The Long Result

by John Brunner

  ‘Don’t get out of bed!’ I cried hoarsely, rolling on one elbow.

  ‘What is it?’ Micky whispered, his face as white as mine.

  It – the thing that had been on my face – was a lump of slowly pulsating blue jelly, translucent, veined with red, about six inches in diameter now it was humped on the floor. It seemed to flow within itself, as though searching, then began to crawl purposefully back towards my bunk. My stomach churned and I hunted for some means of driving it away.

  ‘Micky, have you anything that will burn?’ I demanded.

  ‘Of course not – all my gear is flameproofed.’ He didn’t take his gaze off the horrible object. ‘Roald, what in hell is that?’

  Intent on disposing of both it and my lingering terror, I grabbed for my shoes. ‘I’ll tell you when I get back,’ I muttered grimly. ‘Stay in your bunk – I don’t see how it can climb a vertical slope – but don’t expose bare skin to it whatever you do.’

  I scrambled up on the bunk and reached for the door. The catch resisted my pressure on it, and for an instant I felt another stab of terror; then I discovered that the panel was free to slide already. Someone had doctored the lock, then – but that figured, since an intruder must have brought the horrid jelly-thing. I had no time to puzzle over identities or motives. I knew what I wanted. If I could only find it…

  At the end of the narrow corridor outside I’d noticed an emergency tool cabinet. Let there only be a torch in it, I thought as I sprinted towards it. And there was.

  I smashed the fragmentation panel over the box’s lock and seized the torch. When the startled steward – the only crew-man aboard this automated ship – came to answer the alarm connected with the tool cabinet, he met me carrying a foot-long sword of flame.

  ‘Stop!’ he shouted as I vanished into my own compartment, and came after me with a clatter of hard heels.

  I didn’t stop. I pointed the roaring torch at the jelly-thing, drunk with a primitive sense of revenge. The blob flinched from the searing flame; melted before it could do more than flinch, giving off an evil smell. The surface cauterized into scar tissue and the thing was still. The fireproof plastic of the curtain seemed more alive as it curled away from the heat.

  When the whole visible surface was blackened, I withdrew the torch for a moment. A crack appeared in the covering crust and a thread of blue oozed out questingly. I conquered a desire to vomit, at least temporarily, and re-applied the flame. This time I held it on the spot till the metal glowed and the air was almost unbearable with the stench. After that, there was only a charred lump like overdone meat.

  For a second I stood wavering. Then I turned off the torch and thrust it into the ready hands of the steward. I pushed him out of my way and fled towards the head.

  This time, I did throw up.

  15

  When I felt sufficiently recovered to do so, I went back. The door of our compartment had been closed, and I had to check the reservation cards before I could tell which was the right cabin.

  The air conditioners had already got rid of the odour, and Micky was trying to explain to the mystified steward. On seeing me he broke off.

  ‘Are you all right?’ he demanded anxiously.

  I nodded, and apologized ridiculously to the steward, who was holding the glowing torch carefully away from his body. ‘If you’ll just wait a moment, I’ll tell you all about it.’

  I turned to shut the door, and found that the catch was still not operating.

  ‘It was working all right when we came aboard,’ I muttered to no one in particular. I felt giddy from my narrow escape.

  Going back into the corridor, I ran my fingers over the underside of the lock mechanism. As I’d expected, I touched a small disc clinging there limpet-fashion. I slid it off the edge of the lock, and the catch worked perfectly.

  ‘Know what this is?’ I asked the steward, showing him the disc.

  ‘It’s – why, it’s a nullifier. Holds the wards of the lock by magnetism and stops them engaging when the door is closed.’

  I sat down wearily on the edge of my bunk. Guessing that I must be in a state of shock, the steward put down the torch in the corner and fumbled out a flat case from his pocket.

  ‘Here!’ he said, handing me a green tablet. ‘It’s a euphoric – it ought to help.’

  I chewed on it gratefully, and it did help. Within half a minute I felt calm enough to turn to Micky and explain.

