Astounding Science Fiction Stories: An Anthology of 350 Scifi Stories Volume 2 (Halcyon Classics)

by Various

  "I know. I came through it."

  "It was colonized originally with Indians from southern and eastern India, on Earth. That's why the Galactic League appointed me Observer. I'm an Indian. These people--well, they're what my people might have developed into if they'd lived for hundreds of years in perfect isolation."

  "What's the trouble?"

  Kovandaswamy answered with a question of his own. "You are aware of the Galactic League's chief aim?"

  "Sure. To see that no outworld, however small or distant, is left in isolation. Is that what you mean?"

  "Yes," agreed Kovandaswamy. "Their reason is obvious. For almost a thousand years now the human race has outpaced its social and moral development with development in the physical sciences. For almost a thousand years mankind has had the power to destroy itself. In isolation this is possible. With mutual interchange of ideas, it is extremely unlikely. Thus, in the interests of human survival, the Galactic League tries to thwart isolated development. So far, the Forgotten Worlds have cooperated. But Ophiuchus IX is an exception."

  "And the League wants me to find out why?"

  "Precisely."

  "How are they thwarting--"

  Kovandaswamy was sweating despite the air-conditioning, despite his almost-naked state. "You have the right to turn this mission down, of course. The League told me that."

  "I'm here," Mayhem said simply.

  "Very well, sir. Sooner or later, every outworlder who ventures out among the Ophiuchans kills himself."

  "I guess I didn't hear you. Did you say kills himself?"

  "Suicide, Mayhem. Exactly."

  "But how can you blame--"

  "Like their ancestors from the Earthian sub-continent of India, Mayhem, the Ophiuchans are mystics. The trance, the holy man who sits in contemplation of his navel, the World Spirit--these are the things of their culture most important to them. Mayhem, did you ever see a hundred holy men of India working together?"

  "Usually they don't work together."

  "Precisely, sir. Precisely. Here on Ophiuchus, they do. And not merely a hundred. All of them. Virtually all of them. Working together, their minds in trance, unified, seeking their World Spirit, they can do amazing things."

  "Like mentally forcing the outworlders to kill themselves?"

  "Yes, sir. Legally, they are innocent. Morally, they do not recognize the outworlders as equals of themselves. The League wants to know what they are trying to hide. It could be a threat to peace and--existence."

  "You have a body for me?" Johnny would be ready with that provided.

  * * * * *

  If anyone but Johnny Mayhem had asked that question, Kovandaswamy would not have known what he was talking about, or would have thought him insane, or both. But Johnny Mayhem was, of course, the legandary Man Without a Body. How many corporeal shells had he inhabited in the past half dozen years? He shrugged, not remembering. He couldn't remain in one body more than a month: it would mean the final death of his elan, his bodiless sentience. So far he had avoided that death.

  The Galactic League would help him if it could. Every world which had a human population and a Galactic League post, however small, must have a body in cold storage, waiting for Johnny Mayhem if his services were required. But no one knew exactly under what circumstances the Galactic League Council, operating from the hub of the Galaxy, might summon Mayhem. And only a very few people, including those at the Hub and the Galactic League Firstmen on civilized worlds and Observers on primitive worlds, knew the precise mechanism of Mayhem's coming. To others it was a weird mystery.

  Johnny Mayhem, bodiless sentience. Mayhem--Johnny Marlow then--who had been chased from Earth, a pariah and a criminal, almost seven years ago, who had been mortally wounded on a wild planet deep within the Saggitarian Swarm, whose life had been saved--after a fashion--by the white magic of the planet. Mayhem, doomed now to possible immortality as a bodiless sentience, an elan, which could occupy and activate a fresh corpse or one which had been frozen properly ... an elan doomed to wander eternally because it could not remain in one body for more than a month without body and elan perishing. Mayhem, who had dedicated his strange, lonely life to the service of the Galactic League because a normal life and normal social relations were not possible for him....

  "Then you'll do it?" Kovandaswamy asked on Ophiuchus IX. "Even though you realize we can give you no official help not only because the Galactic League approves of your work unofficially but can't sanction it officially, but because an outworlder can't set his foot outside this building for long or off the spacefield without risking death...."

