Star Bridge

by James Gunn

  He had thought of that dark room on Quarnon Four as the beginning and the killing as the end, but the bullet that had shortened Kohlnar’s life by only a few days had been an end only for the General Manager. Horn hadn’t thought beyond it to the inevitable consequence—his own death. He wondered now if the dark room had been the real beginning. He knew that it hadn’t.

  All the little things that go to make up a life had shaped him for the decision that had started him on a three-hundred-light-year journey toward death. The Cluster had given him birth and molded him.

  In the Cluster, individualism was sacred. There was too much to do to waste time on laws; they were obeyed or ignored as it suited the individual. Life was struggle; a man got out of it as much as he could take on his own. The frontiers were everywhere.

  Horn had learned self-sufficiency early. The first Quarnon War had orphaned him; the casual government had ignored him. He bore no malice for either. That was life; the sooner a man learned it, the better off he was.

  Everything he had ever had, Horn had struggled for. He grew strong and quick to learn. He became skillful in getting what he wanted and confident that he could get anything he wanted badly enough.

  All causes were alike, good and bad. A man got what he could out of them. The only person a man must answer to is himself.

  Above all, a man must not care. To care is to yield one’s armor against the world; to care is to hand the world the power to hurt. Let the universe go its way; Horn went his and took, with his strength, what he wanted from the universe.

  Horn looked up between the leaves at the stars. He had thought that people were like stars, separated by dark walls. But he saw them now connected by a network of nerves, bridged by sensitive filaments. No one exists in himself. No action is isolated. The black ships that had swooped down on the Cluster many years before had helped fire the shot that had entered Kohlnar’s chest.

  Is it like this everywhere? Horn wondered.

  He rolled over and got back to his knees and crawled forward again. Perhaps he did not live just for himself. He hadn’t been killed with his parents, and now a man was dead. If he lived now, would it have its effect somewhere else?

  Something brushed against his face, something dangling and furry. He reached out. It was a rabbit, still warm, hanging in the noose of one of his snares.

  Horn took a deep breath. It was a good omen. A rabbit died, and its death would give him strength. Perhaps that strength would give him life again.

  Horn remembered what he had decided back on the chessboard desert. A hiding place. The only place he could hide. As he took the rabbit down and began to skin it, the plan unfolded in his mind.

  THE HISTORY

  Cultures aren’t creatures.…

  And yet they are much alike. A creature is a collection of cooperating cells; a culture is a collection of cooperating individuals. Like cells, the individuals specialize in their functions; they divide labor and sometimes inherit these divisions; they propagate themselves. Sometimes they grow wildly and, unless controlled, threaten the whole organism.

  Like a creature, Eron needed blood, nerves, and food. Eron itself was the heart, the brain, and the stomach.

  One thick, golden cylinder drove out from Eron into the greatest engine of all, into the flaming, yellow heart of giant Canopus. It was the master Tube. It was power. Power sustained the deadly walls of the other Tubes, and the walls transmitted it to power centers at each Terminal. Power. The blood of empire.

  The Tubes were nerves. Along its walls raced variations—messages—bridging light years in hours.

  And through the Tubes, just as swiftly, sped the giant ships: freighters, cruisers, liners. The cradles inched them into the locks; massive doors closed behind; air was sucked out. Doors parted in front of them, and they fell, fell into darkness, fell toward the narrowing center of the Tube until they passed it and began to slow. Only the golden bands that encircled them insured against a fatal contact with the invisible walls. The food of empire.

  The analogy can be extended, but analogies don’t bleed on the dissection table. Eron was more and less than a living thing.…

  7

  THE DARK ROAD

  The lights roamed restlessly from artificial peaks, fleeing across the smooth pavement, illuminating for a second a dark form that turned its head away from unbearable brightness, jumping into the rocks, climbing the hills, crossing another beam like a giant sword, gleaming from the black flanks and golden bands of battleships with their own, roving cyclopean eyes.

