Anderson, Poul - Tomorrow's Children 02

by Chain Of Logic (v1. 1)

  "Dick! How much longer, Dick?”

  Hammer turned at the low call and scowled back at the uncertain shapes of his followers. “Shut up,” he growled. “No talkin’ on march.”

  "I’ll talk when I please.” The voice was louder.

  Hammer hunched his great shoulders and thrust his battered hairy face aggressively into the moonlight.

  “I’m still boss,” he said quietly. “Anytime you wanta fight me for the job, go ahead.”

  He had their only remaining firearm, a rifle slung over his back and a belt of a few cartridges, but with knife and club, fists and feet and teeth he was also the deadliest battler in the gang. That was all which had kept him alive, those unending dreadful years of feud and famine and hopeless drifting, for no gang-man was ever safe, and a boss, with his own jealous subordinates to watch as well as outsiders, least of all.

  “O.K., O.K.,” yielded the other man sullenly. “Only I’m tired an' hungry, we been goin’ so long—”

  “Not much farther,” promised Hammer. “I rec’nize this territory. Come on-—an’ quiet!”

  They moved ahead, stumbling, half asleep with weariness, and the terrible gnawing void in their bellies was all that kept them going. It had been a long journey, hundreds of miles of devastated southland, and it was hard, bitterly hard to pass these comparatively rich farms without lifting more than a few chickens or ears of corn. But Hammer was insistent on secrecy, and he had dominated them long enough for most of them to give in more or less automatically. He had not yet chosen to reveal his plans, but this far into “enemy” country they must involve fighting,

  The moon was lowering when Hammer called a halt. They had topped a high ridge overlooking a darker mass some two miles off, a town. “You can sleep now,” said

  the chief. “We’ll attack shortly before sunrise. We’ll take the place an’then—food! Houses! Women! Likker! An’ — more.”

  The gang was too tired then to care about anything but sleep. They stretched on the ground, lank animal figures in clumsy garments of leather and ragged homespun, carrying knives and clubs, axes, even spears and bows. Hammer squatted motionless, a great bearded gorilla of a man, his massive face turned toward the sleeping town. A pair of his lieutenants, lean young men with something hard and deadly in their impassive countenances, joined him.

  “O.K., Dick, what’s the idea?” muttered one. “We don’t just go tearin’ in; if that was all, there’re towns closer to where we came from. What’re you cookin’ now?”

  “Plenty,” said Hammer. “Now don’t get noisy, an’ I’ll explain. My notion’ll give us more’n a few days’ food an’ rest an’ celebration. It’ll give us—home.”

  “Home!” whispered the other outlaw. His cold eyes took on an odd remote look. “Home! The word tastes queer. I ain’t spoke it so long—”

  “I useta live here, before the war,” said Hammer softly and tonelessly. “When things blew up, though, I was in the army. The plagues hit my unit, an’ those who didn’t die the first week went over the hill. I headed south, figgerin’ the country’d busted up an’ I’d better go where it’d be warm. Only too many other people got the same idea.”

  “You’ve told us that much before.”

  “I know, I know, but—anybody who lived through it can’t forget it. I still see those men dyin’—the plague eatin’ ’em. Well, we fought for food. Separate gangs attacked when they met. Until at last there were few enough left an’ things picked up a little. So I j’ined the village an’ tried farmin’.”

  The dog howled again, closer. There was an eerie quavering in that cry, something never voiced before the mutations began. “That mutt,” growled one of the gang-men, “will wake the whole muckin’ town.”

  “Nah, this place has been peaceful too long,” said Plammer. “You can see that. No guards nowhere. Why, there’re sep’rate farms. We had to fight other men, an’ then when we finally settled down it was the bugs an’ blights, an’ at last the floods washed our land from under us an’ we had to take to gang life again. Then I remembered my ol’ home town Southvale. Nice farmin’ land, not too bad weather, an’ judgin’ by reports an’ rumors about this region, settled down, a’most rich. So I thought I’d come back— Hammer’s teeth gleamed white under the moon.

  “Well, you always did love t’hear y’rself talk. Now suppose you say what your deal is.”

