The 8th Golden Age of Science Fiction MEGAPACK ™: Milton Lesser

by Milton Lesser

  "Don't worry about me. I can control it, I can control it."

  Bylanus passed an enormous hand through Bram Forest's body.

  "I'll materialize, when I find Ylia. She draws me...." Already the vision was fading.

  "Farewell, Bram Forest."

  Farewell....

  Was it merely the sound of the wind along the banks of the River of Ice? Bylanus wondered.

  * * * *

  Something struck Pirum's shoulder. The girl crouched, sobbing, at his feet. Pirum whirled.

  His face went white when he saw the man. He swung his fist desperately, and the man blocked it without effort. His arm was caught, as in a vise. He screamed. Something snapped in his arm. Something streaked at his face....

  He took the blow from Bram Forest's fist under the point of the jaw. His head snapped back against the dungeon wall and memory and desire and lust and life oozed out through his smashed skull.

  "Ylia!"

  "You came, Bram Forest."

  "I'll never leave you again."

  "Yes, now, in the amphitheater. I think...."

  Overhead, the crowd roared. Bram Forest listened for a fraction of a second, and raced for the stairs.

  When word of the duel between Bontarc and Retoc came by courier to Laugrim, second in command of the Abarian army under the missing Hultax, Laugrim decided it was time to attack. He gave the signal for his army to march on the city, and the signal was passed from signal-fire to signal-fire in the huge encampment. In a very short time, the army's vanguard began to march. There's no force on all Tarth strong enough to stop us now, Laugrim thought exultantly. This day, Retoc would rule Tarth.

  He was right. There was no Tarthian army strong enough to stop them. But the Army of the Golden Apes which, after Bram Forest's warning, had deployed itself at the very gates of Nadia City so the people in the amphitheater might witness the battle, was not of Tarth....

  * * * *

  "Well, Bontarc," cried Retoc, "can't you do better than that? Surely a king...."

  For many minutes now Retoc, the finest swordsman on Tarth, had been toying with his adversary. He could have killed Bontarc a dozen times over, but he waited, driving the Nadian ruler back, playing with him, making him do incredible gymnastics in order to survive, three times returning his whip-sword to him when it had been torn from the Nadian's hands.

  All Nadia—and all the rulers of Tarth—watched spellbound. It seemed to them that the Nadian ruler had gone into the contest willingly. They made no move, and under the ethics that governed their world, would make no move, to stop the uneven contest.

  Retoc's blurring sword-point whipped and flashed, drawing blood from a dozen superficial wounds. The smile never left Retoc's face. Desperately, knowing his life was forfeit whenever Retoc chose, Bontarc parried the whip-lashing blade.

  * * * *

  Bram Forest emerged into the dazzling sunlight of the arena floor. Squinting, he saw the figures across the sand.

  The men before him were Bontarc of Nadia and Retoc, slayer of his mother, destroyer of Ofridia.

  Retoc saw him first, and cried out exultantly. His wrist blurred, his whip-sword flashed, the point singing, and Bontarc's sword flew from his fingers. "You!" Retoc cried.

  The sword-point had slashed an artery on Bontarc's wrist. The blood spurted out and Bontarc stood there, dazed, holding the wound shut with his left hand.

  "Are you all right, sire?" Bram Forest asked.

  "I can manage until a doctor binds—"

  * * * *

  Bram Forest picked up the Nadian ruler's whip-sword and faced his enemy, sword to sword, at last.

  Retoc looked at him, and laughed. "I almost killed you once," he said. His hand barely seemed to move, but the point of his blade, whipping, flashing, was everywhere. Bram Forest parried desperately. "I'll finish the job now," Retoc vowed.

  Then Bram Forest did an unexpected thing. He used the whip-sword not as a sword: he couldn't hope to match Retoc's skill as a swordsman. He used it as a whip is used, his great arm slicing back and forth through air, up over his head and down, the long length of the uncoiled blading whipping and darting like something alive across the sands.

  Retoc retreated two steps, and lunged with what he hoped would be a death blow.

