Assassination Brigade

by Nick Carter

  In Moscow, he continued his work, but he’d had more sophisticated electrical processes at his disposal. The Russians had constructed artificial arms and hands for him, and he’d been a brilliant success.

  “But the Russians,” he added, “never stopped being suspicious of me.” He paused again and moved his hips against the seat of the wheelchair. Both legs, which I now saw were artificial, fell to the floor.

  “They cut off my legs so I could never escape. They knew I was their enemy. I have always believed in die superiority of the German people. All my work had been to help die German state rule the world—and now that I’ve perfected my techniques, my dream will come true.

  “But to return to the Russians—they had been investigating the history of the Third Reich and they’d discovered my deep, personal devotion to Hitler. But that didn’t stop them from wanting to use my scientific knowledge. They believed I was close to a breakthrough in my experiments. So they kept me in isolation; I had nothing but my work.”

  Von Alder sat in his armchair in front of me, an armless and legless torso. I could see that he was savoring my revulsion and shock as I stared at him. He gave a high, bitter laugh and, using the muscles in his back, sent the wheelchair zig-zagging across the room and back to me again, proving he was far from helpless even now.

  Stationary once more, he went on with his story. In Russia, he had finally perfected a theory to successfully control humans, for by that time, two new developments had been introduced in the world—computers and miniature transistors.

  “As soon as I discovered these two elements,” Von Alder told me, “I knew I had what I needed. The computer, after all, was simply a mechanical brain that could be programmed to do whatever I wanted it to do—a brain outside a body. I knew that if I placed a tiny transistor inside a human brain, I could feed orders from die computer into the transistor. My subject would be under my absolute control.”

  But he still had a problem: he hadn’t known how to place a transistor, even a mirco-dot transistor, inside the human brain. He continued experimenting, never revealing his theory to the Russians.

  Then, Chinese scientists began visiting Moscow to exchange information. Von Alder decided to switch sides. The Chinese seemed to know nothing of his political past and he would be assured of better treatment. He made friends with a Chinese physicist and through him got smuggled out of Russia. It had been easy. Von Alders artificial arms and legs had been removed and he had been fitted into the bottom of a crate of scientific instruments being flown to Peking.

  “Once in China,” Von Alder went on, “I found the solution. It was amazingly simple. Can you guess?”

  Before I could say anything, he answered himself: “Acupuncture.”

  He raced on breathlessly with his story. Using the ancient Chinese medical art of acupuncture, he could bury a micro-dot transistor in the human brain. The transistor was fed from a computer and Von Alders control of the human being was complete.

  As he had done in Russia, Von Alder kept his discovery secret. When the right opportunity came, he planted a micro-dot transistor in the brain of a drunken official of the Communist party, a high-ranking member of the government. Then he activated the transistor with a previously programmed computer, and the Chinese helped Von Alder escape to Switzerland.

  “Unfortunately,” Von Alder sighed mockingly, “the poor Chinese was killed while flying back to his homeland.”

  As soon as he reached Switzerland, Von Alder had contacted his wife. Unknown to him, she had given birth to their daughters soon after the Russians had taken Von Alder away. Ursula continued to keep her husband’s identity a secret because of his association with Hitler, but she had supplied him funds to open a health spa. His family did not know of his current experiments and his daughters never suspected that “Dr. Bosch” was their father.

  The spa flourished, attracting an international clientele of the wealthy and powerful. Von Alder spent years building his assassination squad, implanting the micro-dot transistor in the brains of carefully selected patients at the clinic. When the doctor was ready, he simply activated his human robots through the computer.

  I’d been silent during his long narrative, partially because Von Alder was talking nonstop and partially because his story was too incredible to comment on. He was clearly mad, but he proved very quickly that he was not stupid.

  As if reading my mind, he snapped, “You don’t believe me. You think you’ve been listening to the wild ramblings of a crazy old man.”

