The Magnificent Wilf

by Gordon R. Dickson

  “Very much,” said Tom.

  An upright circle, like a green hoop, formed over the seaward side of the platform; and, looking into it, Tom and Lucy saw—not the land and seascape beyond it, but an underwater view of close ranks of great Sharks, swimming steadily and in remarkable military order. They were dark gray in color, otherwise they looked very much like sharks from Earth with which Tom and Lucy were familiar from pictures. There was only one large difference between them and the sharks known on Earth.

  “They’re fatter than our sharks,” said Tom.

  “Is that so?” said Hmmm. “I didn’t know that. How much fatter are they?”

  Tom hesitated, trying to think of how to describe them. Lucy filled in the conversational gap.

  “They’re about twice as fat as any sharks I’ve seen pictures of,” said Lucy. “It’s rather surprising. Sharks are usually such streamlined things. The thickness in the middle part of the body of those you have here tends to make them look a little clumsy.”

  “They are anything but clumsy, either in the ocean or on land,” said Hmmm. “But it is interesting to know there is that difference between them and the members of the parallel Race that are indigenous to your world.”

  “How long before they get here?” asked Tom.

  “They should begin to come ashore in about fifteen of your minutes,” said Hmmm. “That’s just an estimate, a guess on my part. But I would say about fifteen minutes.”

  Tom looked over at the city; but could see no other Xxxytl in the air at all.

  “Where are your people?” he asked.

  “They will be down at street level,” said Hmmm. “It’d be safer to shoot at the Sharks from high up in the buildings; but the tranquilizer missiles are most effective when fired into a Shark’s open mouth. A Shark hit that way ceases to move in seconds. Hit any place else in its body, a Shark could go on thrashing around for ten of your minutes or more, knocking down buildings and still destroying property, before the tranquilizing effect stopped it.”

  “Why haven’t you simply put a heavier dose into your tranquilizer missiles, so it’ll work faster and can be used anywhere on the Shark’s body? It must be somewhat dangerous to get close enough to a Shark to fire into his open mouth.”

  “We could’ve, of course,” said Hmmm. “But while the heavier dose might work quickly if it struck the Shark elsewhere than in its most vulnerable area, the heavy dose would go on working and the Shark might get overdosed and die. We wouldn’t want that to happen.”

  “No,” said Tom. “I see.” But he didn’t.

  They fell silent, watching the Sharks through the green ring.

  “You must understand,” said Hmmm, breaking the silence after a little while, “what our jeweled buildings mean to our Xxxytl Race. They are the way in which we express our oneness with our world and the universe. If we are to end up eventually losing all our jeweled structures, something will be lost by us, Racially. The heart will go out of our Race, perhaps. There’s been a sadness in most Xxxytl because of these Shark attacks, for the last few generations. If you were able to read and enjoy Madam Poet’s work in our language, you would find a strain of sadness in it that looks toward a twilight, perhaps the end of our day of existence. We think that the Sharks who are attacking us know this—that they have been told this by more intellectually developed Sharks such as you find active on the Stock Exchange. It is only a theoiy, of course; but it is a theory that saddens us a little.”

  Tom and Lucy could think of nothing to say. Then Lucy tried to bring the conversation back to a lighter note.

  “Tell me,” ^she said, “when we first met you you gave us the impression you could change sexes at will, just depending upon how you felt. Why is Madam Poet called Madam Poet? Is it because she just decided to be..female all the time?”

  “Oh, that,” said Hmmm. “All those in any generation of our people who are acknowledged to have risen to historic status tend to follow an ancient practice of—I believe your human word would be ‘freezing’ themselves in one sex or the other for the rest of their lives. They can choose the sex they want, of course. Madam Poet felt that she would prefer to be female. She could, of course, quite freely have decided to be male, instead. In that case she would have been addressed—pardon me, I mean he would be addressed as ‘Sir Poet.’ ”

  A sudden uproar of high-pitched chiming came from the city.

  “I was wrong!” cried Hmmm. “The Sharks were closer than I thought. They’ll be coming out of the water up onto the beach any moment now!”

