Collected Short Fiction

by C. M. Kornbluth

  He rose and balanced himself on the swaying door of their cell. “Next stop,” he said grimly, “M-15!”

  CHAPTER II

  LAWRENCE—Train’s cellmate on the prison ship—stirred uneasily and nudged the other. “What is it?”

  “Listen to that exhaust. Either something’s gone wrong or we’re going to land. How many days have we been going?”

  “They’ve fed us twenty-three times.”

  “Probably two weeks in space. That should be about it. Do you feel the gravity?” Train rolled over. “It’s faint, but it’s there. We must have landed already—the motion we feel is the ship shifting around on the landing field.”

  As though in confirmation of his words, the door to their cell that had been closed for two long weeks snapped open to admit two of their captors. The grey-clad men gestured silently and the prisoners got to their feet. Neither dared to speak; Train remembered the blow that had been his last answer, and so did Lawrence. They walked slowly ahead of their guards to the exit-port of the ship, not daring to guess what they might see.

  Train walked first through the door and gasped. He was under a mighty dome of ferro-glass construction, beyond which stars glittered coldly. They must have landed on the night side of the artificial asteroid, for he could see the blazing corona of the sun eclipsed by the sphere on which he was standing. Fantastic prominences leaped out in the shapes of animals or mighty trees, changing and melting into one another with incredible slowness. It was hard to believe that each one of them must have been huge enough to swallow a thousand Jupiters at once, without a flicker.

  A guard prodded him savagely in the back. He began walking, trying his muscles against the strange, heady lack of gravity, mincing along at a sedate pace. They were headed for a blocky concrete building.

  The doors opened silently before them, and they marched down a short corridor into an office of conventionally Terrestrial pattern.

  For the first time Train heard one of the guards speak. “Last two, sir,” he said to a uniformed man behind a desk.

  “You may leave, officers,” said the man gently. They saluted and disappeared from the room. The man rose and, in a curiously soft voice, said: “Please be seated.”

  Train and Lawrence folded into comfortable chairs, eyed their captor uncertainly. Lawrence was the first to speak.

  “Is there anything I can do for you?” he asked with flat incongruity.

  “Yes,” said the man. “May I have your names?”

  “Train and Lawrence,” said the chemist. The man wrote in a book sunk flush with the desk. “Thank you. And your reasons for commitment to M-15?”

  “In my case, attempted murder,” replied Lawrence. “In Train’s, blackmail and theft. At least, so we are given to understand.”

  “Of course,” said the man behind the desk, writing in the information. “It is my duty as administrator of this asteroid to inform you as well as I may of your functions here and what treatment you may expect.”

  He coughed and sat up straighter. “You may well wonder,” he began pretentiously, “why you have been sent to this bleak spot to expiate your sin against society.”

  “Rebellion against the Syndicate, you mean,” snapped Train harshly.

  “Be that as it may,” continued their informant with a shrug, “this is an officially constituted place of detention under charter and supervision by the Terrestrial League. Certain cases are sent to us for corrective measures associated formerly with World Research Incorporated. Therefore, it is only proper that they should be assigned to experimental work tending to advance the progress of humanity and raise its cultural level.

  “Your work will be a sort of manufacturing process of an extremely delicate nature. However, mechanical controls and checks will make blunders and errors impossible after a short period of instruction. You two men have been technicians of a high order of skill; let us hope that you will redeem yourselves by application to your assigned task.”

  He sat back with a smile. “Now, unless there are any questions—”

  “There damn well are,” snapped Lawrence. “In the first place, is there any communication with the outside world?”

  “None whatsoever. Evil influences might convince you that all here is not for the best, and persuade you to foolish acts of violence. We leave nothing to chance.”

  Train had had enough; he was going to get this soft-spoken fiend if it were his last living act. With a snarl in his throat he leaped at the desk, only to bring up smashing his face against some invisible barrier. Amazed, he put his hands over the frozen, quite transparent surface between his tormenter and him.

