening mechanism is very easy to understand and your charming and intelligent friends would have no difficulty in finding the correct procedure.’

  ‘Suppose we go and take a look and suppose you come with us in case anybody gets any foolish ideas?’

  ‘I am not sure that I follow you, Commander; but, of course, I will accompany you on your search.’

  Koenig said with cold sincerity, ‘Let me make it very clear. If anything has happened to them and the fault is at your door, a great many Copreons will end up dead.’

  Neither Rama nor Menos reacted. Their smiles might have been the same if he had been promising a gold brick to each and every one. In its way, it was as effective as a bland, Oriental mask to conceal true feeling. Or, maybe, they believed they had it so well organised that there was nothing to fear.

  They had gone ten paces when Koenig saw that every Copreon in view was wearing a headband. He said, ‘Alan, the helmets.’ and Carter strode back to pick them up.

  Menos said, ‘A wise precaution, Commander. The severe phase has passed, but there is always a residual flux which has to be guarded against.’

  ‘Now you tell me.’

  ‘I was concerned about the search for your companions.’

  Outside, it was cool and pleasant, hardly more than twenty Celsius. There was a damp smell and small droplets of water glistened on the fern fronds and the leaves of the cycads. Menos said, ‘There is no natural rain on Pelorus. Every night, a sprinkler system operates for three hours. Without it, this valley would become a desert.’

  Morrow said, ‘On our proving orbit we saw evidence of other vegetation, large-scale forestation, for instance.’

  Rama answered too quickly. In spite of the surface unconcern, the action was working on her judgement and she gave something away. ‘Your experience should tell you that all is not as it seems on Pelorus. The lichen would appear to be a natural grass, but your ship would have been destroyed by it. Only infrangom, of the metals we know, can stand against it. Vegetation here is not on a straight biological pattern. There is an electrochemical complication.’

  It registered in Koenig’s head. There had not been a minute since their arrival in the gravisphere that had been free from the Copreon monitors. He was striding it out and the Copreons were having to work to keep their smiles fixed and stay with him. As the party broke from cover into the clearing, he said curtly, ‘You would have saved us a journey, if you had answered our signals and told us that.’

  Menos said, ‘But, as I understand it, the androids made forceful demonstrations to keep you away and you ignored them. You are very determined people and like to see for yourselves. You would not have believed, until you had seen with your own eyes.’

  Morrow and Carter were up the slope at a run. They disappeared into Eagle Nine’s open hatch. As the rest reached the pad, Morrow reappeared. ‘Not a sign, Commander. They’re not here.’

  Koenig’s laser was already out of its clip. He spoke to Menos and the brutal rasp he got into it carried enough conviction to put a check on the smiler. He was aiming at Rama’s neat navel and had first pressure on the firing stud. ‘Don’t push me, Menos. Where are they? I’ll start with your friend. Being a considerate man, I’ll count to five and you can say good-bye to her.’

  There was no doubt Menos felt the pressure. Without the smile, his face had a new look. If Helena Russell had been there to observe it, she would have classified it feature by feature on the Piderit scale as a classic. Mouth was grade six, stubborn and unpleasant. Eyes fixed on Koenig’s finger were grade four, attentive. Nose wrinkled to the root was miming unpleasant reflection. Brows were corrugated. A group of judges would have picked it out from a pile of photo-fit examples as belonging to a man who would have no chance to make friends and influence people.

  Another element in it was bothering Koenig as he worked slowly through his countdown. There was no concern for Rama. The Copreon had been prepared to take a calculated risk. He was waiting for a payoff.

  There was no wavering in Koenig’s eyes. There was no doubt that he would do what he said he would do. It convinced Victor Bergman, for one, and knowing his friend, he reckoned it was something he would have trouble to live with. As Koenig’s cold voice counted, ‘Two,’ and Rama’s hands clenched at her sides, he stepped forward. ‘John! You can’t . . .’

  It went unfinished. Menos had lifted his right hand shoulder high. Bergman felt a force hit the top of his balding head as though he had been struck by an unseen club. Darkness flooding in like a tide, he saw Koenig fighting to stay on his feet and the bright thread of a laser beam searing into the ground between himself and Rama.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Helena Russell swung her long legs out of the narrow bed she was in and looked around the set. She could have been anywhere in the galaxy where an advanced culture had reached the stage of setting up a medicentre with every refined technical aid at the physician’s hand.

  It was a four-bed ward, white and clinical, seemingly without doors or windows and lit by oval ceiling ports. The whole of the wall facing the beds was taken up by hardware, some of which she recognised as similar in design and function to the gear in her own sick bay on Moonbase Alpha.

  First things first, she checked out herself. Slim as a spear, she stood on warm thermoplastic tiling and took a couple of steps. No problem. She was all systems go. There was a tall locker by the bed head, which opened at a touch. Inside was a white Copreon kilt and a pair of thonged sandals. The only item of her own kit was the Bergman patent degaussing helmet.

  Two beds off, Sandra Benes was a pale ivory lay figure. Professionalism never sleeps. Helena went to her bedside and picked up a wrist to check pulse rate. It was steady and dead on normal. Following some subconscious logic of her own, Sandra said, ‘Paul . . .’ then her eyes opened wide and data acquisition networks made corrections. ‘Doctor. Dr. Russell.’

  ‘It’s all right. Another of their fancy drugs. If it goes on like this, we’ll end up as addicts.’

  ‘We? Where are the others?’

  ‘Not here for a sure thing. But, having said that, I wouldn’t know where.’

  ‘They’ll be looking for us.’

  ‘If they can.’

  Quietly spoken, it opened up a whole range of possibilities. Arms on her knees and chin on her arms, Sandra looked soberly at the equipment spread. It was all go. This was one more twist of a convoluted screw. As if they did not have enough problems, keeping Alpha’s life-support systems at the bubble. When, if ever, would they come across a simple and uncomplicated race of people, who would be sincere and open and give them an honest welcome? Every new attempt they made seemed doomed from the start. Everybody had problems of their own or wanted to impose some alien pattern on the Alphans.

  Aloud she said, ‘I suppose it’s the same on Earth planet, when you think of it.’

&nb
sp; Not having all the argument, Helena was lost. ‘What is?’

  ‘Factions. Power groups wanting to push their own programmes. Somebody gets an idea and, who knows, it might be a good idea in itself; but first crack out of the bag and they get fanatical about it. With the best motives, they use brute force to get their message home.’

  ‘Any means justified, if the end’s right.’

  ‘That’s it. But it just isn’t true. Means have a way of altering ends. History proves it, over and over again. Why can’t these people be frank and tell us what they want? What do they expect from us?’

  ‘It can only be something they believe we wouldn’t accept given free choice.’

  ‘We should try to get out of here.’

  Helena Russell went to her locker, snapped on her kilt and put on the sandals. It was half way to feeling fully clothed and in her right mind. Sandra did the same. Starting at either end, they made a slow circuit of the walls. The white enamelled cladding was in sections. Any one panel could be a door. None moved a millimetre under any kind of pressure.

  They were still working methodically, when a whole unit of oscilloscopes pivoted on its base and Rama was in through the gap followed by a couple of Copreon men and four women. As a gesture towards medical etiquette, all except Rama wore white kilts and the women had broad electrum armbands bearing pictographs of a syringe and a lotus plant. Helena Russell had walked into too many sick bays in similar company to be in any doubt. It was a medical team doing the rounds.

  There was no surprise that the patients were up and about. Rama, less smiling than usual, said formally, ‘Good day. Dr. Russell.’

  Helena left the wall she was testing and walked to meet them. Her particular style of blonde beauty was a new thing to the Copreons and all eyes tracked her in. Keeping her voice steady and matter of fact, she said, ‘It will be a good day when we are in our ship and returning to base. Since you have listened so much to our speech you must know that our intentions were peaceful. Let us go as we came and very soon our moon will take us out of your system.’

  ‘I regret, that is not possible.’

  ‘Do you regret it or is that another meaningless phrase?’

  ‘In a certain sense. Other things being equal, I would rather have people pleased with what they are doing than otherwise.’

  Sandra Benes said bitterly, ‘But if what pleases them doesn’t happen to please you, something has to give and you prefer your own way.’

  ‘Just so. Every living organism engineers the environment, as far as it can, to give itself the maximum satisfaction.’

  Helena Russell had to concede that Rama had a powerful argument. Hedonist philosophy made a thick strand in human thinking. It was always a minority who could take the transcendental view and put themselves out of the centre slot. This time, they seemed to be getting Rama on a clear line. Maybe she would be prepared to say exactly what Copreon intentions were.

  Helena said, ‘What you say is partly true and partly not true, the debate still goes on. Are you ready, yet, to be frank with us and tell us what you have in mind for us?’

  Rama gave a curt gesture to her backup force. The two men went to work and wheeled out examination chairs, with headrests and footstalls set wide apart. The four nurses peeled off, two to each Alphan and waited for the next word.

  Rama said, ‘You can make this uncomfortable for yourselves or easy. There is nothing, in fact, to fear. You are to be given a thorough medical examination. You, at least, Dr. Russell, will see nothing strange in that.’

  The chairs were ready, plugged to the keyboard of a diagnostic computer. The nurses moved in, taking an arm each. Helena Russell considered it. She could struggle or she could walk. The end would be the same. It was better to walk and keep some kind of dignity. She threw off the two helping hands and walked firmly to the nearer chair.

  The Copreon operator, clearly very familiar with the technique, slipped two fingers in her waistband and whipped off her kilt. In three seconds flat she was staked out, ankles gripped by bands of infrangom, wrists strapped down to the armrests, head clamped to the stall.

  Keeping her voice steady and professional, Helena said, ‘What is the purpose of this examination? Alphans have regular medichecks. We carry no diseases which would harm you.’

