by Paul Brandis
He threw open the door and stepped in.
"Wait," Thea cried.
From a seat inside the door, a monster in a white coat, reared up and threw a punch at Phil. His fist glanced off Phil's helmet, splitting a crack along its side, and knocking Phil against the wall. He bounced off and spun to the floor. Phil sprang to his feet with a growl. The huge male attendant set himself to throw another punch, but Dante smashed his head open with the butt of his blaster. Like an old building, the monster collapsed to the floor in sections: knees, chest, face.
Phil stared at the great mound on the floor, and shook his head to clear it. He turned to Thea who peeped around the door jamb. "I thought you said there was a nurse in here."
She glanced at him fearfully. "Male nurse?"
He drew her to him. "Honey, now that you can talk, try to be a little more explicit, all right?"
The tall girl laid her head on the top of his helmet, and said softly, "All right."
A tap on his arm caught his attention. "What?"
Dante pointed.
A wide window stretched across the end of the room. Outside, a lightning flash tore the sky, illuminating the large tank in front of it, and the lump wallowing in its depths.
Suddenly hidden lights blinked, and flicked on, keeping the room in a dim, subdued tone. A deep rattle vibrated
through the room, rose in volume, and broke into a wheezing cough. The coughing trailed off, and after a long gasp for breath came the slow, measured words, "Mr. Dyak. It's good to see you." The voice hardened. "You owe me money."
Instinctively, Phil whipped up his blaster, but heard Sighter's voice. "We're getting footstep vibrations. Someone is coming from the direction of—"
Phil never heard the rest. A side door across the room flew open, and a concussion blast doubled him over. The blast knocked Thea back into her room, and Dante, without a helmet, dropped to the floor like a stone.
Bent over and struggling to suck in air, Phil peered up. Jed stalked in.
Phil strained to stand upright, but the pain felt like his guts had been torn from his backbone.
Jed sauntered over and slapped the blaster from Phil's hand. Then he bent over and peered into Phil's helmet. "Why didn't that kill you? That blast was close enough to cave in your chest."
Phil made a note to thank Golden for his metal ribs, and forced words out of his constricted throat. "Jed, ol' buddy, how're you doing? It's great to see you got off of Newgreen all right."
Jed stepped back. "There was never no doubt about that." His face bent to a sneer. "Ol' buddy."
Levering his back upright with his palms, Phil forced himself to breath normally. "Good. But you know, some of the clan never made it." He glanced down at Dante. His friend did not move. Thea pulled herself back into the room.
Phil tried to sound casual. "Oh, oh. Looks like Dante got a pretty bad hit." With Thea kneeling next to him, Phil bent down and rolled him over. Dante groaned and his eyes blinked open.
Phil reached, but before he could come up with Dante's blaster, Jed spoke. "Now, you aren't going to try for the gun, are you?"
Phil stood and continued conversationally. "Also, I suppose you heard what happened when the Dynamine hoods came and threw the Clan off the camp. I'm sorry about your folks. I guess that must leave you without any close relatives."
Jed stepped sharply forward and peered into Phil's helmet. "What do you mean, my folks? What happened to them?"
Slen's phlegmy voice spoke with increased volume. "Don't listen to him, Googan. Can't you see he's stalling? Call out the guard."
Jed ignored the tank. "Are you lying to me? What happened to my folks?"
Phil shrugged. "Well, you know how stubborn your dad was. When the Dynamine hoods came to throw everybody out, he refused to leave. He and your mom barricaded their cabin and put up a fight, a pretty good one, too. Finally the hoods just blew it up. I guess there wasn't much of your folks left. I'm sorry, Jed. I know how much you admired them. We all did."
Jed's face was hard, but soft uncertainty wormed in his eyes. "You're just talking to stall."
Phil nodded. "Of course I am, but it'd be easy to check if it's true. Wouldn't take you but a moment to find out where Dynamine's vacation camp for its middle executives on Terra is located."
The croaking voice came from the speakers next to the tank. "Googan, I gave you an order. Look what they did to Sylvester there. Don't trust them. Call out the guard, this instant."