  “Superglass,” said the man quietly, smiling as on a child. “As I said, we leave nothing to chance.”

  “THIS IS your cell,” said the guard—one they had not seen before. He waved them into a spotless chamber, small and square, featuring two comfortable bunks and elaborate sanitary facilities.

  Train sat on one of the bunks, dazed. “I can’t understand it,” he burst out suddenly and violently. “This whole business is rotten with contradictions.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Lawrence absently, switching the faucet on and off.

  “It’s this sort of thing. They stuck us on this asteroid to die, we know. And yet, look at this room! Perfect for comfort and health. Consider our reception: a very skillful welcome designed to soothe one’s ruffled spirit and put him in a cooperative frame of mind. Of course, it didn’t happen to work with us, because we have very special rages against the system and all it stands for.”

  “It’s very simple,” said Lawrence thoughtfully. “They don’t want us on Earth and they do want us here very badly.”

  “Simple?” Train snorted. “I could have been shot down like a dog in Hartly’s office two weeks ago, and yet he packed me off here at a terrible expense in salaries, fuel, and wear of the ship. I don’t think it was fear of punishment of any kind that stopped him from destroying me then and there. They need me out on this chunk of rock. And I think it has something to do with where the place is, too.”

  “How so?”

  “Like this. It stands to reason that if you put an asteroid in a tight orbit as near as this to the sun, you need a lot of power—expensive power—to keep her there. It would be a lot easier and cheaper to put the orbit out somewhere between Jupiter and Neptune, and would be fully as accessible, or inaccessible, all depending on how you look at it. Ships wouldn’t have to have sun-armor, which costs plenty, and they wouldn’t run the risk of getting caught in an electric twister or prominence.”

  “So this place,” said Lawrence slowly, “is more than a prison.”

  “Obviously. Remember the ancient motto: ‘If it pays, they’ll do it.”

  “And if it doesn’t, they won’t. What was it that smiling gentleman said about congenial occupations commensurate with our training?”

  “That’s it! They manufacture something here that needs trained men and sunlight in huge quantities.”

  “Then why not hire workers? Why run the risk of having convicts responsible for the production of a valuable article or substance? It must be valuable, by the way. Just think of what it cost to get us here, to say nothing of the expense of building and maintaining this setup.”

  Train’s face went grim. “I can guess. It must mean that there’s a fair chance that the substance is so deadly that the men who manufacture it, even with all suitable and possible guards and shields, must be poisoned by it so that they die at their work after a time.”

  “Yes,” said Lawrence, “you must be right.” There was a long silence, then a guard banged his stick on their door.

  “You’re going to work,” he called in on them. The door was unlocked; the two walked out as martyrs might.

  “This way,” said the guard.

  HE SHOWED THEM into a narrow tiled room. “Begin by sealing those bottles. You’ll find torches and materials in your cabinets.” He walked out, closing the door behind him.

&nb
sp; Train stared at the row of open flasks that stood on the shelflike so many deadly snakes. “What are they, Lawrence?” he asked hoarsely.

  “I had an idea all along—” whispered the chemist. He took one of the flasks carefully by the neck and spilt some of its contents on a composition-topped table. “Looks like ordinary table salt, doesn’t it?”

  “Yes. But it has a smell like nothing on earth I know.”

  Lawrence, with the attitude of a scientist who knows and demands that everything should be in its place, opened a standard supply-cabinet and brought out, without looking, an ochre filter and a connected burner. He played the flames on the crystals and squinted through the glass carefully, turning it at sharp and precise angles. Finally he replaced the filter absently and incinerated the little heap of stuff on the table.

  “One of the mysteries of the chemical world is solved,” he said. “That stuff is thalenium chloride.”

  “Never heard of it.”

  “You’re fortunate. It’s the filthiest narcotic that ever cursed a race. Fortunately, only the wealthiest can afford to take it. Seeing the setup required to manufacture it, that’s understandable.

