“And you think they took Wilma?” Huer prodded.
“They must have! They got her, if she was there. And they got my landcar, too! I had to walk all the way back to the Inner City. That’s why I was gone so long—and it nearly killed me, into the bargain.”
“I see, I see.” Now it was Huer’s turn to become agitated. He paced up and down, impatiently turning every time he reached the limit of the cell’s light-wall. “All right, Buck,” he stopped his pacing. “There’s only one course to follow. We’ve got to organize a rescue expedition and head back to Mount Rushmore.”
“That wouldn’t do any good,” Buck countered. “I’m sure those shepherds wouldn’t be there any more. In fact, I heard them leave in my own landcar before I started my walk back here.
“If Wilma overheard my conversation with old Aris—or if the Draconians found Aris and questioned him themselves—then the only place they’d be is—Salt Lake City!”
“What’s that? I never heard of such a city.”
“It’s a place where there was a genealogical-records center. Old Aris knew about it. The shepherds would know that I was headed there. They might have Wilma there, or if they’ve taken her elsewhere—maybe even somewhere off-planet—I’ve still got to go to Salt Lake. That’s where they would be looking for me. Now I’ve got to play into their hands, or seem to, so they can lead me to wherever they’ve taken Wilma!”
“I don’t know, Buck,” Huer shook his head doubtfully. “The more complex your scheme grows, the less I find myself liking it.”
“Doc, we’ve got to! It’s the only chance!”
“Well—” Huer paused, deep in thought. Finally he yielded. “All right, I’ll concede this much. I’ll take it up with my personal counselor. I’ll consult the greatest computer brain yet constructed. Dr. Theopolis.”
“No, Doc,” Buck said sadly.
Huer looked up from his mood of concentration. “No, you say?”
“No.” Buck shook his head.
“Why not?”
“Because Theopolis isn’t here any more. I was just starting to tell you that when you changed the subject. I’m afraid that I traded him to a gypsy named Pandro for the information that Aris was still alive and could help me with my quest.”
“Oh, my, oh, my,” Huer said over and over. “Then I’m afraid that my only other course will have to be to appeal to the full council. And when I do that, and they hear of your escapades and the way you lost both Wilma and Theopolis, they’re going to be very upset with me—and very, very, very upset with you, Buck!”
The Inner City Council of Computers met in a secure chamber in the heart of the Palace of Mirrors. There were levels and degrees of security clearance to be passed through before anyone could begin to approach the council chamber, and by the time anyone reached the chamber itself, he had passed the ultimate tests of loyalty and reliability of the Inner City—or had been dragged there unwillingly, a prisoner brought to face the bar of justice.
In today’s proceeding, Dr. Huer and Captain Buck Rogers had given their testimony and then been excused while the computer brains went to their private deliberations. Each brain was a device of data circuits and processor arrays, microminiaturized storage units and advanced-logic pathways. All were similar, and all were housed in like plexiglass cases, but in their innermost circuitry no two were quite identical. It was as if a council of the wisest of human minds had assembled: all alike in outer form (more or less) and all alike in inner function (also more or less), but all unique as well, each the individual product of a special combination of heredity and environment unlike, in whatever great or small manner, the others.
Their names hardly mattered.
Their backgrounds, their unique capabilities, were hidden inside those identical plexiglass cases. But their deliberations sounded like this:
“The man is a menace. He should be banned from the city.”
“No, that’s too good for him. He has lost the commander of our finest fighter squadron, and the most complex and advanced computer advisor in our own ranks—our very good friend and colleague Theopolis.”
“We must be rational about this. After all, we are computers ourselves, not protoplasm beings like the humans. The question before us is this: shall we allow Captain Rogers to go to this Salt Lake City place, and perhaps be taken prisoner by the Draconians, in the hopes of retrieving Colonel Deering or Dr. Theopolis?”
“No! We must simplify matters. Deering and Theopolis are lost! We had best keep Rogers a prisoner and prevent his doing still more harm!”