  ‘Micky, you were asking what that lump of jelly was. It was a Sagittarian parasite. In the natural state it has the typical Sag silicon metabolism, but recently they’ve been building us some with a carbon base for experiments in tissue-restoration. The idea is to provide a seal for wounds which will be incorporated into the body as the incision heals. A good idea – but up to now it doesn’t work. Human beings are allergic to them.’

  I fingered the skin of my face. So far, there was no sign of a rash, but I was certain one would erupt before we landed.

  ‘Someone put that nullifier on the lock, crept in while we were both asleep, and put that jelly over my mouth and nose. If a miracle hadn’t made me realize that I had to breathe out and not in, I’d have suffocated in complete silence. When I was found dead, there would have been no visible trace of the weapon. It would have been absorbed through the mucous membrane in my nose and united with the natural tissue.’

  When I was found dead! First the numbness of shock, now the artificial elation of the euphoric, was saving me the full force of that horror. But sooner or later I was going to have to face it.

  Micky gave me a compassionate glance and turned to the steward.

  ‘You’d better call the police and have the ship met by a lie-detector squad. Presumably they’ll have to interrogate all the passengers directly we land.’

  ‘But surely they can’t do that,’ the steward objected. ‘We don’t know if the passengers will agree.’

  ‘Blazes!’ Micky jumped to his feet. ‘They’re going to have to put up with it! Don’t you realize this is the attempted murder of a government official?’

  The steward blanched. The idea of that rarest of crimes – murder – aboard his own ship obviously hadn’t connected in his mind till this moment. Now he hurried out, and the door slid to with a hiss.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Just what I wanted to say, only I couldn’t think of the right words. But —’

  I hesitated.

  ‘But what?’ Micky urged.

  ‘You’re wrong,’ I said slowly. ‘Not the attempted murder of a government official.’

  ‘Roald, I don’t get you. It was sure as hell intended to be murder!’

  ‘I’m not arguing about that!’ Nor about my nearly being the victim, I added silently. I shuddered.

  ‘But you aren’t a government official, Micky.’

  He exhaled sharply and his eyes became round and wide. ‘Do you mean I was the one supposed to be killed? Why in the world—?’

  ‘I’m sure of it. I didn’t notice when we came aboard, but just now I had to check the reservation cards to find the right compartment. We’ve taken the wrong bunks. The card on this one bears your name.’

  ‘And in the dark he didn’t realize. I see. But – no, just a second. He could have used a black light.’

  ‘Can you see a man carrying a night-vision helmet around the ship? But he could have slipped the parasite in his pocket – it was small enough. With some sort of sealing around it to keep it from touching his skin.’

  There was a long silence. Watching Micky, I could almost read his mind. He was thinking: what if the killer hadn’t made a mistake? I wouldn’t have guessed what was happening. I’d be lying there dead, and no one would know …

  To a modern man, still expecting perhaps eighty years more life, the waste entailed by premature death became not exactly more frightening – it’s always been frightening – but somehow sadder than for a man able to accept that his survival was one long chain of risks passed only by chance. As a saint is said to grow
more conscious of his sins as those grow fewer, so men living longer seemed more aware of their vulnerability.

  Micky looked up finally and his lips quirked into a wry grin. ‘Shuffled off, unhousel’d, unanneal’d,’ he murmured. ‘Roald, who would have wanted to do this? And why?’

  ‘Assuming I’m right,’ I parried, ‘who do you think?’

  ‘There’s one possibility that I can see, and that’s so slim it’s absurd. But – perhaps the Starhomers are planning the showdown I suggested, and prefer to catch Earth unawares. They might think that shutting me up would help.’

  ‘It damned well would,’ I muttered. I stretched my legs, realized I’d almost put my foot on the dead parasite, and drew back hastily. ‘How many people know about your results?’

  ‘The computer team who processed my matrices for me may know – if they were sharp-witted enough to see the implications, which I tend to doubt.’

  I said thoughtfully, ‘I wonder if someone added two and x and got the right answer. In other words, I wonder if someone who wasn’t sure you’d got your positive proof noticed that you were coming back to the Bureau with me, decided you must be on the right track after all, and took this panicky step to silence you.’

  There was another pause. Abruptly Micky said, ‘I think you suspect a link between the League and the Starhomers.’

  I almost gaped. That very idea had crossed my mind, and I was examining it to see if it was sound enough to utter.

  ‘Well – you, and the police, and Tinescu all seemed to believe the League would never turn from talk to action. But they have been injected with new life from somewhere. From off Earth, perhaps. Are you with me?’

  Micky, chin cupped in his palm, looked like a beardless Mephistopheles as he considered the implications. Abruptly he rose in excitement.

  ‘I’ve been blind! Of course you’re right! What better way to foment distrust of BuCult and hence of Earth’s ability to handle alien and colonial affairs? And the Starhomers are preparing to announce their own version of BuCult – you told me so yesterday. It fits beautifully.’

  ‘It has the extra advantage that as League ideas spread, decent, intelligent people will begin to despair of Earth’s ability to look after cultural exchange. We’ve had League sympathizers planted in the Bureau already, haven’t we?’

  Micky whistled.

  ‘Directly we land,’ I continued, ‘I think I’d better get hold of the man who’s investigating these incidents where the League may be involved. Ah—’ I snapped my fingers. ‘Inspector Klabund, that was the name.’

  A light tapping came at the door. We started, but when Micky slid the panel back it proved only to be the steward.

  ‘I’ve called the police,’ he reported. ‘They’ve agreed to question all the passengers when we touch down. No one can possibly get out before we unseal the main door, so we have him trapped.’

  He gave a little shiver. ‘Unsettling, isn’t it – travelling with a murderer?’

  I put my hand to my face. A prickly-hot sensation was developing. Here was the rash I’d expected. Determinedly I stopped myself rubbing it and making it worse.

  ‘How could he expect to get away with it?’ the steward went on.

  ‘He may well be registered under a false name,’ I said. ‘You see, if his plan had gone off right, no one would have suspected the means employed until they held an autopsy. By that time he could have got well away.’

  ‘Instead of which he’s due for psyching,’ Micky said in a grim voice. ‘But don’t let it worry you, steward. He won’t try anything else. He’s probably sure he succeeded, and the last thing he’ll want is to draw attention on himself.’

  ‘I guess so,’ the steward admitted doubtfully. But he didn’t seem visibly comforted as he left us with an automatic good night.

  ‘You’d better try and catch some more sleep, Roald,’ Micky suggested, and I complied passively, stretching out on the bunk. To judge by the noises across the cabin, Micky had little trouble sleeping but much in finding rest. I couldn’t even doze; within half an hour I gave up trying. Partly, this was because the rash on my face was burning and itching continuously now.

  But much more it was due to an iron-hard, ice-cold purpose that had invaded my mind, locking on to my consciousness with bulldog fangs and promising to give me no respite till it was accomplished.

  The purpose was the ending of the Stars Are For Man League.

  When the express touched down, the police were waiting with grim faces. Even though their business was crime, we’d managed to make murder such a rarity that the mention of the word hung over us all like a cloud of smoke.

  Quietly and competently they stopped each disembarking passenger, summarized what had happened, and led them in turn to a table on which a lie-detector had been set up. The asking of a single question sufficed to eliminate the innocent. At the seventeenth try, a white-faced man who had already been unnerved by the sight of someone he assumed to be dead standing behind the detector table made the needle of the machine jump from the true to the false side of the line.

  Two burly constables moved in to flank him and stop him running away. But he attempted nothing so futile, simply let his hands fall limp to his side.

  Struggling against tiredness, the aftermath of shock, and the maddening irritation on my face, I whispered to the sergeant in charge of the operation, and the latter rapped out a second query.

  ‘Are you a member of the Stars Are For Man League?’

  The man shook his head determinedly, but again the implacable needle quavered over into ‘false’.

  ‘Look at him!’ Micky murmured to me. ‘Someone’s got at him, and it may very well be a Starhomer. He’s a Terran – he’d never be so casual about human life if he hadn’t been influenced from outside.’

  They recorded testimony for the holding charge before they let us go, and scraped the remains of the parasite off the floor of our compartment. Organic analysis would identify not only its origin, but even the particular gene-type to which it belonged, and it shouldn’t be long before they traced the murderer’s source of supply.

  ‘That man won’t last ten minutes at his trial,’ the sergeant commented as the whimpering captive was led away. ‘But there’s something I want to ask you, Mr Vincent. What made you mention the Stars Are For Man League? I’d always had the impression they were all talk and no action – but this is dreadful!’

  ‘I think you’ll be hearing a lot more about the League,’ I forced out between stiff lips. The allergy all human beings showed towards Sag parasites was bringing my hand out in tiny blisters now, as well as my face, even though I’d touched it with my fingers for only a few seconds.

  The sergeant noticed my discomfort, and gestured at a constable whose lapels bore the tiny caduceus of the forensic medicine branch. He looked me over with clucks of sympathy, dug into his first-aid kit and attended to the inflammation.

  ‘That should take care of it for the time being,’ he said when he had sprayed the affected areas with plastoskin. ‘I can give you some histaminoids to minimize the allergy, but you’ll be groggy at least for the rest of the day, so don’t do anything strenuous.’

  ‘Sorry,’ I said grimly. ‘I have some strenuous business to see to. Micky! Come on – Tinescu will be waiting for us.’

  16

  Tinescu shut down his desk, instructing the secretary to record all his calls and tripping the switch that put the ‘busy’ light on at the door.

  ‘Sit down,’ he said, waving us to chairs. His eyes lingered on the plastoskin covering my face, which was still fresh enough to be detectable, but he didn’t comment on it.

  ‘Well, Torres? I imagine it took something galaxy-shaking to shift you from your cosy lair in Cambridge, so let me hear it. I only hope it isn’t bad news.’

  ‘Depends how you look at it,’ Micky grunted, folding his lanky body into the chair and dumping a portfolio containing his documents on the floor at his feet. ‘According to my latest calculations
, Starhome has finally got the edge over us and from here on out will be pulling ahead fast.’

  I watched Tinescu closely. I had no idea how he would take this bombshell. The last reaction I’d expected, though, was the one he showed.

  All of a sudden ten years seemed to drop away from him. For the first time I could recall he looked actually happy, and he beamed on Micky like a proud father.

  ‘Torres, I could hug you. The waiting was driving me out of my mind.’

  ‘I was pretty sure you already knew,’ Micky said.

  ‘Oh, that’s putting it too strong. But you must admit it was inevitable sooner or later. Just recently there have been so many pointers I was practically biting my nails with anxiety in case we were overtaken by events. What put you wise – the nature of the survey findings which they tried to have doctored?’

  ‘That, and a few other things.’

  Tinescu gave a wise nod. ‘They haven’t neglected the soft sciences as much as we used to believe, that’s definite. But since they made it a matter of policy to hide their progress from our survey missions, all we’ve been getting is bits and pieces. Well! This is excellent news. And perhaps,’ he added with a mock glare in my direction, ‘Roald will feel a trifle less harshly towards me for not stepping on the Starhomers’ toes.’

  I couldn’t meet his eyes; I was embarrassed. But I still had objections.

  ‘Surely you could have raised the matter with the Minister,’ I suggested. ‘We could have made some sort of advance arrangements —’

  ‘And told the Starhomers by implication what they didn’t yet realize?’ Tinescu shook his head. ‘Roald, I’m surprised at your lack of subtlety. Speaking of lack of subtlety, I’m sure you’ve deduced that it must be the Starhomers who are financing the Stars Are For Man League?’

  ‘We reached that conclusion by another route,’ Micky said. ‘A League member tried to kill me on the way over. And got Roald by mistake.’