  Tom and Lucy turned their gaze from the ring through which they had been looking at the Sharks swimming underwater—and where they seemed to be still swimming underwater—and looked with fascination at the crescent of mud-colored beach-slope. The)’ looked. They waited. But they saw nothing but the waves coming up, uninterrupted by any form, breaking upon the beach and being followed by the waves just behind. There was nothing else in sight.

  “Any moment now,” repeated Hmmm.

  Chapter 18

  Tom’s mind was spinning like the drive shaft of an engine being driven at its top number of possible revolutions per minute.

  Could it be that Mr. Valhinda had nudged them into coming here to Xxxytl in hopes he and Lucy could do something about protecting the Xxxytl from these Shark raids?

  It could.

  Gloom flooded Tom like a wave of cold, blue-green ocean water. It was true he had the weapons and had been given the briefing of an Apprentice Assassin; but those Sharks looked very large and numerous and there was only one of him. His mind scrambled, tying together everything he had heard about Sharks; and trying to formulate a plan of action.

  “What was that?” said Lucy suddenly, turning on him. “Were you trying to say something in French?”

  “Well, yes,” said Tom, guiltily aware of his bad French pronunciation. “What’s that quote from Georges Jacques Danton, back in the time of the French Revolution? Il faut de … something.”

  “You mean ‘Il nous faut de l’audace, encore de l’audace, toujours de l’audace!’ ” said Lucy, crisply. “ ‘We must dare, dare again and always go on daring.’ Tom— what are you thinking of doing that’s daring?”

  “I don’t know yet,” said Tom, “that’s the trouble.”

  “Look in the ring!” said Hmmm, sharply, interrupting them.

  Tom and Lucy looked. They saw the Sharks now, with the white ceiling of the breaking surf just above them, looking strangely fatter than ever. In fact they seemed to be growing in their middle body area. It was hard to tell for sure because the view they had was almost head-on to the sea predators; and gave them little more than a frontal view of them. But the movement of the sea creatures had changed. It was no longer the smooth progress of someone swimming but more jerky and regular; and at the same time Tom and Lucy became conscious of something else.

  There was a vibration coming from the shore area below them—a rhythmic vibration. It was like a drum beat without the sound of a drum.

  “They are in shallow water and beginning to march now,” said Hmmm. “In a moment you will see them coming out of the waves; we’ve already started to feel and hear them.”

  “Feel and hear—?” began Tom. And then hear them they did. The vibration they felt was in time with a deep thumping sound; as if hundreds of pile-drivers were at work at once beneath the surface of the waves—and just then the first of the Sharks started to emerge.

  As they came from the sea, Tom and Lucy saw that the Sharks had slimmed down remarkably. Even more interesting was the reason for this. As they emerged from the water, narrower of body, they could be seen to have grown four stumpy legs—like elephant legs, only much shorter and very much thicker.

  These were still growing, in that they became longer as the sea-Beings got slimmer and more dangerous looking, mounting the beach. As the Sharks came to a halt, their legs were lifting each of them about as high off the clay surface in proportion to their size as a crocodile mig
ht lift itself with its legs at full extension. The sound of those still marching from the water down along the shore behind them shook the air.

  Thud—thud—thud (pause) Thud. Thud, thud— (pause)—Thud! … Even as high up as their platform was, it felt to Tom and Lucy as if the impact of their heavy feet shivered the platform itself.

  The first six Sharks out of the water had come one after another, forming a line up the slope of the beach. Once they were all out, they turned as one to face in the direction of the city; then stood where they were, marking time like soldiers, the sounds of their heavy feet mixing with the foot-strikes of other Sharks emerging behind them.

  Gradually a long line of Sharks six abreast began to take shape along the shore, all marking time, all now facing the jeweled city; which almost seemed to tremble from the vibration, in spite of the distance between them.

  The Sharks continued to come. Tom and Lucy stared as their ranks extended further and further down the beach; until even at a glance it was plainly not merely hundreds of Sharks emerging from the sea, but thousands of them.