  “Just this. The town’s cut off from outside by ordinary means. Once we hold it, we can easy take care o’ the outlyin’ farms an’ villages. But—you can see the gov’ments’s been here. Few bugs in the crops, so somebody must’a been sprayin’. A jet overhead yesterday. An’ so on.”

  They stirred uneasily. One muttered, “We don’t want no truck with the gov’ment. They’ll hang us f’r this.”

  “If they can! They’re really not so strong. They ain’t got aroun’ to the South at all, ’cept f’r one or two visits. Way I figger it there’s only one gov’ment center to speak of, this town out in Oregon we heard about. We can find out ’zac’ly from the people we catch. They’ll tell!

  “Now look. The gov’ment must deal with Southvale, one way ’r ’nother. There ain’t enough cars ’r roads, they must use planes. That means one’ll land in Southvale, sooner ’r later. The pilot steps out—an’ we’ve got us a plane. I ain’t forgot how to fly. A few o’ us ’r maybe we can ferry a lot, fly to Oregon an’ land at night near the house o’ some big shot, the President even, whoever he is. The plane’s pilot’ll tell us what we need to know. Those jets just whisper along, an’ anyway nobody expects air attack any more. Well be just another incomin’ plane if they do spot us.

  “We capture our big shot, an' find out from him where the atom bombs’re kept. There must be some stockpiled near the city, an' our man’ll make a front f’r us to get at ’em. If he ain’t scared f’r himself, he’s got a family. We set the bombs an’ clear out. The city blows. No more gov’ment worth mentionin’. With what we’ve taken from the arsenals, we’ll hold Southvale an’ all this territory. We’ll be be bosses, owners—kings! Maybe later we c’n go on an’ conquer more land. There’ll be no gov’ment t’ stop us.”

  He stood up. His eyes caught the moonlight in a darkly splendid vision of power and destiny, for he was not, in his own estimate, a robber. Hardened by pain and sorrow and the long bitter fight to stay alive, he was more of a conqueror, with the grandiose dreams and at least something of the driving energy and transcendent genius of an Alexander or a Napoleon. He genuinely hoped to improve the lot of his own people, and as for others—well, “stranger” and “enemy” had been synonymous too long for him to give that side of it much thought now.

  “No more hunger,” he breathed. “No more cold an’ wet, no more hidin’ an’ runnin’ from a stronger gang, no more walkin’ an’ walkin’ an’ never gettin’ nowheres. Our kids won’t die before they’re weaned, they’ll grow up as God meant they should, free an’ happy an’ safe. We c’n build our own future, boys—I seem t’ see it now, a tall city reachin’ f’r the sun.”

  His lieutenants stirred uneasily. After some ten years of association they recognized their chief’s strange moods but could not fathom them. His enormous ambitions were beyond the scope of minds focused purely on the daily struggle for life, they were awed and half afraid. But even his legion of enemies and rivals acknowledged Hammer’s skill and audacity and luck. This might work.

  Their own ideas of a future went little beyond a house and a harem, But to smash the government was a cause worth giving life for. They associated it with the disaster, and thus with all their woes. And it was their enemy. It would kil! them, or at least lock them up, for deeds done when life depended on ruthless action. It would certainly never permit them to hold this green and lovely land.

  Unless—unless!

  The dog had been snuffling around the outlaw camp, a vague misshapen shadow in the fleeting moonlight. Now he howled once more and trotted down the ridge toward the dark silent mass of the town.


  Alaric Wayne woke up at the sound of scratching. For a moment he lay in bed, mind still clouded with sleep. Moonlight streamed through the window to shimmer off the tumbled heaps of books and apparatus littering the room. Outside, the world was a black and white fantasy of bulking shadow, dreaming off into the remote star-torched sky.

  Full wakefulness came. Alaric slid out of bed, went to the window, and leaned against the screen. It was his dog, scratching to get in. And—excited. He raised the screen and the animal jumped clumsily over the sill.

  The dog whined, pulled at Alaric’s leg, sniffed toward the south and shivered. The boy’s great light eyes seemed to deepen and brighten, flash cold in .the pouring moonlight; shadow-masked, his thin face was not discernible, but its habitual blankness slid into tight lines.