  "By suicide?"

  "Yes. I'm practically a prisoner in Galactic League Headquarters, as is my staff. You see--"

  "What about the body?"

  Kovandaswamy looked at him nervously. "A native, Mayhem. A native won't be molested, you see."

  "That figures. What kind of native?"

  "In top shape, sir. Healthy, young, in the prime of life you might say."

  "Then what's bothering you?"

  "Nothing. Nothing, sir."

  "Your technicians are ready?"

  "Yes, sir. And vowed to secrecy."

  Mayhem found a tiny capsule in the pocket of his Sirian jumper, and popped it in his mouth.

  "What--what's that?" Kovandaswamy asked.

  Mayhem swallowed. "Curare," he said.

  "Curare! A poison!"

  "Paralysis," said Mayhem quickly. "Muscular paralysis. You die because you stop breathing. Painless ... and...."

  "But--"

  "Call your technicians ... new body ... ready...." Gasping, the Sirian gentleman, hardly Johnny Mayhem now, fell to the floor.

  Trembling, Kovandaswamy pressed a button on his desk. A few moments later, two white-coated technicians entered the office.

  "Project M," Kovandaswamy said.

  Grimly the technicians went to work.

  * * * * *

  Mayhem awoke.

  Ordinarily it was his elan alone which journeyed between the worlds, his elan which was fed the information it would need in hypno-sleep while the frozen body was thawed out. Sometimes, however, he came the normal way in a body which still had some of its thirty days left, as he had come to Ophiuchus IX in the Sirian gentleman.

  Darkness. The body felt young and healthy. Mayhem wondered vaguely how it had died, then decided it did not really matter. For the next thirty days the body would live again, as Johnny Mayhem.

  Recessed lighting glowed at the juncture of walls and ceiling. Mayhem was reclining on a cot. A loin cloth and a large shawl had been laid out for him. On the far wall of the room was a tinted mirror. Mayhem got up and went over there.

  What his new body looked like hardly mattered, he told himself. Youth, health, strength--these were important. He could sense them internally. He could....

  He stared at the image in the mirror. His face turned beet red. He went for the shawl and the loin cloth and put them on. Cursing, he went to find Kovandaswamy.

  "Is this supposed to be a joke?" Mayhem demanded.

  "You never asked what the--" Kovandaswamy began.

  "How am I supposed to find out anything--like this?"

  "It's a young body, a healthy body. It is also the one we were given when the Galactic League first came here. It is the only one we were given."

  "Take it or leave it, eh?"

  "I'm afraid so, Mayhem."

  "All right. All right, I guess I shouldn't complain. It could probably outrun and outfight and outthink the dyspeptic old Sirian gentleman, and things turned out well enough on Sirius III. But it'll probably take most of my time just getting used to it, Kovandaswamy. I'm supposed to be conducting an investigation."

  "At least as an Ophiuchan you won't arouse suspicion."

  Mayhem nodded slowly, with reluctance. There was nothing else to say. He shook hands with Kovandaswamy and, wearing the loin cloth and the shawl, left the Galactic League building.

  With, of course, a completely
new identity.

  Mayhem walked a mile and a half through hot, arid country. The League building was isolated, as if its inmates might contaminate the native Ophiuchans. Along the dusty road Mayhem passed a guru, the name for a wise man or a holy man first in India and now here on Ophiuchus IX. The guru sat in contemplation of the tip of his nose, legs crossed, soles of feet up, eyes half-closed. The guru remained that way, without moving, until Mayhem was out of sight. Then the guru behaved in a very un-guru-like manner.

  The guru got up quite nimbly, joints creaking, skin dry and cracked. Three strides brought him to a tree with a partly hollow trunk. He lifted a radio transmitter and began to talk.

  * * * * *

  In twenty generations, the initially small population of Ophiuchus IX, all colonists from India on Earth, had increased geometrically. The colonized planet, now, was as over-populated as the teeming sub-continent which long ago had sent the colonists seeking a new home. As a result, unemployment was chronic, discontent widespread, and whatever inner serenity mysticism might bring was widely sought after. This did not stop the non-mystics, however, of whom there were many, from seeking jobs that could pay money that could fill empty bellies....