Jed stepped to the phone and keyed a button. "This is Captain Googan, did Dynamine take over a camp at the south end of Puget Sound for a resort for our executives?"
Words sprang onto the monitor.
"Were there any casualties in the operation?" He read. "No, I mean to the people who lived there?"
The answer came, and he spoke softer. "Names?"
After a moment he turned back to Phil.
Phil gave him a gesture of helpless sympathy. "I'm sorry, Jed. I just thought you should know. Now you know why I'm here."
Jed shook his head, pain in his eyes. "No. Why are you here?"
Slen's voice scratched from his speakers in desperation. "Don't listen to him, Googan. What am I paying you for? Call your men."
With a twitch of irritation, Jed strode to the tank and flipped a switch. The speakers fell silent, but the blob in the slimy solution writhed closer to the glass; bubbles curled up from its surface.
Jed turned back. "Well, why are you here?"
Phil's throbbing ribs made breathing agony. He jerked a finger towards the tank. "To kill that thing, that's why." He stopped, then tore off his helmet. "Listen." He looked away, amazement on his face. "I just had an incredible idea. What's your job here?"
Jed frowned. "Why do you want to know?"
Phil raised his voice with intensity. "Come on, man, your job?"
"I'm in charge of fortress security."
Phil laughed with elation. "That's great. Are your men loyal?"
"Sure. I kept the staff I had before...well, before
I... "
Phil nodded. "I know, before you traded us in to Slen. I understand, and it's all right. The important thing is whether you can count on them or not, and I'm sure you can. Now listen, Dante found out that Slen has no heirs. If we knock him off, we could take over his whole operation, everything. The three of us could run the whole thing three ways. You with the muscle. Dante with the brains. You in charge of security, Dante with the technical know-how."
Jed sneered at him like he was weak minded. "Just like that."
"Yes, just like that. What's wrong with the idea?"
"Slen's got thousands of executives, hundreds of whom are lawyers. Do you think they would let you get away with it."
Phil smiled his wickedest. "Would you let them stop us?" He paused to let that sink in. "You see, it's just like you having the gun there now. The one with the firepower wins."
Jed's wide forehead wrinkled as he wrestled with the chances. Phil spoke up. "You don't want to be a captain of the guard all your life."
Jed drifted in his dreams of power. "I wonder if it could really work?"
"Of course it could. Come on," he motioned for the man to help him. "Let's get Dante up and ask him."
Together they raised Dante to his feet. Thea rubbed his forehead, and Dante weakly smiled his gratitude.
Phil grasped Dante's chin and spoke loudly, forcing him to concentrate on his words. "I was just telling Jed that we should kill Slen and run Dynamine Corp. What do you think?"
Dante looked dazedly from one man to the other. "Jed?"
Phil nodded vigorously. "Right, Jed. Tell him we can do it."
Dante glanced at Phil once more, then at Jed, then snapped up and spoke decisively. "Of course we can do it. It's a great idea. I should have thought of it myself."
The effort exhausted him. He slumped, and Thea grabbed his arm.
Phil turned to Jed. "See, man? We can do it." Then he dropped his voice, his tone again sympathetic. "And
don't ever forget what Slen did to your folks. Everyone respected them, and felt their loss deeply." He nodded towards the tank with contempt. "The bum deserves to die. He's done enough harm for one man, or whatever he is." He reached for Jed's blaster. "And if you don't want to kill him, I will."
Jed jerked the weapon away. "You don't need a gun," and he spun and blasted the tank.
A thick torrent of the yellowish liquid spewed out. The pasty, grey-white truncated body slithered out and bounced on the floor dragging tubes from the lump of its head, and from its rectum.
Lights on a console next to the nurse's chair blazed on, and the high, thin pitch of a siren split the air.
The blaster jerked over, exploded, and the console erupted in sparks.
Then, as Jed swung his blaster back to Phil and fired, Phil dodged to one side, and the concussion charge roared past, smashing a wide tear in the plaster wall. The near impact spun Phil around, stunning him.
Jed raised his blaster again and steadied his aim. But Thea leaped into his view.