  He wheeled over to the huge computer, saying, “Listen to this, Mr. Carter. Listen carefully.” He signalled to Suzanne Henley, who pressed a button. Suddenly, the voice of the President of the United States filled the room. He was discussing the upswing of trade with Russia and China. As his voice continued, Von Alder’s wild cackle almost drowned it out.

  “Not only do the transistors transmit my orders,” Von Alder said, “but they also act as receivers. I can hear conversations taking place all over the world. You are now hearing your president speak through a transistor planted in die brain of one of your State Department’s highest officials. They are at a Cabinet meeting.”

  Von Alder signalled to Suzanne, and she pushed a series of buttons. Conversations from Russia, China, England flooded the room, one after another.

  Now I knew how Von Alder followed all my actions, beating me to every destination. He must have had transmitters in the brains of Agent Z1 and Verblen, and perhaps others at AXE.

  “Nobody can stop me,” Von Alder boasted. “I arranged those assassination-suicides so there would be no questions left when I came in with the big kill. When I threaten now, they’ll believe me. And do exactly as I wish.”

  His eyes glittering, the doctor rolled his wheelchair close until our faces were only inches apart. “Now we shall discuss your future, Mr. Carter. While you were unconscious, I placed a transistor in your brain. In a moment my assistant,” he nodded toward Suzanne, “will activate it. From then on, you will be totally and completely in my power, obeying the programmed tape that I have placed in the computer.”

  Von Alder sat for a moment, staring into my face. He obviously relished my helplessness. I realized only too well his power, and I felt the sweat break out on my body.

  Von Alder turned away from me and nodded to the girl. I braced myself as I watched her hand reach for a button on the computer. She touched the button. A set of lights flashed and more buzzing came from the machine. I waited tensely, not knowing what to expect. Would I black out? Would I lose all memory of the past? What would happen? Soon the lights stopped flashing.

  “The Nick Carter transistor has been activated, Dr. Von Alder,” the girl said in a cool voice. “Function is perfect.”

  I sat stiffly in the chair. I had felt nothing—my brain was still operating as clearly as before. I didn’t know what had happened, but obviously I was not under Von Alder’s control. I tried to make a rigid mask of my face so that he wouldn’t detect anything.

  Von Alder apparently thought the operation had succeeded. He scarcely gave me a second glance as he wheeled excitedly about the room, talking to himself. “I have succeeded! Again as always!”

  He made a motion toward Suzanne and said, almost contemptuously, “Release him, please.”

  The girl quickly came to my bed and began to loosen the straps that held me. I kept my face averted in case she might see something there to warn her, but she barely glanced at me. When I was finally free, she moved back to the computer. I didn’t know how to act then, so I simply sat where I was while Von Alder continued to breeze back and forth, rambling on about his plans.

  Suddenly, in the midst of his diatribe, he stopped talking and came rushing at me in the wheelchair, the nerves in his face twitching un-controllably.

  At almost the same moment, Suzanne screamed to me, “Look out, Nick! He knows you’re not controlled. He knows! He saw your eyes!”

  Her warning came just in time. I leaped from where I was sittin
g as Von Alder’s wheelchair came bearing down upon me. I saw then, too late, that there were two muzzles thrust out under the armrests of the wheelchair. One muzzle was spewing a sheet of searing flame, while a jet of blinding gas was emitted from the other. If I had not jumped when I did, I would have been burned to a crisp cinder. Even so, part of my left shoulder and arm were badly burned, and I was half-blinded as I dodged to one side.

  Von Alder, in a frenzy, swung the wheelchair around and came at me again, both muzzles spitting out the lethal flame and hissing gas. I ran, twisting and turning across die room, as he propelled the wheelchair at me. I was burned again across the back before I could elude him, for, this time, he had been traveling too fast. I was near exhaustion, but before he could swing the wheelchair around again, I lunged after him.

  As he was spinning die chair around, I sprang for his back and hooked an arm around his neck. The wheelchair was still racing forward, carrying me with it. With my free hand, I dug my fingers deep into Von Alder’s neck until I reached the nerve I was seeking. I applied pressure and temporarily paralyzed him. Now he couldn’t move , even a muscle to try to slow his vehicle. Using all my weight, I swung the speeding wheelchair around and aimed it straight at the wall of glass.