  A long line gathered outside the employment office of Denebian Exports the morning after Mayhem had left the League building in his new body. Denebian Exports was the largest outworld company currently on Ophiuchus, a company which had solved the outworlder-suicide problem quite simply by hiring no one but natives. Still, hoots and catcalls surrounded those on the employment line. Other jobless Ophiuchans, apparently preferring near-starvation to working for the outworlders, threatened to make the situation dangerous.

  Pandit Gandhi Menon, a lean, handsome Ophiuchan of perhaps thirty years, wished there was some way he could shut his ears to the abuse. He needed work. His father and mother were ill, his child was starving, his wife already dead. The gurus offered their own unique solution, of course. The body is nothing, they said. The mind is everything. But thus had the gurus spoken for four thousand years, on Earth and on Ophiuchus. The great majority of Ophiuchans, Pandit Gandhi Menon included, preferred food for the body to food for mystic thought. Still, the crowds were ugly, threatening to break up the line of job-seekers if Denebian Exports didn't open its doors soon....

  An unkempt little man, not old but with a matted growth of beard, an unwashed body which gave the impression of wiry strength, and wild eyes, abruptly flung himself at the young woman in line in front of Pandit.

  Shouting, "Not our women, too!" the little man attacked the girl, trying to drag her from the line. "It is bad enough our men, but not our women!"

  * * * * *

  Pandit caught the fanatic's wiry arm and brought it behind his scrawny back in a hammerlock. "Leave her alone," he said. "If you try that again, I'll break your arm."

  The fanatic looked at Pandit with hate in his eyes, but stepped back and stood to one side mouthing invective.

  The girl, who was about twenty-five years old, had a livid mark on her arm. She wore loin cloth and shawl, the usual garb. She was, Pandit observed for the first time, quite pretty.

  "Thank you," she said. "I--I'm not sure I like working for the outworlders. But I need the money."

  "Don't we all," Pandit told her. "But we're not hired yet. I am Pandit Gandhi Menon."

  "Sria Krishna," the girl said, smiling at him. "What sort of work is it?"

  "Don't you know, Sria Krishna?"

  The girl shook her head and Pandit said: "Actually, I guess I don't know, either. But there are rumors the outworlders want jet-pilots. Not for rocketry. For jets. To fly to the Empty Places."

  * * * * *

  "The Empty Places? Why?"

  Pandit shrugged. "Because they are empty, perhaps. Because they are too dry and too arid to support life. Because Denebian Export can claim whatever it found there, for free export. So go the rumors. But surely you can't pilot a jet."

  "Can you?"

  "Yes," Pandit said promptly with a faint show of pride.

  "My father taught me. I want to thank you for what--"

  "Nothing. Anyone in my position would have done it. This rabble--"

  The rabble was still noisy. Occasionally they hurled offal at the stragglers joining the rear of the long line. But Pandit and Sria Krishna stood in the forefront, and presently the door opened. In a few minutes Pandit watched the girl disappear inside. He waited nervously, licking dry lips with a parched tongue. It was early morning, but already very hot. He needed the work. Any work. He needed the money which outworlders could pay so abundantly for honest work. He wondered if the fanatic gurus ever thought of that. Then the door in front of him opened again and a fat, unctuous-looking Ophiuchan came out. He seemed to be an official of sorts.

  "One more!" he said. "Only one! The rest of you begone."

  Behind Pandit there was a general press of bodies, but he was first in line and did not surrender his position. The unctuous-looking man admitted him, half-expecting a bribe. Pandit passed him by; he didn't have a single copper.

  He approached a desk. The crowd noise outside was loud, those who had not joined the line crowing because most of those on it had been turned away. Behind the desk sat a small Denebian man of middle years. He looked nervous.

  "Can you fly?" he asked in a voice almost desperately thin.

  "Yes," Pandit said. Then the rumors were right.

  "How much experience?"

  "Five years on and off."

  "You have a license?"

  "There are no licenses on Ophiuchus IX," Pandit pointed out.

  "Yes, of course. I'm sorry. Habit. You people don't lie."

  "We try not to."

  "Your name?"