  The changing, prismatic colors of the monument and the radiance of the golden Tube stretching starward from it made the center of the field bright with wonder and imagination. But the perimeter of the field was dark, and guards stood in the darkness like patient shadows, unmoving, waiting for dawn to give them rest.

  Among the shadow guards, a shadow moved; it was a little shorter than the others. A cloak and hood gave it a humped shapelessness. It passed from guard to guard, stopping for a moment and moving on.

  The great sealed ruins of Sunport were quiet. Elsewhere there was noise and life; here was only silence and shadows and the sweep of searchlight. The day’s thousands were gone, inspected, passed, shipped elsewhere, through the Tube at the domed base of the monument or through the older Terminal on Callisto. Only half the battleships remained around the edges of the field and the guards that were their complements. The only other ship was a small scout, insignificant beside the towering bulk of a battleship.

  The desert was stirred into a sea of climbing dust by ships and hunters; they soared over the mountains and toiled over the hills and probed the hollows. But here there was quiet. The assassin had escaped for the moment, but he would not get far. Certainly he would not return.

  “Guard!”

  The shadow stiffened as the shapeless shadow stopped beside him. It was a woman’s voice, low and soft.

  “Yes?”

  “What have you seen?”

  “Other guards.”

  She was passing, but she stopped and peered up at his shadow face. It was too dark to make out features. The guard saw nothing but a pale blur under the shadow of the hood. A faint fragrance drifted to him; his nose wrinkled. His pulse quickened. He had never been so close to one of the golden women. He could reach out now and touch her, if he dared.

  He stood straight and still, staring ahead.

  “You don’t think the assassin will come back?” the woman asked.

  “Guards aren’t paid to think.”

  “I’m asking you to think, now.” Her voice became reflective. “They laughed when I said he would be back. They said they would catch him on the desert.” She spoke to the guard again. “What do you think? Will he come back?”

  “If I were he, I would come back.”

  She peered at his face again, curiously, futilely. “Your accent is odd. Where were you born?”

  “In the Cluster.”

  “You enlisted after the War?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you don’t know this area.”

  “A little.”

  “Then where did the assassin come from?”

  “The desert.”

  “But the hunting parties were out. There’s no food and almost no water.”

  “A strong man could do it. A clever man could get through.”

  “But how would he get here? And how did he get away?”

  “Beyond the ship, there, is a tree. Behind the tree is a tunnel that cuts down through the mountain, down close to the desert. He never had to get closer than that.”

  “You knew this? Why didn’t you say something?”

  “To whom? I gave the reason before.”

  “Guards aren’t paid to think?” The woman was silent for a moment. “Maybe you’re right. But then you don’t love Eron, do you?”

  “Should I?”

  “Why did you enlist in the Guard if you didn’t want to serve Eron?”

  “There was another choi
ce?”

  “And yet Eron pays you, feeds you, shelters you. What do you give Eron in return?”

  “What Eron asks of me and everyone: obedience.”

  “You think we are hard masters then, the Golden Folk?”

  “Masters are good and bad. Eron remains the same. It didn’t grow strong by kindness. Eron is fat; the rest of the Empire starves.”

  “Then why doesn’t it revolt?”

  “With what? Fists against battleships? No, Eron is safe as long as it has the Tube.”

  The woman was silent for a long time. The guard stood straight, but his breath came quickly.

  “Why will the assassin come back?” she asked finally.

  “Where else can he go? The desert is suicide. The hills will soon be as deadly. His only chance is to come back here and steal a ship. Once among other men, you will never find him.”

  “I think you sympathize with him.”

  “He is a man like other men. Deluded, perhaps, but he did no more than any guard is paid to do.”

  “At least you’re honest,” the woman said. “I won’t ask your number. I’d have to report you for treason, and you’ve helped me tonight. I’m grateful.”

