Journey to Infinity - [Adventures in Science Fiction 02]

by Edited by Martin Greenburg

  Burt smiled broadly and his own mind reached out to George’s and Harold’s, saying, “Something has got them worried, though the higher-ups aren’t lively to have told them much’’

  “Yes—it looks as if there’s irritation in influential circles and the cops got bawled out in consequence. Evidently news is coming through “ Pause. “Did you feel any probe?”

  “No.”

  “Neither did we. That Drane must have gone’’ Pause. “Pity we can’t talk with Melor this way. He’s walking behind like a fatalist pacing to certain death? Pause. “Got plenty of guts, the way he’s taken us on trust’’

  “Yes—but we’ll look after him!”

  They reached the levitators. The entire landing was now solid with armed police and a number of them were pressing eagerly into the deserted apartment, intent on thorough search.

  Herded into a levitator, the captured quartet and their escort of seven crammed it to capacity. The glassite doors slid shut. The burly captain pressed a button and the levitator soared smoothly upward while its occupants watched the rising indicator with offhand interest. They stopped at the twenty-seventh floor.

  The captain didn’t permit the doors to open. He stood with his attention fixed upon the indicator while slowly his beefy face changed color. Suddenly, he rammed his big thumb on the ground-level button and the levitator shot downward.

  Harold: “Who did that?”

  Burt: “Me. I couldn’t resist it.” Then, vocally, and loudly, “I didn’t notice any guns go off. Did you?”

  The other captives grinned. The captain glared at the up-flying shaft but said nothing. The escort’s uneasiness registered more openly on their faces.

  A veritable guard of honor had lined up between the front entrance and the waiting car. About sixty guns were held in readiness on either side—in flat disregard of the fact that one had only to start something and let the fire of one rank bring down half the opposite rank, thus providing plentiful company in death.

  The four got into the car, and its driver, a thin featured, pessimistic individual, looked even less happy for their arrival. He had a cop for company in front. The car blew its jets and started off with half a dozen cars leading and a full dozen following. It was a cavalcade worthy of the year’s best burial, and its pace was suitably funereal as it wended its way through a succession of side streets to the outskirts of the city. A thousand feet above them a helicopter and two gyros drifted along, carefully following every bend and turn on their route.

  The destination proved to be an immense, needlelike skyscraper, tall, slender, graceful. It soared majestically from spacious, well-tended grounds around which stood a high wall surmounted by the spidery wiring of a photoelectric telltale system. As they swept through the great gateway, the prisoners caught a glimpse of the telltale marker-board in the granite lodge and a group of heavily armed guards lounging behind the gates.

  “The palace of the Council,” Melor informed. “This is where they make worlds and break them—or so they claim.”

  “Be quiet!” snapped the cop in front. Then, in a high, squeaky voice, he added, “There are fairies at the bottom of my garden!”

  “Indeed?” said Burt, affecting polite surprise.

  The cop’s sour face whitened. His grip tightened on his blaster, forgetting in his emotion that a stronger hold was supposed to be ineffective.

  “Let him alone, Burt!” thought Harold.

  “I don’t like him,” Burt came back. “His ears stick out.”

  “How he smells of fury!” criticized Melor, openly.

  Conversation ended as the procession halted in front of the skyscraper’s ornate entrance. The quartet climbed out, paraded through another wary guard of honor, entered the building. Here, more black-uniformed men conducted them two levels below ground, ushered them into an apartment which, ominously, had a beryllium-steel grille in lieu of a door. The last man out turned a monster key in the grille and departed.

  Before the inmates had time thoroughly to examine their new prison, an attendant appeared, thrust packaged foods through the bars of the grille, and told them, “I haven’t got the key and don’t know who has. Neither can I find out. If you want anything, call for me, but don’t think you can make me open up. I couldn’t do it even if I wanted —which I don’t!”

  “Dear me,” said Burt, “that’s unkind of you.” Going to the grille, he swung it open, looked out at the astounded attendant and continued, “Tell the Council that we are very comfortable and appreciate their forethought. We shall be pleased to call upon them shortly.”

  The attendant’s scattered wits came together. He took to his heels as if the breath of death was on his neck.

  “How did you do that?” demanded Melor, his eyes wide. He ambled loose-jointedly to the grille, looked at its lock, swung it to and fro on its hinges.

  “The gentleman with the key locked it, then unlocked it, and wandered away satisfied that duty had been done,” Burt released a sigh. “Life is full of delusions.” Opening a packet, he examined its contents. “Calorbix!” he said disgustedly, and tossed the package on a table.

  “Here they come,” George announced.

  A horde arrived. They locked the grille, put two heavy chains around its end post, padlocked those. The four watched in amused silence. A pompous little man, with much silver braid strewn over his chest, then tried the grille, shaking it furiously. Satisfied, he scowled at the four, went away, the horde following.

  Burt mooched restlessly around the room. “There are scanners watching us, microphones listening to us and, for all I know, some cockeyed gadget tasting us. I’m fed up with this. Let’s go see the Council.”

  “Yes, it’s about time we did,” George agreed.