  Rama was looking thoughtfully at Helena. She had seen the impact that was being made on the Copreon men. By her own philosophy, she was all for maximising on the pleasure principle; but suppose, for instance, this spectacular blonde creature should become the court favourite? It was an angle she would have to watch. There was a little of the dark pleasure of malice in her voice as she said, ‘I will tell you what is intended for you, Dr. Russell. You will remember that I said the Copreon women are sterile and that the medical skills available here could not help us. That was not strictly true. We have a competent medical team; but we do not have supplies of a certain drug, which is the key element in reversal procedures.’

  Helena said, ‘It is possible that our resources on Alpha could help you.’

  ‘I think not. But there is something we can do. First we have to assess your compatibility. You understand that transplant surgery has always had problems where host tissues and donor tissues do not match. Rejection occurs. We must check this and calculate what, if any, modification is needed for the Alphan body to match our own.’

  Perhaps it would have been more reasonable to struggle to the last step. Helena felt suddenly sick. Sandra had been following the dialogue like a tennis umpire and began to heave away at her retaining straps, dark eyes brilliant with a mixture of anger and simple fear. She fairly spat out, ‘‘Don’t think you’ll get away with this. Alphans will avenge us. You are signing a death warrant for your people.’

  ‘You have probably misunderstood me. No harm is intended to you. You will simply carry out your function as women. You will act as hosts to Copreon foetuses. Fertilised eggs will be implanted in the uterus. You will bear the child. Its biological parents will be Copreon. The gestation period is shorter for us. We calculate that each of you, with care and attention, will bear two children each year. This will give our people new hope while they work on their long-term project.’

  Helena said, ‘That could only be done with our co-operation and you will not have it.’

  ‘Don’t deceive yourself, Doctor. One way or another, we will get it. Now, there are other matters I have to attend to. I leave you in attentive hands.’ Sandra had stopped struggling. One of the nurses had picked up a hypo gun and was examining the charge setting. The Alphan said quickly, ‘All right. That won’t be necessary.’

  The nurse looked across at Rama who had stopped at the hatch and got a curt nod. As a parting shot Rama said, ‘We are very reasonable. If you cooperate, you will be treated well. But if it becomes necessary, you will be kept under sedation.’

  The hatch closed at her back and the medical team went silently to work. Blood tests, smears, the whole range of data for their computer to go to work on. When it was done, the leading Copreon tore a long printout from the outfall and looked at it with every satisfaction. He spoke in Copreon and it was clear that it was all good news. They were in business.

  A nurse asked a question and got a short answer which was clearly a negative. The team tidied the work area and gathered at the hatch. With a final look at the Alphans and a comment which raised a general laugh, the leader opened up and all went through. One minute the ward had seemed over full and very busy, the next it was quiet as a grave and empty except for the Alphans.

  Sandra said, ‘Can they do it, Dr. Russell.’

  ‘There’s nothing against it. The technique was developed on Earth planet a few decades ago. It was never much used. Our problem was to control fertility rather than increase it. It’s an established practice for stock improvement, getting a good breeding animal to bear other strains more efficiently.’

  The chairs had been left at full tilt, so that the Alphans were lying almost horizontal. As she spoke, Hele
na had been rocking herself backwards and forwards, throwing her weight as far as she could to press her heels against the footrests and then her shoulders against the flat leatherette back. She was getting two of three centimetres of free movement.

  Sandra Benes saw the move and joined in enthussiastically on her own account. She also went on talking, recognising that there could well be a monitor on listening watch. ‘Rama said something about another project they have in the long term. What could she mean by that?’

  ‘I’ve been thinking about it. Two things possibly. One would be getting control of the whole planet again. The other would be trying to leave altogether and get back to Copreon.’

  ‘They said there were no ships.’

  ‘What they say and what the truth is, can be different.’

  ‘There could be a building programme. They might have a damaged ship somewhere that they aim to repair.’

  ‘Copreon is likely to be out of range for Eagle Nine, but they could use parts of her in their own craft.’

  There was no reply from Sandra. She was a surprised girl. A last frenetic thrust had beaten the ratchet stop and her chair had slammed forward. As the footrests swung down for a full due and thumped into the pedestal supports, there was a definitive click and the ankle bands snapped open. At the same time, the headband swivelled away.

  Without the wrist straps holding her arms, she would have been thrown flat on the parquet. As it was, she believed her shoulders would never be the same again as they took the strain.

  But she was free to move. Squatting under the curve of the chair, with an ache in every joint, she got her teeth to the right-hand strap and worked at it, blood dropping on her heaving chest as the metal toggle cut into her mouth.

  When her right hand came free she was sobbing with effort and had to clear sweat from her eyes. Then she was plucking the other strap away and dropped on all fours like a bemused hound dog. She crawled over to Helena and hauled herself to her feet using the chair as a prop. Swinging her weight with Helena’s she threw the chair past its stop and came near to getting herself flattened.