  Prokliam the seneschal was trembling so much he could hardly stand. Just outside the amphitheater, in the very shadow of the amphitheater wall, the great Golden Apes of legend had materialized. There were thousands of them, and they were three times the size of men, and methodically and with great ease, they were destroying the Abarian army before it could enter the amphitheater.

  Without the Abarian army, Volna and Retoc would never subjugate Nadia, never rule Tarth. But Prokliam the seneschal had committed himself to their cause. Now only death awaited him.

  Or, had he committed himself? Couldn't he change sides before it was too late? Couldn't he slay Volna, here in the royal box, for all to see? Couldn't he become a hero of the people? He was confused. He wished he could think clearly, but he was more frightened than he had ever been in his life. There was something wrong with his logic. Something.... Well, no matter. Slay Volna first, call her traitor, and then worry about his logic—

  He turned away from the wall and marched down the flights of stairs between the citizens of Nadia, flanked in two wildly shouting mobs on either side of the aisle, and plunged a knife into Volna's back, killing her instantly.

  The people roared, and rose up. Like a tide they swept toward Prokliam, the seneschal who had wanted to be prime minister.

  "No, no!" he cried. "No, please. You don't understand. ... I see it now ... what was wrong with my thinking ... you don't know yet ... you don't know ... to you she was still the Princess Volna, loyal, true ... you don't understand, please."

  The wave rolled over Prokliam the seneschal, leaving him battered and bloody and dead in its wake.

  * * * *

  The strong, whipping motion of Bram Forest's arm made a wall of steel of his whip-sword. Try as he might, with all the skill at his command, Retoc could not dent that wall. But, he thought, there was another way. Slowly, desperately, he maneuvered Bram Forest back toward Bontarc, who was sitting in the sand and using all his remaining energy to hold the life blood in his veins, his fingers clamped, vise-like, about his own arm.

  Bram Forest's arm blurred up, down, to either side. He wove a web of death. It was brawn against skill, he knew—and the strength of his arm might win! Retoc was sweating. Retoc was not the cool swordsman he had been moments before. Desperately, Retoc sought an opening, and found none. True, his superior footwork was forcing Bram Forest back across the sand, but what did that matter? Last time they dueled he had made the mistake of meeting Retoc on his own grounds as greatest swordsman of Tarth. This time....

  His legs caught against something. He fell heavily.

  Retoc's sword-point flashed down.

  Bram Forest rolled over, stood up with sand blinding his eyes. For precious moments he could see nothing but could only spin with the whip-sword; slashing air in all directions, hoping Retoc couldn't strike through the wall of steel.

  Then, slowly, vision returned to his stinging eyes. Bontarc lay stretched out on the sand now, unconscious, the blood pumping from his severed artery. If he bled like that for more than a few moments, he would die. If he died, and if Nadia rose in its wrath against Abaria, then all that Bram Forest had dreamed of, not revenge against Abaria for a wrong done, but eternal peace on Tarth, would be lost....

  He took the offensive, weaving his wall of steel toward Retoc. The Abarian thrust his own sword, and withdrew it, and parried, and lunged and thrust again. The wall of steel which was Bram Forest's singing blade advanced relentlessly.

  Round and round his head, Bram Forest whirled the whip-sword. Retoc could—just—block the motion, the death-laden circle, with his own blade. He became accustomed to it. He used all his effort, all his skill to block it.

  Then, abruptly, Bram Forest raise
d his sword-arm and brought it down from high over his head.

  Retoc screamed.

  And died screaming, his head and torso split from crown to navel.

  Bram Forest rushed to Bontarc, stretched out on the sand, and with his own hand stemmed the bleeding.

  Bylanus the Golden Ape said: "All Tarth is yours to command if you wish it, Bram Forest."

  "No, Bylanus. Take your people back to your world and live in peace. We of Tarth thank you."

  Bylanus smiled. "I thought you would say that."

  "Portox was a great scientist," Bram Forest said. "But he thought too much of revenge. The ancient wrong is righted."

  "Then you'll spare Abaria?" gasped the delegate of the assembled Tarthian nobles, who had come to the meeting called by Bylanus that night.