  “The sooner the better,” added Harold.

  Melor offered no comment. The conversation of his friends, he decided, was oft confusing and seemingly illogical. They had a habit of going off at the queerest slants. So he contented himself with staring at the grille through which nothing but some liquid form of life could pass, while he wondered whether Tor and Vern had yet been dragged into the net. He hoped not. It was better to execute one Lingan than three.

  A minute later the man with the keys came back accompanied by two guards and a tall, gray-haired official clad in myrtle green. The badge of the Silver Comet glittered on the latter’s shoulder straps. His keen gaze rested on the warden as that worthy surlily unlocked the padlocks, withdrew the chains, freed the grille.

  Then he said to the four, “Most remarkable 1” He waited for a response, but none came, so he carried on. “This warder hasn’t the least notion of what he’s doing. As the Council expected, you influenced him to return and unlock the gate. We kept him under observation. It has been an interesting demonstration of what hypnosis can achieve.” His smile was amiable. “But you didn’t expect him to return accompanied, eh?”

  “What does it matter?” Harold answered. “Your brain advertises that the Council is ready to deal with us.”

  “I waste my breath talking.” The official made a gesture of futility. “All right. Come with me.”

  ~ * ~

  The Council looked small. Its strength a mere eight, all but two of them human. They sat at a long table, the six humans in the middle, a nonhuman at each end. The thing on the extreme right had a head like a purple globe, smooth, shining, hairless, possessing no features except a pair of retractable eyes. Below was a cloaked shapelessness suggesting no shoulders and no arms. It was as repulsive as the sample on the left was beautiful. The one on the left had a flat, circular, golden face surrounded by golden petals, large and glossy. The head was supported by a short, fibrous green neck from the knot of which depended long, delicate arms terminating in five tentacles. Two black-knobbed stamens jutted from the face, and a wide, mobile mouth was visible beneath them. It was lovely, like a flower.

  Between this table and the staring captives hung a barrier of wire. Harold, Burt and George could see that it was loa
ded, and their perceptions examined it gingerly. They diagnosed its purpose simultaneously : it bore an alternating current imposed upon a pulsing potential. Two hundred cycles per second, with a minimum pressure of four thousand volts rising to peak points of seven thousand every tenth cycle.

  “Hypnocast jammer!” reported Burt. He was puzzled. “But that doesn’t blank neural sprays. They’re different bands. Can you hear what they’re thinking?”

  “Not a thing,” answered Harold. “Neither could I get your thoughts while you were speaking.”

  “I’ve lost contact, too,” put in George. “Something which isn’t that screen is droning out a bass beat note that makes a mess of the telepathic band.”

  Sniffing with distaste, Melor said, “This is where I come in. I know what’s the matter. There’s a Drane in the room. He’s doing it.”

  “Are you sure of that?”

  “I can sense him.” He pointed at the flowerlike being on the left. “Furthermore, Dranes can’t speak. They’ve no vocal cords. The Florans function as their interpreters—that’s why this one’s here.”

  One of the humans on the Council, a bull-headed, heavily jowled man, leaned forward, fixed glittering eyes on the four. His voice was harsh.

  “The Lingan is right. Since we are not assembled to be entertained by your alien antics, nor to listen to your lies, but solely for the purpose of weighing fresh truths with justice and with wisdom, we find it necessary to employ a Drane.”

  So saying, he made a dramatic gesture. The Floran reached a tentacled hand down behind the table, lifted the hidden Drane, placed it on the polished surface.

  Mental visualization, Harold realized, had proved correct with regard to shape and appearance but had misled him in the matter of size. He’d taken it for granted that a Drane possessed bulk comparable with his own. But this creature was no larger than his fist. Its very smallness shocked him.

  It was lizardlike, but not so completely as first appeared, and now that he could see it closely, its tiny but perfect uniform looked absurd. While they regarded it, the thing sat there and stared at them with eyes like pin points of flaming crimson, and as it stared the strange beat note disappeared, a psychic flood poured through the screen and lapped around their minds.

  But already the three shields were up, while the fourth—the Lingan—felt the force only as an acute throb. The pressure went up and up; it was amazing that such a midget brain could emit so mighty a mental flow of power. It felt and probed and thrust and stabbed, its violence increasing without abate.

  Perspiration beaded the features of the trio as they gazed fixedly at the same spot on the Drane’s jacket while maintaining their shields against its invisible assault. Melor sat down, cradled his head in his arms, began to rock slowly from side to side. The Council watched impassively. The Drane’s optics were jewels of fire.

  “Keep it up,” whispered Harold. “It’s almost on the boil.”

  Like the lizards it resembled, the Drane’s pose was fixed, unmoving. It had remained as motionless as a carved ornament since it had reached the table, and its baleful eyes had never blinked. Still its psychic output went up.

  Then, suddenly, it pawed at its jacket, snatched the paw away. A thin whisp of smoke crawled out of the cloth. The next instant, the creature had fled from the table, the mental pressure collapsing as its source disappeared. Its sharp, peaky voice came into their minds as the thing snaked through a tiny door, fled along the outer passage. The voice faded with distance.