“Now, wait, my friends. What will best serve the Inner City? That must be our prime guiding principle in all things. This man is from the twentieth century. His knowledge of the past is a unique resource. Further, he is a born pilot, an expert rocket flyer. He is too valuable to waste, sitting and rotting in a light-cell.”
“On the other hand, Colonel Deering and Dr. Theopolis are also valuable members of the city—too valuable to let go of without at least an attempt to regain them. This man is our only link to their disappearance and our hope for getting them back! We have to let him try, for the good of the city.”
“That does compute, doesn’t it?”
“I’m afraid it does. I dislike doing so, but I fear I have to agree.”
“Yes, I agree also.”
“Very well, then, we have reached our consensus. The council is agreed that Rogers will be freed—not cleared of the charges against him, but rather offered his freedom as an opportunity to go after the others and try to rescue one or both of them!”
Buck was sitting in Dr. Huer’s office when word of the council’s decision arrived. He had been cleaned up since his arrival back at the Inner City and his incarceration in the light-cell. His hair was combed now, his face smooth-shaven, his tattered rags replaced by a sleek set of male garb.
His tormented body had been rebuilt by good eating and special nutrient supplements. He was strong and spry, ready to return to whatever action presented itself.
Dr. Huer received the official notification of the council’s command and informed Buck of it. “I’m not thrilled,” the aged savant commented. “You’re neither convicted nor cleared, Buck. You’re to be freed conditionally, in hopes of getting back Wilma and Theopolis.”
“Good,” Rogers snapped. “I don’t care what kind of official stamp those boxes of dry cells put on my papers. The important thing is that they’re willing to let me go after Wilma.”
Huer stared at Buck.
“And Theopolis,” the latter added. “I miss Theo, too, Doc. But after all, he is just a machine!”
“I’m not sure that I’d agree with you on that point,” Dr. Huer countered, “and I doubt very much that Dr. Theopolis would! But—as soon as Ellis 14 arrives with your special equipment, we can start getting you ready to go.”
“Who’s Ellis 14?” Buck asked.
“Why, he’s here now,” Huer replied, as a panel slid open in the wall and a tall figure emerged from it.
Ellis 14 was as tall as Buck Rogers. He had a shimmering metallic skin, a slim but powerful build, and a graceful, confident way of moving himself. He was a sort of male analogue of the female secretarial robot in the outer office, Lisa 5.
“How do you do, Captain Rogers,” Ellis 14 said in an electronic voice. “I’m very pleased to make your acquaintance.”
“Likewise,” Buck mumbled, not certain whether it was etiquette to offer to shake hands with a robot.
“I’m your armorer,” Ellis 14 intoned. “I’ve brought you some equipment for use on your new mission. Here,” he said, extending a laser-gun toward Buck, hilt first, “your personal hand-weapon. Please be careful with it. Please do not point it at any person or object you do not mean to destroy. That includes me. It is capable of cutting through twelve senks of alum.”
Buck took the pistol and slipped it into his belt.
Ellis 14 held a small, soft case toward Buck. “This is your survival kit,” the robot
said. “It contains first-aid devices as well as signaling and survival gear. Notable features are the blood-stop, brace clamp, emergency protein supply, moisture synthesizer, and solar-storage blanket.”
“I wish I’d had this on my way back from Rushmore,” Buck commented.
“That is regrettable,” the robot answered. “The kit is a non-sensitive item and would have been available to you upon request, Captain Rogers. Why did you not draw one before departing Inner City?”
“Never mind,” Buck said. “How’s about a spare pair of socks?”
“Notice the linear extrusions on the outer surface of the survival kit,” Ellis 14 answered. “Emergency clothing supplies contained therein are made to expand upon contact with outer atmosphere and/or vacuum to counteract the special contractile storage conditions of the container.”
“I’m sorry I asked,” Buck said huskily.