  "My fight was with Retoc and the Abarian army. Retoc is dead, the army decimated and disbanded. My fight with Abaria is over."

  "Then what will you do?"

  Bram Forest took Ylia's hand. "I'd like to see a great nation rise again on the Plains of Ofrid."

  Bontarc, his arm bandaged, said: "My people will help you build. And, with your wayfarers as a nucleus maid Ylia...."

  "It will be a small nation at first," Ylia said.

  "It will grow, so long as Tarth knows peace," Bontarc told her.

  "Tarth will know nothing but peace from now on," Bram Forest promised.

  It was a promise which he knew all of them would keep.

  A PLACE IN THE SUN

  Originally published in Amazing Stories, Oct. 1956

  “A Johnny Mayhem Adventure"

  The SOS crackled and hummed through subspace at a speed which left laggard light far behind. Since subspace distances do not coincide with normal space distances, the SOS was first picked up by a Fomalhautian freighter bound for Capella although it had been issued from a point in normal space midway between the orbit of Mercury and the sun’s corona in the solar system.

  The radioman of the Fomalhautian freighter gave the distress signal to the Deck Officer, who looked at it, blinked, and bolted ’bove decks to the captain’s cabin. His face was very white when he reached the door and his heart pounded with excitement. As the Deck Officer crossed an electronic beam before the door a metallic voice said: “The Captain is asleep and will be disturbed for nothing but emergency priority.”

  Nodding, the Deck officer stuck his thumb in the whorl-lock of the door and entered the cabin. “Begging your pardon, sir,” he cried, “but we just received an SOS from—”

  * * * *

  The Captain stirred groggily, sat up, switched on a green night light and squinted through it at the Deck Officer. “Well, what is it? Isn’t the Eye working?”

  “Yes, sir. An SOS, sir….”

  “If we’re close enough to help, subspace or normal space, take the usual steps, lieutenant. Surely you don’t need me to—”

  “The usual steps can’t be taken, sir. Far as I can make out, that ship is doomed. She’s bound on collision course for Sol, only twenty million miles out now.”

  “That’s too bad, lieutenant,” the Captain said with genuine sympathy in his voice. “I’m sorry to hear that. But what do you want me to do about it?”

  “The ship, sir. The ship that sent the SOS—hold on to your hat, sir—”

  “Get to the point now, will you, young man?” the Captain growled sleepily.

  “The ship which sent the SOS signal, the ship heading on collision course for Sol, is the Glory of the Galaxy!”

  For a moment the Captain said nothing. Distantly, you could hear the hum of the subspace drive-unit and the faint whining of the stasis generator. Then the Captain bolted out of bed after unstrapping himself. In his haste he forgot the ship was in weightless deep space and went sailing, arms flailing air, across the room. The lieutenant helped him down and into his magnetic-soled shoes.

  “My God,” the Captain said finally. “Why did it happen? Why did it have to happen to the Glory of the Galaxy?”

  “What are you going to do, sir?”

  “I can’t do anything. I won’t take the responsibility. Have the radioman contact the Hub at once.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The Glory of the Galaxy, the SOS ship heading on collision course with the sun, was making its maiden run from the assembly satellites of Earth across the inner solar system via the perihelion passage which would bring it within twenty-odd million miles of the sun, to Mars which now was on the opposite side of Sol from Earth. Aboard the gleaming new ship was the President of the Galactic Federation and his entire cabinet.

  * * * *

  The Fomalhautian freighter’s emergency message was received at the Hub of the Galaxy within moments after it had been sent, although the normal space distance was in the neighborhood of one hundred thousand light years. The message was bounced—in amazingly quick time—from office to office at the hub, cutting through the usual red tape because of its top priority. And—since none of the normal agencies at the Hub could handle it—the message finally arrived at an office which very rarely received official messages of any kind. This was the one unofficial, extra-legal office at the Hub of the Galaxy. Lacking official function, the office had no technical existence and was not to be found in any Directory of the Hub. At the moment, two young men were seated inside. Their sole job was to maintain liaison with a man whose very existence was doubted by most of the human inhabitants of the Galaxy but whose importance could not be measured by mere human standards in those early days when the Galactic League was becoming the Galactic Federation.