  He had to —think!

  The dog was warning him of danger from the south. But, though the mutation shaping the canine brain had given it abnormal intelligence, he was still a dog, not qualitatively different from the rest of his species, not able to understand or reason above an elementary level. Three years before, Alaric had spotted qualities in the pup by certain signs, and raised and trained it, and there was a curious half-rapport between them, a mutual understanding. They had co-operated earlier, on their long hikes, to hunt or to avoid the wild dog packs, but now—

  There was danger. Men outside town, to the south, with hostile intentions. That was all the dog had been able to gather, it would have been enough for any normal human, as a basis of action. But Alaric wasn’t normal.

  He stood shivering with effort, clenching his hands to his forehead as if to prevent a physical disintegration of his frantically groping brain. What did it mean? What to do ?

  Danger—danger was clear enough, and primitive instinct revealed the action one must take. One ran from the packs of human boys when they intended to commit mayhem on a mutant, and hid. One skirted the spoor of wild dogs or the bears beginning to spread since hunting fell off. Only‘in this case —slowly, reluctantly, fighting itself, his shuddering mind spewed out the conclusion—in this case, one couldn’t run. If the towm went, so did all safety

  Think—think! There was danger, it couldn't be run from—what to do? His mind groped in fog and chaos. It could grasp at nothing. Disjointed logic chains clanked insanely in his skull.

  Reason did not supply the answer, but instinct came, the instinct which would have surged to the fore under the pressure of immediate peril, and now finally broke through the swirling storm of a mind trying to think.

  Why—it was so simple. Alaric relaxed, eyes widening with the sheer delightful simplicity of it. It was really as obvious as—why, it had all the primitive elementariness of the three-body problem. If you couldn't run from danger— you fought it!

  Fighting—destruction—yes, something to destroy, but he would only have the newly reclaimed powerhouse available—

  He scrambled into his clothes with frantic speed. A glance at stars and moon told him, without his thinking about it, how long to sunrise. Not long— and in his own way he knew the enemy would attack just before dawn. He had to hurry!

  He vaulted out the window and ran down the silent street, the dog following. All the town’s electrical and electronic equipment was stored at the powerhouse. It would be quite a while before the whole community had electricity again, but meanwhile the plant ran several important machines, charged storage batteries, and performed other essential services.

  The building stood beside the river, the only lit windows in town besides the police station glowing from its dark bulk. After the war there had been no time, supplies, or parts to spare for the generators, and they had been plundered to repair the vital farm equipment, but recently the government had delivered what was necessary to get the water turbines going again. It had occasioned a formal celebration in South vale—another step up the ladder, after that long fall down.

  Alaric beat on the door, yelling wordlessly. There came the sound of a scraping chair and the maddeningly slow shuffle of feet. Alaric jittered on the steps, gasping. No time, no time!

  The door creaked open and the night watchman blinked myopically at Alaric. He was an old man, and hadn’t gotten new glasses since the war. “Who’re you?” he asked. “And what do you want at this hour?”

  Alaric brushed by unheedingly and made for the storeroom. He knew what he needed and what he must do with it, but the job was long and time was growing so desperately short.

  “Here . . . hey, you!” The watchman hobbled after him, shaking with indignation. “You crazy mutie, what do you think you’re doing—?”

  Alaric shook loose the clutching hand and gestured to his dog. The mongrel snarled and bristled, and the watchman stumbled back, whitefaced. “Help!” It was a high, old man’s yell. “Help, burglar—”

  Somehow words came, more instinctive than reasoned. “Shut up,” said Alaric, “or dog kill you.” He meant it.

  The animal added emphasis with a bass growl and a vicious snap of fangs. His head reeling, his heart seeming to burst his ribs, the watchman sank into a chair and the dog sat down to watch him.

  The storeroom door was locked. Alaric grabbed a heavy wrench and beat down a panel. Tumbling into the storeroom, he grabbed for what he needed. Wire—meters-—electronic tubes—batteries—hurry, hurry!