  The wheelchair raced full speed toward its target. I hung on, watching the wall come closer and closer until, when the wheelchair crashed through the glass, I dropped to the floor. The chair, with Von Alder’s body in it, shattered through the glass and tumbled end-over-end into the valley below.

  Suzanne Henley rushed over to me and helped me to my feet. I looked at her. “You saved me, didn’t you?”

  “Yes,” she answered, clinging to me. “I’ll explain it later.”

  The two of us stood wordlessly at the edge of the room, looking down into the deep chasm below. There, hundreds of feet below, lay Von Alder’s body on the glacier ice with the smashed wheelchair next to it. From the height, the body looked like a tiny broken doll whose arms and legs had been torn off. Suzanne shuddered, and I pulled her away from the window.

  “The computer,” she said, suddenly remembering. “I have to shut it down.”

  She hurried across the room and pushed the buttons. The rows of lights went out, and the buzzing slowed to a low hum. With a final shudder, the machine stopped altogether and stood silent.

  Suzanne looked at me. “It’s all right now,” she said. “The computer’s deactivated. None of die transistors will work, and all of Dr. Von Alder’s victims will resume their normal identities. In time the micro-dot transistors—including the one in your brain—will simply dissolve.” I nodded. It was over.

  Eighteen

  After the computer was stopped, I put in a call to Hawk in the States. I gave him a terse, complete account of what had happened. When I finished, he instructed me to stay at the spa. He would make a full report to the President and to representatives of other governments. Then they would all come to Switzerland to witness the final destruction of the computer.

  While Suzanne and I waited, she told me her story. She had worked for Von Alder for two years. She was British, had gotten to him through a classified help-wanted ad in a London newspaper. She had been a lab assistant in London and the spa offered something different to do.

  She’d been a virtual prisoner from the day she arrived. Escape was impossible. Even on the night she came to my hotel room, if she hadn’t knocked me out, somebody with her—one of Von Alder’s goons—would have finished the job.

  A combination of hate and despair drove her to take that wild gamble at the computer. She hoped, she prayed, that freeing me would help free her.

  Within a few hours, Hawk and his group began to arrive. They were incredulous when I related the full details of Von Alder’s story. I think if Suzanne hadn’t been there to back roe up—and if I didn’t have such a solid reputation in the field—I’d have been dismissed as a crank. And of course there was also the computer to provide proof.

  Acting on the orders of the President, Hawk had the Swiss authorities rope off the giant machine. On the following day, the spa was cleared of people. Then experts were called in to dismantle the computer. All evidence of Dr. Von Alder’s scheme to rule the world—the computer and the spa—was destroyed. The doctor’s body was flown to Berlin and placed in the Von Alder family plot in the dead of night. Only Ursula was informed of his death, and she requested that her daughters never know of their father’s existence after World War II.

  The people of Berne were told by the authorities that the spa had to be destroyed because the structure had been found unsafe. Now that the case was closed and everything accounted for, Hawk, Suzanne, and I met at the chalet, where I still had a room, for a farewell drink. Hawk was flying back that night, but he had generously suggested I might like to stay over another day.

  “Well, Nick,” he said, clinking glasses with me, “We can score another one for AXE.” That was the closest Hawk would ever come to giving me a compliment.

  Later, after Hawk’s plane had left, Suzanne and I lay in bed in my room. We had made love again, and I pulled her close to me and said, “You know, I feel like I could go on for the rest of my life making love to you. A dangerous feeling.”

  She raised up on one elbow, leaned over me, and smiled softly. “Maybe, Dumplink,” she whispered, “that’s just what will happen to you. Don’t forget, you still have a transistor embedded in your brain, and I know almost as much as Dr. Von Alder did about controlling people. I might just decide to make a small computer and program you so that you’ll have to make love to me day and night.”

  “You think that scares me?” I asked as I kissed her.

  The End

  Table of Contents

  Copyright Notice

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen