by Various
Cole nodded.
"You don't believe me. Look." Sherikov leaned over and snapped on the vidscreen mounted in the wall. "Watch, this. The operation should still be going on."
The screen lit up. A scene gained form.
"This is a confidential Security channel. I had it tapped several years ago--for my own protection. What we're seeing now is being piped in to Eric Reinhart." Sherikov grinned. "Reinhart arranged what you're seeing on the screen. Pay close attention. You were there, two hours ago."
Cole turned toward the screen. At first he could not make out what was happening. The screen showed a vast foaming cloud, a vortex of motion. From the speaker came a low rumble, a deep-throated roar. After a time the screen shifted, showing a slightly different view. Suddenly Cole stiffened.
He was seeing the destruction of a whole mountain range.
The picture was coming from a ship, flying above what had once been the Albertine Mountain Range. Now there was nothing but swirling clouds of gray and columns of particles and debris, a surging tide of restless material gradually sweeping off and dissipating in all directions.
The Albertine Mountains had been disintegrated. Nothing remained but these vast clouds of debris. Below, on the ground, a ragged plain stretched out, swept by fire and ruin. Gaping wounds yawned, immense holes without bottom, craters side by side as far as the eye could see. Craters and debris. Like the blasted, pitted surface of the moon. Two hours ago it had been rolling peaks and gulleys, brush and green bushes and trees.
Cole turned away.
"You see?" Sherikov snapped the screen off. "You were down there, not so long ago. All that noise and smoke--all for you. All for you, Mr. Variable Man from the past. Reinhart arranged that, to finish you off. I want you to understand that. It's very important that you realize that."
Cole said nothing.
Sherikov reached into a drawer of the table before him. He carefully brought out a small square box and held it out to Cole. "You wired this, didn't you?"
Cole took the box in his hands and held it. For a time his tired mind failed to focus. What did he have? He concentrated on it. The box was the children's toy. The inter-system vidsender, they had called it.
"Yes. I fixed this." He passed it back to Sherikov. "I repaired that. It was broken."
Sherikov gazed down at him intently, his large eyes bright. He nodded, his black beard and cigar rising and falling. "Good. That's all I wanted to know." He got suddenly to his feet, pushing his chair back. "I see the doctor's here. He'll fix you up. Everything you need. Later on I'll talk to you again."
Unprotesting, Cole got to his feet, allowing the doctor to take hold of his arm and help him up.
After Cole had been released by the medical department, Sherikov joined him in his private dining room, a floor above the actual laboratory.
The Pole gulped down a hasty meal, talking as he ate. Cole sat silently across from him, not eating or speaking. His old clothing had been taken away and new clothing given him. He was shaved and rubbed down. His sores and cuts were healed, his body and hair washed. He looked much healthier and younger, now. But he was still stooped and tired, his blue eyes worn and faded. He listened to Sherikov's account of the world of 2136 AD without comment.
"You can see," Sherikov said finally, waving a chicken leg, "that your appearance here has been very upsetting to our program. Now that you know more about us you can see why Commissioner Reinhart was so interested in destroying you."
Cole nodded.
"Reinhart, you realize, believes that the failure of the SRB machines is the chief danger to the war effort. But that is nothing!" Sherikov pushed his plate away noisily, draining his coffee mug. "After all, wars can be fought without statistical forecasts. The SRB machines only describe. They're nothing more than mechanical onlookers. In themselves, they don't affect the course of the war. We make the war. They only analyze."
Cole nodded.
"More coffee?" Sherikov asked. He pushed the plastic container toward Cole. "Have some."
Cole accepted another cupful. "Thank you."
"You can see that our real problem is another thing entirely. The machines only do figuring for us in a few minutes that eventually we could do for our own selves. They're our servants, tools. Not some sort of gods in a temple which we go and pray to. Not oracles who can see into the future for us. They don't see into the future. They only make statistical predictions--not prophecies. There's a big difference there, but Reinhart doesn't understand it. Reinhart and his kind have made such things as the SRB machines into gods. But I have no gods. At least, not any I can see."