  She turned away. As she turned, they heard a faint groan. The woman started to swing back and found herself inside the arc of the guard’s powerful arm, a sweaty palm clamped over her mouth. She took a quick, sharp breath and started to struggle.

  Horn cursed softly to himself as he fought against the woman’s unsuspected strength. Her body was surprisingly firm and youthful, and her muscles twisted wirily inside his arms.

  A few minutes more and he could have dashed for the scoutship, but the woman had blundered along before he was more than dressed. It wouldn’t have mattered if he hadn’t been weak and talkative. Those had trapped him.

  He should have killed the careless guard, the fool who turned his back to shadows, but at the last moment he had slowed his hand. Here was a man, like himself perhaps, trapped into serving Eron; why should he die? He was no enemy. And Horn had let him live, to groan. And then he had kept the woman here with foolish chatter when she wanted to leave.

  Why? Horn decided to trust his intuition.

  The woman struggled fiercely, silently; she twisted and kicked, and her breath came hot and quick against Horn’s hand. Suddenly she stopped fighting. Her body stiffened.

  “Yes,” Horn whispered. “The assassin.”

  A wandering light swept close. Horn drew the woman back with him into the shadows. The diffused edge of the beam touched them. The woman’s hood had fallen back from her shoulders, revealing a long, tumbling mass of red-gold hair and the gentle sweep of a golden cheek. For an instant Horn’s arms relaxed; she almost got away from him then.

  In his arms was Wendre Kohlnar, the lovely face in the coin, Director for Communications, daughter of the man he had killed.

  Horn’s arms tightened just in time. “I don’t want to kill you,” he whispered. “But I will if you make me. It’s up to you. I’m going to let you go in a moment. Don’t move until I tell you. Don’t shout or scream. The moment you take a deep breath I’ll shoot you through the back. The pistol is turned to low velocity; it won’t make any noise. Understand?”

  She nodded. Horn’s arms dropped away. She drew in a quick breath. The pistol barrel jabbed into her back.

  “Careful!” Horn whispered.

  “I couldn’t breathe,” she said quickly. “You bloody killer!” she added bitterly.

  “I killed one man,” Horn said. “How many billions did your father kill? Not just men, either. Women and children, too.”

  “You know, then?” she said, starting to turn.

  “Keep your eyes ahead,” Horn snapped. “Yes, I know who you are.”

  “That was different,” Wendre said.

  “It always is.”

  “But why?” Wendre asked. Her voice was puzzled. “He was dying.”

  Horn didn’t answer. He didn’t know the answer, and he had asked himself the same question. Why? Who had wanted Kohlnar killed? Who had paid Horn to kill him? And why was it important that Kohlnar didn’t die a natural death?

  It was important. Someone had gone to a great deal of trouble and expense and risked his own life to set the plan underway. It had to be important. But it wasn’t as important right now as getting away and staying alive.

  “We’re going to walk across the field,” Horn said slowly. “You’ll walk in front; I’ll follow. Head for the scout. Climb the steps. Order the crew out. If you try anything, you’ll die.”

  “All right,” she said.

  “Let’s go,” Horn said.

  She walked in front of him across the field. It wasn’t far to the little ship, maybe two hundred meters, but the reflected glory of the monument was brighter as they went toward it.

  Wendre’s walk was a little hesitant and stiff, but Horn decided it would pass unnoticed. Who would question one of Eron’s Directors? Horn marched behind her at a respectful two-pace distance and a little to the left. It would take keen eyes to see, in the darkness, the pistol held low against his right thigh.

  Half of the distance was behind them. Still no challenge. No suspicion. The field lay in night and silence, stirred only by the sweep of roving beams and the brisk click-click of their footsteps on the pavement.

  The steep stairway leading up to the dark port of the scout was only a few steps away.

  “Slowly,” Horn whispered.

  Obediently, Wendre slowed her pace.