  “Thalenium’s supposed to be a solar element—unstable—made up in the sun’s core. They named it after the Muse of Comedy, for some reason or other. I never came across an authentic case of thalenium poisoning, but it’s supposed to cause hallucinations viler than anything imaginable to the normal mind. External manifestations are great spasms of laughter—hence, comedy and the comic muse.”

  Train stared at the innocent-appearing crystals. “And we have to handle it?”

  “No danger, yet, I suppose, if we are careful.”

  Lawrence picked up a flask full of the narcotic with tongs. “Like this,” he said, skillfully playing a stream of flame across its tapering spout. He set it down and quickly slipped a cap over the softened glass. “Then,” he added, “you appear to spray it with this stuff.” He squirted a film of heavy liquid on the cap. It set sharply, and letters and figures came out on it.

  “Authentic thalenium chloride, c.p., 500 mm,” he read. “Clever devil, World Research!”

  They set to work, moving like machines, sealing the flasks in three sharp operations.

  “There’s no danger yet,” observed Lawrence. “I don’t know, and can’t imagine, what the process of its actual manufacture may be, but we’ll find that out later. If the stuff is prepared direct as the chloride, it might be fairly harmless, but if free metallic thalenium is used then there must be hell to pay among the workers.”

  “Then there’s no point, as yet, in going on strike?”

  “Certainly not. Everything’s gravy so far. And of course, it’s going to be gravy as long as we do our work faithfully, obediently, and not too intelligently. Thus, for example, it pays to make minor mistakes like this one.” He took a sealed bottle firmly by the neck and snapped it against the edge of the table. It shattered and spilled over the floor.

  “I get the idea. We case the joint for as long as we can, staying away from the dangerous operations. Then we escape?” He poured an acid over the salt on the floor; it bubbled and gave off thin wisps of vapor.

  Lawrence scattered a neutralizing base over the acid. It became a white froth that he flushed down a floor-gutter. “I see,” he remarked, returning to his work, “that we’ve been thinking along somewhat similar lines.”

  “I have a machine,” said Train irrelevantly. “I developed it all by myself—no, I’m forgetting my girl friend, a very competent head for details—and if I get back to Earth and have two weeks to myself, along with reasonable equipment, I guarantee that I’ll wipe World Research and all that’s rotten in it off the face of the Earth and out of the cosmos, too.”

  “Sounds remarkable. What does it do?”

  Train told him.

  The chemist whistled. “Quite out of my field,” he said. “It takes a physicist to dope out those things that really count.”

  “Independent Fourteen, they call it,” said Train with a tight-drawn smile. “And I swear by every god in the firmament that nothing—nothing—is going to keep me from getting back to Earth, setting up Independent Fourteen, and blowing World Research to hell!”

  CHAPTER III

  TRAIN was lying half-awake on his cot when the door slammed shut. “Hiya, Lawrence.” The chemist bent over him. “Get up, Barney. It’s happened.”

  Train sat up abruptly. “How do you know?” he snapped.

  “I was just seeing the Oily Bird.” That was the name they had given the infuriating man who greeted them on their arrival. “He says we’ve made good in the packaging department and we’re going to be promoted. He still doesn’t know that we are wise as to what is going on.”

  “Promoted, eh? What’s that mean?”

  “He said we were going into the production end of the concern. That we’d have to handle the stuff without tongs. Be exposed to sunlight. And, at this distance, that’s surely fatal in a short time.”

  “I didn’t think it would come this quickly,” said Train. “Then we’ll have to dope something out—fast.”

  “Fast is the word. How about slugging a guard?”

  “Too crude. Much too crude. They must have an elaborate system of passwords and countersigns; otherwise it would have been done successfully long ago. And Lord knows how many times it’s failed!”

  “Right,” said the chemist. “We can’t slug a guard. But maybe we can bribe one?”

  “I doubt it. We know it hasn’t succeeded. I suppose they make big money as such things go.”

  “Can we put psychological screws on one? Know any little tricks like suggesting hatred against the system he’s working for?”

