The Stainless Steel Rat Goes to Hell

by Harry Harrison

  “It can wait.” Then she was gone. I whistled up another drink.

  “Tell me all that happened,” Coypu said.

  “You let her go after Slakey alone!” I accused. “With all the massed strength of the Corps to hand.”

  “And a gun to my head. Do you think that there was any way to stop her?”

  “No—but you could at least have tried.”

  “I did. What happened?”

  I slumped in a chair, sipped my drink, and told him the entire repulsive story. My descent into Purgatory from Heaven and the women at the sorting tables there. Then being tossed through Slakey’s machine to the living hell of the mining world. He popped his eyes a bit when I told him about our escape in the rebar cages. Narrowed his eyes into pensive slits when he heard about the laboratory and the mysterious circular tunnel.

  “And that was that. My dearest Angelina was there and whisked us back here and you know the rest.”

  “Well, well, well!” Coypu said when I had finished, jumping to his feet with excitement and pacing back and forth.

  “Now we know what he is doing and how he is doing it—we just don’t know what he is doing it for.”

  “Perhaps you know, Professor, but some of us are still in the dark.”

  “It’s all so obvious.” He stopped pacing and raised a didactic finger. “Heaven is the seat of all of his activities, we can be sure of that now. It matters not in the slightest where the mineral is mined. Because it was brought to Heaven after you and the male slaves extracted it from the ground. Dropped through an interuniversal field to end up in Heaven where it is ground finely and bombarded in a cyclotron—”

  “A what?”

  “A cyclotron, that is the machine that you saw in the tunnel. Your description was quite apt, even if in your ignorance you did not know what you were looking at. It is an ancient and rather clumsy bit of research apparatus that is not used much anymore. It is basically a very large, circular tube that has all the air inside evacuated. Then ions are pumped in and whirled around and around through the tube, held in orbit away from the tube walls by electromagnets. After building up tremendous speeds the ions smash into a metallic target.”

  “Why?»

  “My good friend, how did you manage to obtain an education without studying basic science in school? Any first-year student would remember the simple fact that if you bombard platinum with neon ions you obtain element a hundred and four, called unnilquadium. It follows, obviously, that if you hit lead isotopes with a beam of chromium you will obtain unnil-sextium.”

  “What is that?”

  “A transuranic element. In the Stone Age of physics there were believed to be only ninety-eight elements, the heaviest of which was uranium. As new ones were discovered they were named, we think, after household gods. Curium after the god of medicine who cures disease, that sort of thing. Anyway, after the discovery of mendelevium, nobelium and such, the elements were numbered in an ancient and lost language. One hundred and four is unnilquadium, one hundred and five unnilquintium and so forth. Slakey has created a new element, much further up the atomic number table I am sure. It is obviously generated in very small quantities and comes out of the cyclotron still mixed with the original ore. Machines cannot detect it or they would have been used for this onerous task. But obviously women, and not men, can find it. Angelina will tell us more about that …”

  “About what?” she asked. Making a glorious entrance in a green space jumper that went beautifully with her now red-gold hair.

  “What were you and the other women looking for in the grit?” I asked.

  “I have no idea.”

  “But exactly what were you doing?”

  “An interesting phenomenon. All the bits of sand and gravel looked exactly alike. But some of the grains, when you touched them they felt—slow? No, that’s not right, perhaps the other grains felt faster. It’s almost impossible to describe. But once felt never forgotten.”

  “Entropy,” Coypu said firmly. “That’s Slakey’s special field of research. I am certain now that he is producing particles with different entropy.”

  “Why?”

  “That is what we will have to find out.”

  “How?” I asked. Puzzled, bothered and bewildered.

  “You will find a way, you always do,” Angelina said, patting me on the arm. Her smile turned to a frown when she looked at her filthy fingertips. “Go burn those clothes,” she ordered. “Then wash until your skin glows, then wash some more.”

  I went willingly, well aware now of the stench, itch and scratch of my battered body. In the guest suite a burst of flame in the bathroom burner incinerated my clothing. I punched for antiseptics as well as soap in the bath, sank with a sigh under the warm water with a weary whew … .

  Woke up drowning as my nose slipped beneath the surface. Hawked and spat out water; I must have fallen asleep. My body was giving me a message that I was happy to receive. Dried and dusted I went on all fours into the bedroom, crawled dizzily into bed and knew nothing more.

  Angelina and I were having a relaxed drink before dinner. The twins and Sybil were off somewhere, while the professor was busy in his laboratory. We had a few moments alone.

  “Any particular way you would like me to kill Slakey in Heaven?” I asked.

  “Messy and painful. Though he wasn’t really that awful to me. But he was an irritating fat old git. Cackling with joy when the surgicalbot cut out the implant. Painless really, just messy. He couldn’t have cared less after that. I was just another woman for his slave labor at the tables. That terrible one-eyed robot grabbed me—now that is one piece of rusty iron I intend to dispatch personally—and took me off to the sorting place. One of the other women let me touch a grain she had found and that was that. Unlike those other poor creatures I knew that I could leave at any time, so it wasn’t too awful. I also knew that you would be making a breakout from somewhere somehow as soon as you could, so I didn’t mind waiting. I worked along with the others until I saw you and your friend running away from the robot. That was when I decided that it would be better if we all came back here.”