  Suddenly the odor of danger was stifling. Horn felt like screaming or running madly for the steps that led up toward freedom, up toward safety. He clamped his teeth firmly on his lower lip and stilled the eager trembling of his muscles. Of course there was danger. The farther he went, the more dangerous the situation became. It would build higher and higher until the scout blasted away from the mesa and got beyond the range of battleships, beyond pursuit.

  In front of him, Wendre’s shoulders straightened.

  “I don’t want to kill you,” Horn whispered.

  The shoulders slumped. She started up the steps.

  Danger. Stirring close. Crouching in the darkness. Horn’s eyes were busy in the masklike calm of his face. But he saw nothing.

  Calm! Calm!

  Horn climbed behind Wendre, watching her back, quickening his pace a little to close the gap between them. When they entered the ship, he must be only half a step behind.

  Two more steps. One.

  Danger! It exploded! Something moved in the shadow of the little ship. At the first flicker, Horn shoved Wendre forward, instinctively.

  The bullet whined between them and screamed off the rounded hull of the ship.

  “Guards!” Wendre was shouting. “The assassin. Guar—”

  The clanging of the port cut off her words. That way was closed. Wendre had tricked him. But it hadn’t been a trick. There had been a shot.

  And Horn was spinning, waiting for the second shot, braced against it. Before it came, his own gun spat. A muffled thud came from the shadows beside the ship. A groan. A whisper of cloth.

  A sound of men running. Shouts. The searchlights hesitated and began to converge.

  Horn was leaping down the steps. Two long strides brought him to the ground. He didn’t hesitate. He ran toward the center of the field, toward the glowing monument.

  Feet drew close behind him, many of them.

  “There!” Horn shouted. “There he is!”

  He ran hard, holding his gun in front of him. Behind, the running feet came on. But there were no shots.

  They were running into a fantasy of leaping, shifting, many-colored shadows, painting them with paint-dipped fingers.…

  “There he goes!” someone shouted.

  Behind, distantly, came the creaking of an opening port. A woman’s shouts were indistinguishable.

  You’re quick, Wendre, Horn thought. But not quite quick enough.

  A hunter has to know what he is hunting. T
he guards didn’t. No one knew what he looked like, not even Wendre. She knew that he was dressed like a guard, but she was the only one. As long as the chase continued, as long as the guards weren’t mustered, inspected, questioned, searched, they couldn’t find him. Before then, he would have to fade back into the hills. The far hills, this time.

  Someone pulled abreast of him. The long desert trip, the thirst, the hunger, the lack of sleep had weakened him. But the guard beside him was looking ahead, looking for an assassin.

  Assassin, assassin. The word hammered in Horn’s brain. What is an assassin? What does he look like? How can you tell him from other men?

  The Victory Monument drew close. Guards streamed by on both sides as Horn’s stride faltered. His breath came raggedly.

  He had time to wonder about the bullet that had passed so close to him. Close but too far. A foot in front. Fantastic inaccuracy for a guard. It had passed through the space where Wendre had been a moment before, where she would have been if Horn hadn’t pushed her through the lock. Wendre? Had the bullet been meant for her?

  Were there other assassins?

  And then Horn was beside the towering cube, glowing with the giant picture of the Cluster’s surrender. The platform was gone, and he wondered why he was here instead of running with the guards toward the distant hills, and then he understood. He could never make it. He could never survive another chase; he didn’t have the strength to escape again. Again his instinct had been quicker than his judgment.

  Here was escape. The only possible escape. Dangerous. Possibly fatal. But escape, if he lived through it. There was no other chance.

  He tried to remember the Terminal he had inspected on Quarnon Four, the Terminal that stood outside the capital like a monument to futility. Somewhere in the Cluster there had been another, just like it, identical with Eron’s Terminals to the minutest detail. They had never come to life. They had been dusty mausoleums for years.

  Horn felt along the smooth black wall. Close to one corner was a crack. He traced it as high as he could reach; it went on up. Down, it turned a corner a few centimeters from the pavement, paralleled it for a meter and turned up again. A rectangle. The door.