  “Why do they do all this stamping?” Lucy asked Hmmm. “Is it instinctive, or are they doing it deliberately for some reason?”

  “It is probably a combination of amphibious instinct and deliberate intention,” answered Hmmm, shouting now to be heard over the noise from the beach below as the heavy feet kept up their rhythm. “We have land animals with hooves who stamp their feet as a warning, or when they’re in a rage. Maybe it’s that. Hut we think the Sharks hope to frighten us into abandoning the city, so they can march in and take our jewels without trouble. They always try it. We never go. But they keep doing it just the same.”

  “It’s frightening,” said Lucy.

  It was indeed, thought Tom. Intimidating. It was the sort of drum-beat sound that seemed to signal an unstoppable power—a power that could walk through mountains, smash through any barriers, invincible.

  He turned and spoke to Lucy.

  “What did you say?” Lucy shouted in his ear. “I can’t hear you over the noise!”

  “I said,” Tom shouted back into her ear, “I need more information. I’m going to get Hmmm to take us down to meet that front rank of Sharks.”

  “Tom—” began Lucy. But he had already turned away to shout at Hmmm. Before she could get Tom turned back to hear her, the platform had begun to swoop down to the shore; a moment later it was landing just in front of the first rank of Sharks.

  They had come down less than forty feet from that first rank; and, in spite of the distance and the sea creatures’ short legs, it seemed to Lucy that the first six of the sea-monsters loomed over the platform and its riders, their enormous mouths shut, their dark, unblinking eyes staring at these land dwellers who dared approach them. Down here, right next to them, the vibration and sound of their stamping seemed to fill the world. Speech was impossible.

  The Shark at the farthest right of the front rank made a sudden change in the rhythm of his thumping—to a thump—(pause)—thump thump thump—(pause)—thump THUMP! Then he stood still.

  The five Sharks next to him also stood still. The change in rhythm and the cessation of the pounding moved back through the long serpent of Shark ranks for a number of minutes. At last, a silence that was almost more ominous than the noise had taken its place.

  Tom stepped down from the platform and walked several steps toward the first Shark. The one who, by his example, had stopped all the rest from marking time.

  Lucy, unwarned, was still only half a step behind Tom as he left the platform but right beside him by the time he stood facing this one particular Shark.

  “What are you?” demanded the Shark in Xxxytl, with a flash of great murderous teeth, in several rows behind each other in both upper and lower jaws.

  Unlike most of the sea creatures that Tom had known of before, from the dolphins of Earth to the several sea-living Aliens shown Tom in his original Sector briefing by Alien device, the Shark did not speak in a high squeaky voice; but in about the range of a human tenor. Still, the utterances came out harshly and aggressively—even sneeringly.

  “For one thing,” replied Tom also in Xxxytl, “you ought to be able to see from my weapons harness that I’m a Galactic Assassin. Beside me is my Consort, Lucy. Or are you Sharks of this world so barbaric that you don’t know what a Galactic Assassin is—and can do?”

  “We know,” said the Shark. “But also we know you are not a full Assassin. You are only learning to be an Assassin.”

  “And who told you that?” asked Tom.

  “None of your business!” said the Shark, closing his jaws with a ringing snap. “We have our ways of knowing.”

  “L’audace …” thought Tom.

  “As I was well aware,” he said. “But your admitting it now was all I needed to take action.”

  “Admit? What do you mean?” said the Shark in a new tone of voice. “I didn’t admit anything.”

  “You didn’t need to,” said Tom. “But to answer you—the fact you think I’m a learning Assassin makes no difference to this situation here and now. I have my weapons and I know how to use them. In the wink of an eye I can move my hand and all of you would be gone.”

  “Our eyes do not wink,” said the Shark. “And we have no interest in you. Only in the city that waits for us. Out of our way, or be trampled into dust.”

  “Don’t try it,” said Tom.

  “Tom!” said Lucy warningly.