  Better! Not a word of complaint about what she had gone through to rescue me. My angel, my Angelina! Words could not express my gratitude, but some fervid kisses did get the message across. We separated when Coypu arrived. I ordered him his favorite Crocktail while Angelina went out to do whatever women do when their hair is mussed.

  “A question, if you please, Professor.”

  “What?” He sipped and smacked his lips happily.

  “How are you doing with that little difficulty you had—about not being able to send machines through between the universes? You will recall that when we went to Hell the only weapons that worked were salamis.”

  “I do recall it—and that is why I instantly tackled the problem. It is solved. An energy cage protects any object you wish from the effects of transition. You have an idea?”

  “I certainly do. You will remember that my son James hypnotized that old devil Slakey in Hell.”

  “Unhappily, unsuccessfully. He was too insane to be questioned easily. And there wasn’t enough time to do more.”

  “What if you had him or any other of the Slakeys here?”

  “No problem at all then. We have highly skilled psychologists who work with computerized probes that can track thought processes down through all the levels of the brain. Mental blocks can be removed, traumas healed, memories accessed. But we don’t have him here or any of the others. And the one in Hell. We know that he has been there too long. He will die if he is moved out.”

  “I know—and I’m not suggesting that. Now run your mind back to the adventurous past. You must recall the time way when the Special Corps was almost destroyed?”

  “Was destroyed!” He shivered and sipped. “You restored us to reality when you won the war. Shan’t forget that.”

  “Anything to help a friend. But what I am interested in now is the time fixator. The machine you
built when reality was getting weaker and people were popping out of existence. You told me that as long as a person remembered who he was he was safe from the effects of the time attack. So you put together the machine that records the memories of an individual and feeds them back every three milliseconds.”

  “Of course I remember the time fixator—since I invented it. We have plenty in stock now. Why?”

  “Patience. Then you will also remember that I took your memories with me. Then, when I had to move back through time again, I let your memories take over my body to build a time helix, the time-traveling machine that is also your invention.”

  His eyes opened wide as his speedy thoughts leaped to the conclusion that I was slowly building towards. He smiled broadly, finished his drink, jumped to his feet, rushed over and seized my hand and pumped it enthusiastically.

  “Brilliantly done! An idea that is as good, almost, as one I might have thought up. We take the time fixator to Hell—”

  “Plug Slakey into it and take a recording. Then leave him there in the flesh—but bring back all of his memories!”

  Angelina had returned and heard this last. “If you are off on one more interuniversal trip you are not going alone this time.”

  Said without anger but with an unshakeable firmness. I opened my mouth to protest. Closed it and nodded.

  “Of course. We’re going back to Hell. Wear your lightest clothes.”

  “But no salamis this time.”

  “Quite right. That was an emergency measure—that succeeded I must remind you—that won’t be needed now. We’ll take the marines again, but well-armored and armed this time. To defend us while we make a memory recording of the Slakey in red.”

  “No troops,” she said. “They would only get in the way. It will be just you and I in a fast armored scout tank. A lightning attack, find the old devil. Then I fight off anyone who gets in the way while you plug his brain into the memory fixator. After that it will be home in time for lunch. Tomorrow?”

  “Why not? They want me in the hospital today. Some therapy for my bruises and cuts, and a broken rib or two that they are going to put right. Tomorrow morning will be fine.”

  It was. The body scan showed that two of my ribs were cracked. But microwindow surgery soon took care of them. The incision was so small that all that was needed was a local anesthetic. Since I am always very interested when someone fiddles around with my insides, I insisted upon having a hologram monitor, just like the surgeon’s, so I could watch what was happening in glorious color 3D. The flexible needle snaked in through my skin and on into the bone of the rib itself. Once in place nanotechnology devices poured out of the tip of the needle, a submicroscopic crowd of molecular machines that grabbed the broken bone ends with their manipulators, then held tight onto each other. Micromotors whirred and the broken ends were neatly pulled together. Wonderful. The little machines would remain in place as new bone grew over them. I went right from the operating table to the laboratory where the interuniversal transporter and Angelina were waiting.

  “I’m ready whenever you are,” she said. She certainly was. Tastefully garbed in a black uniform, all metal studs and grenade clips, black boots—and a heavy weapon holstered on each hip.

  “Very fetching,” I said, slipping on the backpack that held the time fixator. “How was the test drive in your steel steed?”

  “Very nice indeed,” she said, patting the armor plate on the scout tank. “Fast, tough, with impressive fire power. More than enough weaponry to cover you in Hell. How was the bone operation?”

  “Fast and efficient and I’m all mended and raring to go. Shall we?”

  “In a moment. Before we leave I want to impress on Professor Coypu a few important facts. Like the fact that we are not setting up housekeeping in Hell and want to be returned here soonest.”

  “Exactly.”

  Coypu strolled over from his control console looking decidedly miffed. “There will be no problems with the operation of the interuniversal activator this time, I can assure you of that.”