  Dragging it out into the main room before the great droning generators, he squatted down, a tatterdemalion gnome, eyes like blued metal, face tautened into a savagery of concentration, and got to work. Through a visual blur, the guard stared in uncomprehending terror. The dog watched him steadily, with sullen malevolent hope that he would try something. It was embittering, to hate all the world save one being, because only that being understood—

  False dawn glimmered wanly over the land, touching houses and fields with wandering ghost fingers, glittering briefly off the swift-flowing river before deeper darkness returned. Hammer’s gang woke with the instant animal alertness of their kind, and stirred in the fogdrifting twilight. Their scant clothes were heavy with dew, they were cold and hungry—how hungry!—and they looked down at the moveless mass of their goal with smoldering savage yearning.

  “Fair is the land,” whispered Hammer, “more fair ’n land’s ever been. The fields ’re green t’ harvest an’ the fog runs white over a river like a polished knife—an’ it’s our land, our home.” His voice rose in hard snapping command: “Joe, take twenty men an’ circle north. Come in by the main road, postin’ men at the edge o’ town an’ the bridge over the river, then wait in the main square. Buck, take your fifteen, circle west, an’ come in the same time as Joe, postin’ men outside town an’ in that big buildin’ halfway down Fifth Street—that’s the machine shop, as I recall, an’ I hope you c’n still read street signs. Then join Joe. The rest follow me straight no’th. Go as quiet as you can, slug ’r kill anyone you meet, an’ be ready f’r a fight but don’t start one. O.K.!”

  The two other groups filed down the hill and vanished into misty dusk. Hammer waited awhile. He had previously divided the gang into bands assigned to his lieutenants, reserving the best men for the group immediately under him. He spoke to them, softly but with metallic rapidity:

  “Accordin’ t’ what I remember o’ Southvale, an’ to what I seen elsewhere, they don’t expect nothin’ like this. There’ve been no bandits here f’r a long time, an’ anyway they’d never think a gang had the skill and self-control t’ sneak through the fat lands farther south. So there’ll be no patrol, just a few cops on their beats—an’ too sleepy this time t’ give us much trouble. An’ nearly all the weapons ’re gonna be in the police station—which is what we’re gonna capture. With guns, we’ll control the town. But f’r the love of life, don’t start shootin’ till I say to. There may be armed citizens, an’ they c’n raise hell with us ’nless we handle ’em right.”

  A low mutter of assent ran along that line of haggard, bearded, fierceeyed men. Knives and axes glittered in the first dim dawn-flush, bows were strung
and spears hefted. But there was no restlessness, no uncontrollable lust to be off and into battle. They had learned patience the hard way, the last sixteen years. They waited.

  Timing wasn’t easy to judge, but Hammer had developed a sense for it which had enabled him to pull several coups in the past and served him now. When he figured the other groups were near the outskirts of town, he raised his hand in signal, slipped the safety catch on his gun, and started down the hill at a rapid trot.

  The white mists rolled over the ground, but they needed nothing to muffle the soft pad of their feet, most bare and all trained in quietness. Grass whispered under their pace, a staked-out cow lowed, and a rooster greeted the first banners of day. Otherwise there was silence, and the town dreamed on in the cool twilight.

  They came onto the cracked pavement of the road, and it was strange to be going on concrete again. They passed an outer zone of deserted houses. As Hammer had noticed elsewhere, Southvale had drawn into a compact defensive mass during the black years and not grown out of it since; As long as there were no fortified outposts, such an arrangement was easy to overrun. Still, the outlaws were enormously outnumbered, and had to counterbalance the disadvantage by the cold ruthlessness of direct action. Hammer stopped at the edge of habitation, told off half a dozen men to patrol the area, and led the rest on to the middle of town. They went more slowly now, senses strainingly alert, every nerve and muscle taut with the expectancy of danger.

  Hoofs clattered from a side street. Hammer gestured to a bowman, who grinned and bent his weapon. A mounted policeman came into view a few blocks down. He wasn’t impressive, he had no sign of office except gun and tarnished badge, he was sleepy and eager to report to the station and then get home. His wife would have breakfast ready—