“Also,” Ellis 14 said, “here is your line-beam.” He handed Buck a tiny package hardly bigger than a .22-caliber cartridge. “Hide this anywhere upon your person, or leave it in a place of your own selection for alternate usage. It is a line-transmitting device which emits a unique pulsating signal which we can detect and locate from selected monitoring stations. Its range is indefinite and its speed of propagation, as yet unmeasured, appears to approach the instantaneous.”
“What’s he talking about, Doc?” Buck asked Dr. Huer.
“What he’s saying, Buck, is that if you keep that line-beam on your person, we can locate you, at any time, any place in the known universe. Or, if you leave it somewhere else, we can locate the line-beam itself.”
“Ah-hah!” Buck commented. “O-kay! You guys have some hotshot equipment section around here. You’ve come a long way since old oh-oh-whatsiz-name’s day!”
The door from Dr. Huer’s reception room opened and the Lisa 5 secretarial robot entered the inner office. She handed a message to Dr. Huer. “I’m sorry to interrupt, Doctor. I think this may be very urgent.”
Huer accepted the scrap of message paper from the robot.
Meanwhile Buck was watching a bit of amazing interplay between the Lisa 5 and the Ellis 14 robots. As the secretarial model entered the room the armorer had followed her every move with the electro-optical scanners that he used for eyes.
While Dr. Huer was reading the message form, Lisa 5 looked around the inner office. When her eyes—or electro-optical scanners—met Ellis 14’s, an almost visible bolt of energy passed between the two slim figures. In an instant Lisa 5 looked away, for all the world like a shy, yet subtly coquettish woman noticing the frank admiration of an attractive man.
Huer looked up from the message slip. Absent-mindedly he thanked the Lisa 5 robot again for bringing it. Then to Buck he said, “This is a report on the playback scan of the Mount Rushmore area. We had it shot from orbit. I’m sorry, Buck, it doesn’t show anything very useful.”
Lisa 5 had remained standing near Dr. Huer—and Ellis 14. Now Huer noticed her and said, “Thank you, Lisa. You may go.”
She exchanged a parting glance with Ellis 14 that all but singed the air between them to an electric-blue cinder—then moved back to the outer doorway, swaying as she went.
“I wonder if that was passion or just a short circuit,” Buck laughed.
Huer, abstractedly again, simply hummed.
“How do these robots reproduce?” Buck asked softly.
“We build them in a factory. How did you think?” Huer responded.
“Maybe you don’t have to.”
Ellis 14 said, “Captain Rogers, you should have a soma drone to replace your broken Twiki, and a new compuvisor to replace Dr. Theopolis.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Buck told the armorer. “I want to travel light on this little outing. I’ll go alone. And I intend to get Theo back. He thinks I sold him out—and I suppose I did, in a way. But if I’m responsible for his loss, then I’ll be the one to rescue him, too!”
“I hope you’re right, Buck,” Dr. Huer remarked. His voice, and his face, were those of a very worried man.
E I G H T
Fully outfitted in a military g-suit—or the twenty-fifth-century equivalent of that marvelous invention of Buck Rogers’ own era—and with all the special gear that Ellis 14 had provided him, Buck sat aboard a flashing monorail car, headed from his quarters in a smart residential sector of the Inner City, to the defense squadron ready-area of the domed metropolis’ spaceport.
His head was filled with his worries and his plans. The loss of Wilma Deering—and her presumed capture by the Draconians—had brought home to Buck the true strength of his feelings for her. These weren’t just the loyalty of a rocket jockey for his commanding officer, although that was part of Buck’s feeling; nor merely a sense of the obligations of friend-and-colleague for a fellow member of the spacefaring fraternity, although that was part of Buck’s feeling, too.
There was a stronger sensation than either of those familiar emotions. It was something that made his belly feel warm, his chest tight, and his head light whenever he thought of Wilma. It was something that Buck had heard about, read about, seen movies about, sung songs about—yet never quite believed in until now.
“Yep,” he thought to himself, “in the words of the immortal Duke Ellington tune, I got it bad and that ain’t good!”