  The name of the man with whom they maintained contact was Johnny Mayhem.

  “Did you read it?” the blond man asked.

  “I read it.”

  “If it got down here, that means they can’t handle it anywhere else.”

  “Of course they can’t. What the hell could normal slobs like them or like us do about it?”

  “Nothing, I guess. But wait a minute! You don’t mean you’re going to send Mayhem, without asking him, without telling—”

  “We can’t ask him now, can we?”

  “Johnny Mayhem’s elan is at the moment speeding from Canopus to Deneb, where on the fourth planet of the Denebian system a dead body is waiting for him in cold storage. The turnover from League to Federation status of the Denebian system is causing trouble in Deneb City, so Mayhem—”

  “Deneb City will probably survive without Mayhem. Well, won’t it?”

  “I guess so, but—”

  “I know. The deal is we’re supposed to tell Mayhem where he’s going and what he can expect. The deal also is, every inhabited world has a body waiting for his elan in cold storage. But don’t you think if we could talk to Mayhem now—”

  “It isn’t possible. He’s in transit.”

  “Don’t you think if we could talk to him now he would agree to board the Glory of the Galaxy?”

  “How should I know? I’m not Johnny Mayhem.”

  “If he doesn’t board her, it’s certain death for all of them.”

  “And if he does board her, what the hell can he do about it? Besides, there isn’t any dead body awaiting his elan on that ship or any ship. He wouldn’t make a very efficacious ghost.”

  “But there are live people. Scores of them. Mayhem’s elan is quite capable of possessing a living host.”

  “Sure. Theoretically it is. But damn it all, what would the results be? We’ve never tried it. It’s liable to damage Mayhem. As for the host—”

  “The host might die. I know it. But he’ll die anyway. The whole shipload of them is heading on collision course for the sun.”

  “Does the SOS say why?”

  “No. Maybe Mayhem can find out and do something about it.”

  * * * *

  “Yeah, maybe. That’s a hell of a way to risk the life of the most important man in the Galaxy. Because if Mayhem boards that ship and can’t do anything about it, he’ll die with the rest of them.”

  “Why? We
could always pluck his elan out again.”

  “If he were inhabiting a dead one. In a live body, I don’t think so. The attraction would be stronger. There would be forces of cohesion—”

  “That’s true. Still, Mayhem’s our only hope.”

  “I’ll admit it’s a job for Mayhem, but he’s too important.”

  “Is he? Don’t be a fool. What, actually, is Johnny Mayhem’s importance? His importance lies in the very fact that he is expendable. His life—for the furtherance of the new Galactic Federation.”

  “But—”

  “And the President is aboard that ship. Maybe he can’t do as much for the Galaxy in the long run as Mayhem can, but don’t you see, man, he’s a figurehead. Right now he’s the most important man in the Galaxy, and if we could talk to him I’m sure Mayhem would agree. Mayhem would want to board that ship.”

  “It’s funny, we’ve been working with Mayhem all these years and we never even met the guy.”

  “Would you know him if you saw him?”

  “Umm-mm, I guess not. Do you think we really can halt his elan in subspace and divert it over to the Glory of the Galaxy?”

  “I take it you’re beginning to see things my way. And the answer to your question is yes.”

  “Poor Mayhem. You know, I actually feel sorry for the guy. He’s had more adventures than anyone since Homer wrote the Odyssey and there won’t ever be any rest for him.”

  “Stop feeling sorry for him and start hoping he succeeds.”

  “Yeah.”

  “And let’s see about getting a bead on his elan.”

  The two young men walked to a tri-dim chart which took up much of the room. One of them touched a button and blue light glowed within the chart, pulsing brightly and sharply where space-sectors intersected.

  “He’s in C-17 now,” one of the men said as a gleaming whiteness was suddenly superimposed at a single point on the blue.

  “Can you bead him?”

  “I think so. But I still feel sorry for Mayhem. He’s expecting to wake up in a cold-storage corpse on Deneb IV but instead he’ll come to in a living body aboard a spaceship on collision course for the sun.”

  “Just hope he—”