She raised her hands seductively, and hummed in a high, soft tone that rose to a wail. Slowly she began to sway in her song of seduction. She moved closer.
His initial shock past, Jed sneered. "You gotta be kidding. I haven't looked at a woman in years."
So she kicked him in the balls.
Jed dropped the blaster, and doubled up in pain. He staggered back, nearly stepping on Slen's corpse.
Thea hurried to Phil. "Can you walk?"
He clutched his chest, but nodded. Looking past her and seeing Jed bent over with his hands braced against his knees for support, Phil staggered over, and swung weakly at him.
Jed ducked lower, found his blaster, and reared up with a look of triumph. But before he could fire, his feet slipped out from under him in the slimy liquid, and he sprawled backwards into a stinking puddle.
In desperation, Phil fell on him, but was too weak to hold tight.
Jed rolled him aside and struggled to sit up. Phil tried to grab his neck, but the stronger man pushed away.
Phil fell back, felt one of the rubbery tubes coming out of Slen's corpse, and quickly twisted it around Jed's neck. He tried to pull away, but the elasticity of the tube pulled tighter. He wrenched back, and the corpse jerked up and slapped him in the face.
Terror-stricken, Jed fought to push the ugly apparition away. But it swung back, its dead, lidless eyes staring at him from what had been a face.
A scream bubbled from Jed's lips.
With Jed's attention diverted, Phil twisted harder, throttling the scream to a gurgle.
As the monster rubbed against his face, Jed's revulsion overrode his senses. He never knew he was strangling, until he collapsed.
Like a man unable to awaken from a nightmare, Phil continued to strain at the tube long after Jed had cease to breathe, not hearing the urgent call in his earplug, not feeling Dante tugging at his arm.
Finally Phil's eyes focused on Dante's urgent expression. "All right, you can stop now. He's dead."
Phil stared at the mess on the floor. "He's dead?"
Dante nodded vigorously. "Right. And Thea says there's something wrong with the Minister."
Dazed, Phil stared at Thea who still wore Dante's ear plug. Only then did Phil hear Sighter's voice. It sounded slow, unsure. "I'm sorry, Phil. I can't...my mind is drifting. Someone wants it. I..."
As Dante dragged him to his feet, Phil called. "Sighter, what do you mean, someone wants your mind? Where are you?"
"We're...we're on our way to Terra. We've been to Serena. Oh, what..what is happening to me?"
"Serena?" He paused, then remembered. He yelled in desperation over his mike. "Sighter, you have Ghosts aboard. They're trying to get into your mind. You must fight them. Concentrate, Sighter. You must combat them by your will."
The voice came back even slower. "But we don't combat. We only trade. We are not..." His voice faded away.
Phil shouted even louder. "You must hold on until we can get there and help."
"I'll try, but hurry. If the computer sees I'm losing, he may destroy everything. This seems to be that unknown contingency that I...I'm sorry Phil. I can't help you any—"
"Sighter!"
Only static hissed out of their earplugs.
A look of sad detachment drew Thea's face. "I heard a second voice in the Minister's. It was like those I heard moaning in the wilderness when I was sick on Serena. So unhappy."
Dante stepped between them. "Yeah? Well, we're going to be even unhappier if we don't get out of here."
Thea grabbed his arm. "Yes, I hear. Footsteps on the stairs."
CHAPTER 27
Phil cursed. "Great. Sighter's gone just when we need him." He headed for Thea's room.
"Come on. This way."
"Wait. Stop."
He turned to Thea. "What? We've got to fight our way out of here. Stay close behind me."
Dante stopped him. "If we try to fly out of here now, they'll just shoot us out of the sky. We must find the control room and shut off the power to the automatic armament."
"Fine. Should we ask one of the guards where the control room is?"
Thea shook her head. "No, wait. There's something Sighter told me in his instructions." She turned to the door Jed came through. "The contingency is great that there is a way from Jed's room to the guard room, which is next to the control room."
They stared at her. Finally Phil spoke. "She even sounds like Sighter." He skipped across to Jed's room and opened the door. "Quick, before security gets here."