  Pandit told him. The Denebian wrote it down on a form and said: "You'll do. Pay is twenty credits a mission." It wasn't much, but it was more than Pandit had expected.

  "What do we fly?" he asked. Questions didn't seem welcome, but no harm trying.

  * * * * *

  The Denebian looked at him and laughed. "You want the job?"

  "Yes, I want the job."

  "Then don't ask questions."

  Pandit nodded.

  "Out through that door, then. The other new pilots are assembling."

  And Pandit left the small office.

  A moment later a buzzer sounded on the Denebian's desk. He spoke into a grid: "Orkap here. Go ahead."

  "The guru near the League building reports that a native Ophiuchan left the building heading for the city."

  "When was this?"

  "Yesterday morning."

  "And?"

  "Draw your own conclusions. Natives don't go near the League headquarters as a rule, do they?"

  "No."

  "And the League, of course, will want to know about the suicides?"

  "Yes, but--"

  "But nothing," said the radio voice, which belonged to the only other Denebian currently on Ophiuchus IX. "We can assume this native is a spy. For the League, Orkap."

  "All right. I don't see any need to worry, though."

  "Don't you? The gurus, like the other natives, can sham, but they can't lie. Sooner or later a guru will be brought out of trance by the League, questioned, and--"

  "Tell them about us?" Orkap asked in a shocked voice.

  "It could happen. Maybe it's happened already. There won't be any proof, of course, but the League would send a spy. Suppose I describe this native to you."

  Orkap said, "Go ahead," and the radio voice did so.

  In a shocked voice Orkap admitted: "I've given that Ophiuchan a pilot's job this morning. There can't be any doubt about it."

  "Ah, then you see? You see?"

  "I can fix that. I can--"

  "Orkap, Orkap. You'll do nothing now. Let the spy alone for now. Then, in the Empty Places, you will merely announce to the pilots that there is a spy among them. Don't reveal who it is." He could not believe his ears.

  "But--"

  "They want work. They need w
ork. They'll all be afraid the finger of guilt may point at them. They'll work like dogs for you, and I wouldn't be surprised if they uncovered the spy themselves."

  "Yes," Orkap said. "Yes, I understand."

  "All but one thing, Orkap. There is one thing you don't understand. The spy's identity--"

  "You already told me who the spy was."

  "Yes. But there is another spy. Working for us, in the League building."

  "I never knew," said Orkap.

  "The spy among your pilots is more than appearance indicates. Did you ever hear of Johnny Mayhem?"

  Orkap's heart jumped into his throat. Who in the galaxy hadn't heard of Mayhem? "But," he gasped, "a--"

  "Nevertheless. It is Mayhem."

  Orkap was suddenly afraid, more afraid than he had ever been in his life. The ubiquitous Mayhem.

  * * * * *

  The fierce white sun of Ophiuchus IX broiled down on the Empty Places, a featureless desert two-thousand miles across and as lividly white as bleached bone. In all that burning emptiness, the jet cargo craft looked very small and very insignificant, like black midges on the dead white sand.

  Midges among midges, the new pilots walked.

  One said: "But I see no cargo."

  Another: "These outworlders and their mystery...."

  All were sweating, all uncomfortable, but all grateful for the twenty credits a flight they would earn, whatever the cargo turned out to be.

  "What do you think?" Pandit asked Sria.

  "I think I've never been so hot in my life. I feel like I'm being broiled alive."

  "Here comes the Denebian now."

  They had been driven into the Empty Places in a sand sled. The trip had taken two days but because the sled was air-conditioned no one had objected. When they saw the half dozen jets they knew why a sled had taken them into the wilderness. The jets were small cargo-carriers with room for pilot, co-pilot and perhaps a ton of cargo in each. Whatever it was the Denebians wanted exported, it didn't take up much room.

  Orkap of Deneb walked toward them past the first of the jets. He began without preamble: "Your cargo is packed and ready to be moved in an underground vault five hundred yards from here. You will break up into pairs, a pilot and co-pilot for each jet." Sria Krishna and Pandit had already paired themselves together. "You work on your own time, getting the cargo with trundle-sleds, loading it, taking off, delivering it to the Denebian freighter at the spaceport. When you are finished, you collect your pay."