Cole nodded, sipping his coffee.
"I'm telling you all these things because you must understand what we're up against. Terra is hemmed in on all sides by the ancient Centauran Empire. It's been out there for centuries, thousands of years. No one knows how long. It's old--crumbling and rotting. Corrupt and venal. But it holds most of the galaxy around us, and we can't break out of the Sol system. I told you about Icarus, and Hedge's work in ftl flight. We must win the war against Centaurus. We've waited and worked a long time for this, the moment when we can break out and get room among the stars for ourselves. Icarus is the deciding weapon. The data on Icarus tipped the SRB odds in our favor--for the first time in history. Success in the war against Centaurus will depend on Icarus, not on the SRB machines. You see?"
Cole nodded.
"However, there is a problem. The data on Icarus which I turned over to the machines specified that Icarus would be completed in ten days. More than half that time has already passed. Yet, we are no closer to wiring up the control turret than we were then. The turret baffles us." Sherikov grinned ironically. "Even I have tried my hand at the wiring, but with no success. It's intricate--and small. Too many technical bugs not worked out. We are building only one, you understand. If we had many experimental models worked out before--"
"But this is the experimental model," Cole said.
"And built from the designs of a man dead four years--who isn't here to correct us. We've made Icarus with our own hands, down here in the labs. And he's giving us plenty of trouble." All at once Sherikov got to his feet. "Let's go down to the lab and look at him."
They descended to the floor below, Sherikov leading the way. Cole stopped short at the lab door.
"Quite a sight," Sherikov agreed. "We keep him down here at the bottom for safety's sake. He's well protected. Come on in. We have work to do."
In the center of the lab Icarus rose up, the gray squat cylinder that someday would flash through space at a speed of thousands of times that of light, toward the heart of Proxima Centaurus, over four light years away. Around the cylinder groups of men in uniform were laboring feverishly to finish the remaining work.
"Over here. The turret." Sherikov led Cole over to one side of the room. "It's guarded. Centauran spies are swarming everywhere on Terra. They see into everything. But so do we. That's how we get information for the SRB machines. Spies in both systems."
The translucent globe that was the control turret reposed in the center of a metal stand, an armed guard standing at each side. They lowered their guns as Sherikov approached.
"We don't want anything to happen to this," Sherikov said. "Everything depends on it." He put out his hand for the globe. Half way to it his hand stopped, striking against an invisible presence in the air.
Sherikov laughed. "The wall. Shut it off. It's still on."
One of the guards pressed a stud at his wrist. Around the globe the air shimmered and faded.
"Now." Sherikov's hand closed over the globe. He lifted it carefully from its mount and brought it out for Cole to see. "This is the control turret for our enormous friend here. This is what will slow him down when he's inside Centaurus. He slows down and re-enters this universe. Right in the heart of the star. Then--no more Centaurus." Sherikov beamed. "And no more Armun."
But Cole was not listening. He had taken the globe from Sherikov and was turning i
t over and over, running his hands over it, his face close to its surface. He peered down into its interior, his face rapt and intent.
"You can't see the wiring. Not without lenses." Sherikov signalled for a pair of micro-lenses to be brought. He fitted them on Cole's nose, hooking them behind his ears. "Now try it. You can control the magnification. It's set for 1000X right now. You can increase or decrease it."
Cole gasped, swaying back and forth. Sherikov caught hold of him. Cole gazed down into the globe, moving his head slightly, focussing the glasses.
"It takes practice. But you can do a lot with them. Permits you to do microscopic wiring. There are tools to go along, you understand." Sherikov paused, licking his lip. "We can't get it done correctly. Only a few men can wire circuits using the micro-lenses and the little tools. We've tried robots, but there are too many decisions to be made. Robots can't make decisions. They just react."
Cole said nothing. He continued to gaze into the interior of the globe, his lips tight, his body taut and rigid. It made Sherikov feel strangely uneasy.
"You look like one of those old fortune tellers," Sherikov said jokingly, but a cold shiver crawled up his spine. "Better hand it back to me." He held out his hand.
Slowly, Cole returned the globe. After a time he removed the micro-lenses, still deep in thought.
"Well?" Sherikov demanded. "You know what I want. I want you to wire this damn thing up." Sherikov came close to Cole, his big face hard. "You can do it, I think. I could tell by the way you held it--and the job you did on the children's toy, of course. You could wire it up right, and in five days. Nobody else can. And if it's not wired up Centaurus will keep on running the galaxy and Terra will have to sweat it out here in the Sol system. One tiny mediocre sun, one dust mote out of a whole galaxy."
Cole did not answer.
Sherikov became impatient. "Well? What do you say?"
"What happens if I don't wire this control for you? I mean, what happens to me?"
"Then I turn you over to Reinhart. Reinhart will kill you instantly. He thinks you're dead, killed when the Albertine Range was annihilated. If he had any idea I had saved you--"
"I see."
"I brought you down here for one thing. If you wire it up I'll have you sent back to your own time continuum. If you don't--"
Cole considered, his face dark and brooding.
"What do you have to lose? You'd already be dead, if we hadn't pulled you out of those hills."
"Can you really return me to my own time?"
"Of course!"
"Reinhart won't interfere?"
Sherikov laughed. "What can he do? How can he stop me? I have my own men. You saw them. They landed all around you. You'll be returned."
"Yes. I saw your men."
"Then you agree?"
"I agree," Thomas Cole said. "I'll wire it for you. I'll complete the control turret--within the next five days."
IV
Three days later Joseph Dixon slid a closed-circuit message plate across the desk to his boss.
"Here. You might be interested in this."
Reinhart picked the plate up slowly. "What is it? You came all the way here to show me this?"
"That's right."
"Why didn't you vidscreen it?"
Dixon smiled grimly. "You'll understand when you decode it. It's from Proxima Centaurus."
"Centaurus!"
"Our counter-intelligence service. They sent it direct to me. Here, I'll decode it for you. Save you the trouble."
Dixon came around behind Reinhart's desk. He leaned over the Commissioner's shoulder, taking hold of the plate and breaking the seal with his thumb nail.
"Hang on," Dixon said. "This is going to hit you hard. According to our agents on Armun, the Centauran High Council has called an emergency session to deal with the problem of Terra's impending attack. Centauran relay couriers have reported to the High Council that the Terran bomb Icarus is virtually complete. Work on the bomb has been rushed through final stages in the underground laboratories under the Ural Range, directed by the Terran physicist Peter Sherikov."
"So I understand from Sherikov himself. Are you surprised the Centaurans know about the bomb? They have spies swarming over Terra. That's no news."
"There's more." Dixon traced the message plate grimly, with an unsteady finger. "The Centauran relay couriers reported that Peter Sherikov brought an expert mechanic out of a previous time continuum to complete the wiring of the turret!"
Reinhart staggered, holding on tight to the desk. He closed his eyes, gasping.
"The variable man is still alive," Dixon murmured. "I don't know how. Or why. There's nothing left of the Albertines. And how the hell did the man get half way around the world?"
Reinhart opened his eyes slowly, his face twisting. "Sherikov! He must have removed him before the attack. I told Sherikov the attack was forthcoming. I gave him the exact hour. He had to get help--from the variable man. He couldn't meet his promise otherwise."
Reinhart leaped up and began to pace back and forth. "I've already informed the SRB machines that the variable man has been destroyed. The machines now show the original 7-6 ratio in our favor. But the ratio is based on false information."
"Then you'll have to withdraw the false data and restore the original situation."
"No." Reinhart shook his head. "I can't do that. The machines must be kept functioning. We can't allow them to jam again. It's too dangerous. If Duffe should become aware that--"
"What are you going to do, then?" Dixon picked up the message plate. "You can't leave the machines with false data. That's treason."