He leaped to his feet as the monorail slid to a silent halt at the Inner City spacefield. He climbed down from the train and platform, passed through the ready-room, and crossed the tarmac, stepping between the waiting, ever-ready fighter rockets that stood prepared to blast off in defense of the Inner City and all of Earth at a moment’s notice.
He dismissed the ground crewmen who worked efficiently around the starfighters, climbed into the cockpit of his own craft, and dogged down the pilot hatch.
He started through the checklist that every pilot had to follow before any takeoff. As Buck neared the end of the list there was a bleep from his cockpit telescreen. He finished the checklist and flipped the toggle to activate the telescreen.
The screen flickered to life. A face filled its dimensions—a rounded, hairless dome, a face with small, refined, even wizened features and bright, piercing eyes that bored into Buck’s from behind a pair of old-fashioned, lens-and-earpiece spectacles.
“Huer here,” the cockpit speaker announced unnecessarily.
“Yes, Doc,” Buck answered.
“I just ’vised you to wish you—what did you people used to say? Bon ami!”
“Thanks, Doc,” Buck laughed. “That’s French for good friend. I think you meant bon voyage. That means good trip. But I appreciate the thought, I really do.”
“All right, Buck. Try to stay in contact. Use your line-beam any time. And try to bring Wilma back for us, will you?”
“You bet, Doc. And thanks for the call. I don’t know why I didn’t think of using a starfighter before, for traveling around this continent. With the roads mostly shot and the trains not running any more, it sure beats the tar out of walking a Couple of thousand miles.”
He flicked off the televisor link with Dr. Huer and switched it for a video scan of the Earth from his starfighter. Then he punched the firing stud for his main power-packs and the ever-present hand of the space god slammed him back against his padded pilot’s seat.
The starfighter blasted away from the tarmac, away from the spaceport, away from the Inner City, away from the banks of what had once been Lake Michigan.
Only this time it did not continue into the void of outer space, either to orbit the Earth or to head for some more distant celestial point. It arced, instead, across the heavens over North America, headed in a sub-orbital path from northeast to southwest, to the basin of what had once been the Great Salt Lake and was now a huge, glistening white salt flat in the middle of the great southwestern desert.
In a mere matter of minutes the starfighter completed a journey even longer than the one that had taken Buck so long, when he returned on foot from Mount Rushmore to the Inner City. As
the one-man rocket arced in for its landing, Buck hit the manual override switch and took control back from the ship’s computer guidance system. He guided the starfighter in for a landing, like a onetime fighter jockey making for the deck of an oceangoing aircraft carrier.
The starfighter skidded to a halt on glistening salt flats and Buck Rogers undogged the pilot hatch, climbed from the cockpit, and hit the hard, dry surface of the old lakebed.
Before him stretched an incredible sight. It was as if he had mistakenly set a course for one of the planet’s polar ice caps instead of the heart of old Utah. A sea—or rather, an “ice floe”—of dazzling, pure white stretched as far as the eye could see. Buck started forward and the “ice” crystals crunched drily beneath his flight-booted feet.
And at the far edge of the plain of whiteness there rose what might have been some relic-city left at the South Pole by a prehistoric race of nonhuman, perhaps even extraterrestrial, intelligence. Its spires rose into the air, some of them sheared off as if by a gigantic scythe, others complete to their tips where statues of golden angels sounded silent trumpets to summon long-dead multitudes to worship.
This strange vision was in the middle of the Utah desert, and the ice floe was really a salt flat, the dried residue of the onetime Great Salt Lake. And the temperature was well over a hundred degrees by the long-abandoned Fahrenheit scale of Captain Buck Rogers’ youth.
Buck sealed his starfighter securely and set out across the salt flats. By the time he reached the ancient temple at their far edge he was drenched in perspiration and his heat-sapped muscles were crying out for relief. But he grinned, and he pounded on the towering ornate doors of the temple. There was no response save the echo of Buck’s own blows.
“Sure,” he muttered to himself. “All dead.” But if the files survived . . .
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