  “Burning . . . burning . . . burning!”

  The Council member who had spoken originally, now sat staring through the screen at the prisoners. His hand was on the table, and his fingers rapped its surface nervously. The other members maintained blank expressions. He turned his head, looked at the Floran.

  “What happened?”

  “The Drane said he was burning,” enunciated the mouth in the flowerlike head. Its tones were weak, but precise. “His mind was very agitated. The peril destroyed his ability to concentrate, and he had to flee lest worse befall.”

  “Pyrotics!” said the Council member incredulously. “There are legends of such.” His attention returned to the captives. “So you’re pyrotics—fire-raisers!”

  “Some of your people can do it—but don’t know it themselves,” Harold told him. “They’ve caused most of any seemingly inexplicable fires you’ve experienced.” He made a gesture of impatience. “Now that we’ve got rid of that Drane how about giving way to what’s on your mind? We can read what is written there, and we know the next move: you’re to call Burkinshaw, Helman and Roka, after which the parley will start.”

  Frowning, but making no retort, the Council member pressed a red button on his desk. His attitude was one of expectancy.

  In short time, Helman and Roka entered the room, took seats at the table. The former’s bearing was surly and disgruntled. The latter grinned sheepishly at the quartet, even nodded amiably to Harold.

  One minute after them, Burkinshaw Three, the Supreme Lord, came in and took the center seat. His awesome name and imposing title fitted him like somebody else’s glove, for he was a small, thin man, round-shouldered, narrow-chested, with a pale, lined face. His balding head had wisps of gray hair at the sides, and his eyes peered myopically through rimless pince-nez. His whole appearance was that of a mild and perpetually preoccupied professor—but his mind was cold, cold.

  That mind was now wide open to the three. It was a punctilious mind, clear and sharp in form, operating deliberately and calculatingly through the mixed output of the other humans at the Council table.

  Arranging some papers before him, and keeping his gaze fixed upon the top sheets, Burkinshaw spoke in measured, unhurried tones, saying, “I don’t doubt that you can read my mind and are reading it now, but in justice to the Lingan, who cannot do so, and for the benefit of my fellows who are not telepathic either, I must use ordinary speech.” He adjusted the pince-nez, turned over a sheet of paper and continued.

  “We, of the Imperial Council of Action, have decided that the safety of the Empire demands that we obliterate the planet known to us as KX-724 together with any adjacent planets, satellites or asteroids harboring its dominant life form. We are now met to consider this life form’s final plea for preservation, and it is the duty of each of us to listen carefully to what new evidence may be offered, weighing it not with favor or with prejudice, but with justice.”

  Having thus spoken, the Supreme Lord removed his pince-nez, polished each lens, clipped them carefully on his nose, stared owlishly over their tops at the prisoners. His eyes were a very pale blue, looked weak, but were not weak.

  “Have you chosen your spokesman?”

  Their minds conferred swiftly, then Harold said, “I shall speak.”

  “Very well then.” Burkinshaw relaxed in his seat. “Before you commence it is necessary to warn you that our grave decision concerning the fate of your people is neither frivolous nor heartless. In fact, it was reached with the greatest reluctance. We were driven to it by the weight of evidence and, I regret to say, additional data which we’ve recently gained is of a nature calculated to support our judgment. Bluntly, your kind of life is a menace to our kind. The responsibility now rests with you to prove otherwise—to our satisfaction.”

  “And if I can’t?” queried Harold.

  “We shall destroy you utterly.”

  “If you can,” said Harold.

  The assembled minds reacted promptly. He could hear them, aggressive and fuming. The purple thing exuded no thoughts but did give out a queer suggestion of imbecilic amusement. The Floran’s attitude was one of mild surprise mixed with interest.

  Burkinshaw wasn’t fazed. “If we can,” he agreed blandly, while his brain held little doubt that they could. “Proceed in your own way,” he invited. “You have about fourteen hours in which to convince us that our decision was wrong, or impracticable.”

  “You’ve tempted us into giving minor demonstrations of our p
owers,” Harold began. “The Drane was planted here for a similar purpose: you used him as a yardstick with which to measure our mental abilities. From your viewpoint, I guess, the results have strengthened your case and weakened ours. Only the yardstick wasn’t long enough.”

  Burkinshaw refused to rise to the bait. Placing his fingertips together as if about to pray, he stared absently at the ceiling, said nothing. His mind was well disciplined, for it registered no more than the comment, “A negative point.”

  “Let it pass,” Harold went on, “while I talk about coincidences. On my world, a coincidence is a purely fortuitous lining-up of circumstances and either is isolated or recurs haphazardly. But when a seeming coincidence repeats itself often enough, it ceases to be a coincidence. You know that, too—or ought to know it. For example, let’s take the once-alleged coincidence of meteoric phenomena appearing simultaneously with earthquakes. It occurred so frequently that eventually one of your scientists became curious, investigated the matter, discovered solar-dynamic space-strain, the very force which since has been utilized to boost your astrovessels to supra-spatial speeds. The lesson, of course, is that one just can’t dismiss coincidences as such when there are too many of them.”