  “That’s what you told me when you sent me to Heaven and I almost died with my boots off.”

  “Improvements have been made since then. Your vehicle has one activator built into the hull while you once again have one in your bootheel. And if worse comes to worse just clutch Angelina tightly—”

  “Always a pleasant thought!”

  “—and she will bring you both back.”

  “I feel relieved,” I said, feeling relieved as I climbed into the scout tank and slammed the hatch. Angelina revved the engines and I gave Coypu the thumbs-up. His image scowled back at me from the communicator screen.

  “You can turn the engine off,” he said. “We have a small problem.”

  “How small?”

  “Well … perhaps I should say big. I can’t seem to find Hell.”

  “What do you mean you can’t find it?”

  “Just that. It appears to be gone.”

  CHAPTER 24

  ANGELINA CUT THE POWER, I opened the hatch, and, quivering gently from actio interruptus, we slammed over to interrogate Professor Coypu who was laboring anxiously away at the controls.

  “Why did you say not there … ?” Angelina asked angrily.

  “I said that because it isn’t. Where the hell has Hell gone?”

  “It is a little difficult to lose an entire universe?”

  “I didn’t exactly lose it. It’s just not where it should be.”

  “Sounds the same as losing it,” I said.

  He gave me a surly scowl before turning back to his button pushing and switch throwing. Apparently with no good results. “I cannot access Hell with the former setting. I have checked it a number of times. There appears to be no universe at all there.”

  “Destroyed?” Angelina asked.

  “Since that takes a great number of billions of years I doubt it very much.”

  “Is Heaven still there?” I asked.

  “Of course.” He made some rapid adjustments and pressed a button. Widened his eyes and gasped. Groped behind him for his chair and dropped into it. “Not possible,” he muttered to himself.

  “Are you all right, Professor?” Angelina asked, but he didn’t hear her. His fingers were flashing across the keyboard now and the screen was filled with rapidly flowing mathematical equa— tions.

  “Leave him to it,” I said. “tf anyone can find out what happened it’s him. We’re just in the way now.”

  We went to the lounge area and I snapped my fingers for the barbot. Angelina scowled.

  “Little early to hit the booze, isn’t it?”

  “No booze, just a simple glass of beer to slake my thirst. Join me?”

  “Not at this time of day.”

  I sipped and thought. “We have tg go back to the very beginning of events. Forget the other universe for the moment. When this entire thing started, when you disappeared from Lussuoso, I had Bolivar and James do a thorough sweep of all the planets, to see if there were any other operations run by a Slakey under a different cover. We didn’t find another Temple of Eternal Truth, but we did uncover the same kind of operation under a different name. We went to Vulkann and located the fake church. Went in there—and you know what happened after that.”

  “From Glass to Hell to Heaven and back here. Where we are stuck since the good professor can’t find any of them any more.”

  “We don’t have to wait for him.” I grabbed for the phone. “The search we instigated may have uncovered other Slakey operations on other planets. Let’s see what the boys found out.”

  I heard the splash of water and shrieks of joy in the background when Bolivar or James, answered the phone.

  “Can I interrupt your jollities?” I asked.

  “Just a day at the beach, Dad. What’s up?”

  “I’ll tell you when you get here. But first, do you remember if there were any other Slakey operations uncovered by the original search, when we were on Lussuoso?”

 
“We dropped everything and got out of there so fast—I just don’t know. But I do know that the computer was still running the search program when we left. We’ll get onto it. See you there as soon as we have the records.”

  Professor Coypu was still hammering out equations, Angelina had a cup of tea, and I was thinking of another beer when the boys arrived.

  “News?” I asked.

  “Good!” they said in unison.

  I flipped through the printouts, then passed them to Angelina.

  “Very good indeed,” I said. “A few remote possibles, a couple of maybe probables.”

  “And one dead certain,” Angelina said. “The Sorority of the Bleating Lamb. A women-only congregation, and rich women at that.”

  “Did you note the name of the planet where this operation is now taking place?”

  “I certainly did—Cliaand of all places. You boys are too young to remember the planet, in fact you were in your baby carriage at the time. There were certain difficulties on Cliaand, but your father and I sorted them out. We’ll tell you about it when we have the time. The important thing is that now it is a museum world.”

  “A museum of what?”

  “Warfare, militarism, fascism, jingoism and all that sort of old nonsense. It was a very poor planet when we saw it last, but that must have changed by now. Tourist money, no doubt. Shall we go see?”

  A heartfelt groan caught our attention. Professor Coypu was in the pits of despair. “No good,” he groaned again. “No reason to it. Nothing makes sense. Gone. Heaven and Hell. All gone.”

  He looked so glum that Angelina went over and patted his arm.

  “There, there, it is going to be all right. While you were sweating away at your equations—we have located what we are sure is another Slakey religious operation. We must now plan, very carefully, how this matter should be handled. I don’t think we can afford to make any more mistakes.”

  There was a serious nodding of heads on all sides.

  “Can we use the TI, temporal inhibitor again?” I asked.

  “I don’t see why not,” Coypu said, coming up for air, his depression forgotten at the thought of action. “You told me that it did not work in the Glass universe. Did you leave it there?”