  “It’s all right, Lucy,” said Tom, never moving his eyes from the eyes of the Shark in front of him. “You and your fellow Sharks are here to destroy the city you talk about, and carry away in your bellies most of what it is built of, back into your own territory. Deny that, if you can!”

  “I do not have to deny it, Thing!” said the Shark. “That is what we are here for; and it is what we intend to do—and neither you nor anything else in the universe can stop us.”

  “You’re already stopped,” said Tom. “By what you said just now, you further admitted you’ve come here to commit theft. A Galactic Assassin is also a reserve Member of the much-feared-by-criminal-classes Interstellar Sector Police, in any Sector where the Assassin happens to be at the time. He can be activated as such by the Sector’s own police, themselves; or the Assassin can decide to activate himself. I do so now decide to activate myself. Don’t move. You’re all under arrest!”

  The Shark stared at him, gape-mouthed.

  “We’re what?” he said.

  “Under arrest,” said Tom. “I just arrested all of you in the name of the Galaxy.”

  “Are you insane?” said the Shark. “Do you think you can stop us with words?”

  “If you are sufficiently civilized and knowledgeable, yes,” answered Tom, crisply, “however, if you are not—”

  He pulled his loset from his harness and swung it before him, aiming it at the earth between him and the Shark. At the end of its swing it had disintegrated a trench some thirty feet long, eight feet wide, and a dozen feet deep between him and the front line of Sharks. The sides and bottom of the trench glistened as if it had been covered with molten glass, for all the material there had been subjected to such terrific heat from the loset that it had melted and formed a lining which was keeping the level of seawater in the clay from coming up inside the opening.

  He had also pulled a small bulbous device from his harness with his other hand; and now he sprayed something from this along the bottom of the trench. Immediately, fierce flames flared up in it, reaching out, licking toward the sea creatures. In spite of themselves, the front rank of Sharks recoiled, bumping into the rank behind, which then bumped into the one behind it; and a ripple of movement went backwards through their company.

  “Yay!” came the tiny cheer of Hmmm, on the platform.

  “This is just by way of example,” said Tom to the Sharks, talking over the flaming trench. “If you think you could march over me into the city, just come forward. I’m still standing here, waiting.”

&n
bsp; “Yay!” said Lucy also, before her better sense could stop her.

  “Well?” Tom asked the Shark.

  “We are unstoppable,” the Shark answered, recovering from his first start backward. “If necessary we will fill the trench up and quench the fire with our own bodies. And I will be one of the first to do so!”

  He took a step toward the trench.

  Tom leveled his loset.

  “As fast as you can come, you will be disintegrated,” he said. “In fact, if I should put my loset on full setting—” his thumb moved ominously on the side of the loset “—I could wipe all of you from this shore in an instant!”

  “Tom!” said Lucy in his ear in English. “Can you really do that?”

  “No,” muttered Tom back.

  “Oh,” said Lucy.

  “All right, then, go ahead!” said the Shark, triumphantly. “Tranquilize all of us. We’ll just be back here two days from now and you’ll have to do it all over again. You can’t stand on this seashore forever!”

  “My weapon doesn’t tranquilize,” said Tom. “It disintegrates! You saw what happened to the clay I just disintegrated to make this trench. If I point it at you and press the firing button, you’ll all be blasted into nothingness forever, the same way it was!”

  A buzzing of Shark voices began just behind the front ranks and moved backward through the column.

  “They must be talking Sharkish,” said Lucy in a low voice to Hmmm, who had come up to join them. “What are they saying?”

  “They’re all asking what Tom said and then telling the Sharks behind them,” answered Hmmm.

  “You won’t get away with this!” The Shark was saying to Tom. He and the other Sharks close to him clashed their jaws so that it sounded like innumerable car doors slamming. Then it was silent again. “You may call yourself Reserve Sector Police,” the Shark went on, “but interstellar law has no authority over internal matters on a single world! You couldn’t arrest us if you wanted to.”

  “I’m arresting you for interstellar theft!” said Tom. “And that clearly falls within the province of the Sector Police.”