  Train wrinkled his brow. “Yes, but they are good only after a long period of constant suggestion. We have to move at once. Lawrence, can you play sick?”

  “As well as you. Why?”

  “And do you remember the shape of the eyebrows on the guard we have this week?”

  “Have you gone bats?” demanded the chemist, staring at Train angrily. “This is no time to be playing jokes.”

  The scientist raised his hand. “This isn’t a joke, or a game, either. Those eyebrows may mean our salvation.”

  Lawrence picked up a pencil and paper and sketched out what he remembered of their guard’s face. “There,” he said, thrusting it under Train’s nose.

  Train studied the drawing. “I think this is accurate,” he mused. “If it is, we may be back on Earth in two weeks.”

  THE GUARD KNOCKED on the door, and there was no answer. Suspiciously he pushed it open and entered, half-expecting to be attacked. But he found one of the prisoners in bed with a sallow skin, breathing in shallow gulps.

  “Lawrence is sick, I think,” said Train.

  “Yeah? Too bad. I’ll call the medico.”

  “No,” gasped the patient. “Not yet.”

  The guard turned to go. “I have to call him when anyone is sick. It might start an epidemic, otherwise.”

  “Can you wait just a minute?” asked Train. “I know how to handle him when he gets one of his attacks. It isn’t anything contagious. Just mild conjunctivitis of the exegetical peritoneum.”

  “That a fact?” asked the guard. “How do you handle him?”

  “Easy enough,” said Train. “May I borrow your flashlight?”

  “Sure!” The guard handed over a slim pencil-torch.

  “Thank you.” The scientist balanced the light on the broad back of a chair. “Won’t you sit down?” he asked the guard. “This will take a few minutes.”

  “Sure.” Their warder watched with interest as Train dimmed the lights of the cell and switched on the flashlight so that it cast a tiny spot of radiance on a gleaming water faucet. The guard stared at it, fascinated.

  Train’s voice sank to a whispering drone. “Concentrate on the light. Block out every other thing but the light.”

  The guard shifted uneasily. This was a strange way to treat a s
ick man, and the light was shining right in his eyes. Perhaps he had better call the medico after all. He was half decided to do so, but he felt tired and the chair was comfortable. What was it Train was saying?

  “By the time I have counted to twenty, you will be asleep. One . . .” The guard’s eyes grew heavy. “Concentrate . . . block out everything but the light . . . everything but the light . . . seven . . .

  The spot of light floated before the guard’s face, distorting into strange shapes that shifted. He just barely heard Train drone “twelve” before he began to breathe deeply and hoarsely.

  Train switched on the lights and slipped the flashlight into his pocket. “Perfect specimen, Lawrence,” he exulted. “You can always tell by the eyebrows.”

  “Fascinating,” returned the erstwhile victim to conjunctivitis of the exegetical peritoneum as he climbed out of bed. “What now?”

  Train rolled back the guard’s eyelids with a practiced thumb. “Ask him anything,” he said. “He’ll tell you whatever we want to know.”

  Lawrence cleared his throat, bent over the sleeping man. “When are you leaving for Earth?”

  “This afternoon. One hour from now.”

  “Do the others know you?”

  “They never saw me, but they know my name.”

  “What are the passwords on the way to the ship?”

  “Front gate, rabies. Second gate, tuberculosis. Field guard, leprosy. Ship port, cancer.”

  “Someone must have had a grim sense of humor,” whispered Lawrence to Train. “What are your duties on the ship?”

  “I have no duties.”

  The chemist snapped: “One of us must take his place.”

  “Yes. Which one of us? No, we won’t have to decide. I’m going. Aside from such details as the fact that his uniform will fit me, but would look suspiciously baggy on you, I have a chance to do something about this whole rotten system when I get back. You would only be able to commit more murders, or near-murders.”

  The chemist’s lips whitened. “You’re right,” he whispered. “When you have the chance, promise me that you’ll wipe out this asteroid and the filthy stuff they manufacture here. I don’t think I’ll be around by that time; exposure to the sun might get me sooner than we think.”