"The data can't be withdrawn! Not unless equivalent data exists to take its place." Reinhart paced angrily back and forth. "Damn it, I was certain the man was dead. This is an incredible situation. He must be eliminated--at any cost."
Suddenly Reinhart stopped pacing. "The turret. It's probably finished by this time. Correct?"
Dixon nodded slowly in agreement. "With the variable man helping, Sherikov has undoubtedly completed work well ahead of schedule."
Reinhart's gray eyes flickered. "Then he's no longer of any use--even to Sherikov. We could take a chance.... Even if there were active opposition...."
"What's this?" Dixon demanded. "What are you thinking about?"
"How many units are ready for immediate action? How large a force can we raise without notice?"
"Because of the war we're mobilized on a twenty-four hour basis. There are seventy air units and about two hundred surface units. The balance of the Security forces have been transferred to the line, under military control."
"Men?"
"We have about five thousand men ready to go, still on Terra. Most of them in the process of being transferred to military transports. I can hold it up at any time."
"Missiles?"
"Fortunately, the launching tubes have not yet been disassembled. They're still here on Terra. In another few days they'll be moving out for the Colonial fracas."
"Then they're available for immediate use?"
"Yes."
"Good." Reinhart locked his hands, knotting his fingers harshly together in sudden decision. "That will do exactly. Unless I am completely wrong, Sherikov has only a half-dozen air units and no surface cars. And only about two hundred men. Some defense shields, of course--"
"What are you planning?"
Reinhart's face was gray and hard, like stone. "Send out orders for all available Security units to be unified under your immediate command. Have them ready to move by four o'clock this afternoon. We're going to pay a visit," Reinhart stated grimly. "A surprise visit. On Peter Sherikov."
* * * * *
"Stop here," Reinhart ordered.
The surface car slowed to a halt. Reinhart peered cautiously out, studying the horizon ahead.
On all sides a desert of scrub grass and sand stretched out. Nothing moved or stirred. To the right the grass and sand rose up to form immense peaks, a range of mountains without e
nd, disappearing finally into the distance. The Urals.
"Over there," Reinhart said to Dixon, pointing. "See?"
"No."
"Look hard. It's difficult to spot unless you know what to look for. Vertical pipes. Some kind of vent. Or periscopes."
Dixon saw them finally. "I would have driven past without noticing."
"It's well concealed. The main labs are a mile down. Under the range itself. It's virtually impregnable. Sherikov had it built years ago, to withstand any attack. From the air, by surface cars, bombs, missiles--"
"He must feel safe down there."
"No doubt." Reinhart gazed up at the sky. A few faint black dots could be seen, moving lazily about, in broad circles. "Those aren't ours, are they? I gave orders--"
"No. They're not ours. All our units are out of sight. Those belong to Sherikov. His patrol."
Reinhart relaxed. "Good." He reached over and flicked on the vidscreen over the board of the car. "This screen is shielded? It can't be traced?"
"There's no way they can spot it back to us. It's non-directional."
The screen glowed into life. Reinhart punched the combination keys and sat back to wait.
After a time an image formed on the screen. A heavy face, bushy black beard and large eyes.
Peter Sherikov gazed at Reinhart with surprised curiosity. "Commissioner! Where are you calling from? What--"
"How's the work progressing?" Reinhart broke in coldly. "Is Icarus almost complete?"
Sherikov beamed with expansive pride. "He's done, Commissioner. Two days ahead of time. Icarus is ready to be launched into space. I tried to call your office, but they told me--"
"I'm not at my office." Reinhart leaned toward the screen. "Open your entrance tunnel at the surface. You're about to receive visitors."
Sherikov blinked. "Visitors?"
"I'm coming down to see you. About Icarus. Have the tunnel opened for me at once."
"Exactly where are you, Commissioner?"
"On the surface."
Sherikov's eyes flickered. "Oh? But--"
"Open up!" Reinhart snapped. He glanced at his wristwatch. "I'll be at the entrance in five minutes. I expect to find it ready for me."