They followed and Dante locked the door behind them, just as guards burst into Slen's tank room.
Jed's room was little more than a stone cell cut into the rock. But at the end of the room, stone steps curved down into darkness.
As shouts of confusion rang out in the next room, Phil ran to the steps. But at the top he paused, and whispered, "Now, be quiet. If these lead to the guard room, let's hope that most have come up here to Slen's room."
They crept down the stairs into blackness. Only light shining under a door showed that they had descended to the next floor. Phil depressed the old, flat-handled latch, and peeked in.
The stink of sleep-stale air drifted out. Double-tiered bunks and steel lockers circled the walls of the spartanly furnished room. Phil stretched up, then bent down, searching to see if anyone still lay abed in the bunks. Near the door, one head was bent over, hurriedly pulling on boots. Phil stepped quickly, struck a right cross with the butt of his blaster, and the man crumpled sideways to the floor.
Phil glanced at a wide door at the end of the room.
Thea stepped past him. "No, that's the lavatory. This way." She strode to a door at the side of the room. "This should be the hall with the control room to the left."
She cracked the door, and they peeped out. Down the corridor about fifteen paces, a guard stood next to an open door. A shoulder blaster bounced nervously in his hands. Thea stealthily closed the door.
Phil faced her and whispered, "I'd like to do this without noise if possible. Could you?"
She stared at him, then got the idea. "Oh. Oh, yes." She turned to the door, but he stopped her. "Just a minute." He pulled off the short robe covering her shoulders. "All right. Now."
She stared down at her nakedness, and nodded wearily. "I understand," she said, and pushed open the door.
The guard, spying a tall figure swinging down the hall, jerked his blaster up to the target. In astonishment, his mouth dropped open as he stared at the sinuous girl strolling past. It was doubtful if he felt Phil's blaster butt crack the back of his skull.
Phil grabbed the body before it fell and lowered it silently to the floor. Then he glanced around the doorway into the control room.
Several men in grey uniforms hunched over a long console. Another guard peered over their shoulders. A monitor controlled their attention. It displayed Slen's room where men milled around the dripping mess on the floor.
Phil moved fast
, and clipped the guard who fell forward onto the backs of the startled technicians. Phil pushed him aside, and menaced the others with his blaster. "All right. Everybody raise their hands. Move away from the console. Now," he commanded, and herded them into the corner of the room. Then he turned his blaster toward the console.
"Wait." Dante hurried over. "Blast this, and we have no guarantee that the defenses will be lifted."
Phil glanced back at the first technician, and saw a spark of confirming complacency in his eyes. "So, what do we do?"
Dante studied the board. "Well, this must be the power grid to the individual units." His eyes ran to the lowest rank of switches. "That means that this must be the main switch."
The first technician pulled himself up and stepped forward. "Listen. You idiots'll never get out of here. Give up now, and..."
Phil's eyes did not leave Dante as he swiped the technician a slashing blow across the face with the barrel of his blaster. The man staggered back into the arms of the others.
"So?" Phil continued, "If we don't blow it how can we be sure that it will stay off?."
Dante squinted at the board, then he reached up and flipped a couple of switches. "Ah, just as I thought."
"What? What?"
"The other power supplies have corrected their overcharge and can come on line."
"So?"
"So, I hate to do this to all this high priced equipment, but..." He flipped more switches, then three large levers. Needles in gauges jerked to the far red posts. Warning lights blazed. Then all needles flicked to the off position. The room lights blinked, then came on dimmer.
Phil moved closer. "What'd you do?"
"The same thing as the lightning. I ran all the power supplies at full power through the circuits at once." He flicked a couple of switches; then the overrides. Nothing moved. He spoke over his shoulder. "Check with the truck."
Phil keyed his mike, then nodded. "Yeah. They say the radar is down." He turned to the four technicians. "Now, what are we going to do with you?"
They shuffled back, warily eyeing his blaster.
Thea stepped next to Phil. "Let me talk to them." She had donned her robe again, and now pointed to chairs against the wall. "Sit down, please."
