by Keith Laumer
"I saw it happen. I spoke to him afterwards. It was he who told me the axle and brakes went wrong."
Ollie scrubbed a hand over his face.
"And I thought this was going to be one of those perfect days! You told anyone else?"
David lied, but felt justified as much for Ollie's sake as his own.
"No."
"Then for God's sake, don't!"
"Why? Was it sabotage?"
Ollie groaned. "Don't keep popping out stuff like that—don't even whisper it in fun. There's things I don't want to know about. I'm a top man in my division. I'm working toward a mighty generous pension. I'm a company man."
"And they own everything except your soul, and you've put that in hock to them."
"Go on then, sneer! So what do you do when you've a wife, five daughters and a huge mortgage and installment load to carry? Cut your throat with your tongue and bleed to death? Grow up, fella! I shot my white horse way back, and the armor's gone rusty long since. We've got executives and top echelon men to probe what they think needs probing. Me—I test cars, not rumors." He glared at David. "I don't wanna know—get it?"
"Sure," said David calmly. "Sorry I shot my mouth off." Loudly he added, "Well, I'm telling you—this Windflight is the sweetest job I've ever handled."
A voice behind him said, "Handled is right. You must be a wizard."
David turned as Clem Makim came up with a clipboard under his arm. He placed the board on the table as he signaled for coffee.
"Flattery I can take." David smiled.
"Pulling to the off, you said? Any other little thing you didn't mention?"
"I don't think so."
"Not a stiffness in third when you were coming down the mountain?"
Ollie said, "This guy played tunes on the gearbox coming down. He missed third most times and went to fourth. Very neat. More control that way. What's with these questions, Clem?"
Clem tapped the board's papers. "This axle assembly is special to Windflights, see?" He went into a technical description, finishing: "The third gear ratio was reckoned to be the gear most likely to take a hammering on the production models—likewise the alternating gear on the automatics. So we fitted a variable shaft operating through an electric circuit." He spun the wad of papers over to show a drawing of the axle assembly. "See this small plunger fitted above the housing? That's the connector. It transmits axle stress above a certain ratio. When the stress reaches a certain pitch, the connector operates the variable shaft. The result, without getting too technical, is to decrease the gear load."
"Neat and clever," said David. "Many a good production design has been made to look wrong by bad driving. That should cure any results from customer abuse."
"Yeah," said Clem drily. "Unless some joker stuck a thin silicone strip between the connector contacts. The strip would get warmer each time that gear was used, the silicone would burn off and fuse the contacts so the variable shaft wouldn't work, and overloading would occur along with intense overheating. The axle would jam. At the gear's maximum speed, this would put the car into a skid without the driver having any prior warning—which would have happened to you as you came down the mountain."
"Sweet Christopher!" Ollie exclaimed. "He was taking fourth at ninety! A jammed transmission would have set us weaving—"
"And then into a whiplash and a turnover, or a spin straight over the edge," David continued when Ollie paused. "I might just have held it by the brakes if a tire didn't blow out."
"I doubt it," said Clem, grim faced. "Any further strain, such as extreme braking, would force the transmission coupling outward, and that would split the brake master cylinder. You wouldn't have a chance to control her." Clem slammed the table with his fist and roared: "Where's my goddam coffee?"
"Now, now, Mr. Makim!" said the waitress as she brought the coffee. "We do have other customers, y'know."
He stared at her. "Daphne," he said softly. "Sweet Daphne darling, why don't you marry a psycho and get yourself shot or something?"
"Charming," said Daphne. "I pity your wife."
"Two more specials," said Ollie. "Hot and strong. And pity all our wives while you're in the mood."
"Funny men!" said Daphne. "How I hate these goddam company dumps!" She flounced away.
"So, now what?" said David.
"I'm withdrawing your car," said Clem. "You can continue your test on number eight. She's on the checking ramp now."
"Am I in this?" said Ollie.
Clem stirred his coffee and shrugged.
"Guess we're all in it, Ollie. I've been on to Thias Rumbold."
"Right to the top, huh?"
"This isn't any time to fool around with the small fry."
"Thias Rumbold," said David. "He's a hard man to meet. I think I've met every other top executive at the plant but him."
"Gineas would see to that," said Clem. "Likes to spare his father a lot of routine work, Gin does."
"Clem!" Ollie spoke sharply.
Clem smiled thinly. "Won't hurt our friend here to know—or us to tell him. It isn't any company secret that Gineas sees himself as top man. But not for this one—not if costs me my pension. Old man Thias is still the top lap in this outfit, and that's where this baby has to be dumped. It's too hot for you and me to handle."
"Yeah, yeah, perhaps you're right. Is he coming over?"
"By helicopter, in an hour. You'd better be up the mountain in number eight in about twenty minutes, else you'll not get up there again before we have to open the road to the public."
"We have limited rights," said Ollie to David. "Even though the company owns the mountain. But we always patrol the road before we let our cars loose on it—just in case some nutty family decides to picnic right on a curve."
"It has been known," said Clem, regaining some of his cheerfulness. "We lose more families that-away!"
But it wasn't a family picnic that caused David trouble on his second and much faster drive up the mountain. They were nearing V.P.15, close to the top, and a layer of heavy cloud.
By a freak of cloud formation, the gray coils suddenly split and sunshine poured through in a golden lance across the curve and the vantage point stand. David had the car set right for the curve, came around fast, well under control, when the glinting light caused his gaze to flick upward.
What he saw registered with lightning speed. He yelled to Ollie, "Duck!" as he whipped the gears down, then poured in power. The car whipped, slid, lurched, then answered his desperate efforts to spin it into the escape road below the vantage point. A bluish flare of light hit the road where the car had been.
Chapter 9
THE RUMBOLD SHOWDOWN
David whipped the big car out of its tire-squealing skid as it nosed into the parking area below the vantage point.
"What the hell!" Ollie Temper shouted as David cut the engine and unhitched his safety belt. "You gone crazy?"
"Stay here." David leapt from the car, hand groping into his inside pocket through the zip of his racing coveralls.
Ollie ignored this request and pounded after David, who'd now reached the higher section, leapt the guardrails and was racing after a figure just disappearing around the hut, heading for a car parked out of sight from the road.
"Hold it!" David raised his cigarette case.
Ollie, panting up behind, gasped, "Lester Shalk! What in hell are you doing here?"
The man whirled, staggered a little under his own impetus, then stood with feet widespaced, elbows tight to his sides, hands holding an object which looked like a camera with a gray, stubby, telescopic lens.
"Stay!" he called. "Just stay there." He moved the object from side to side to cover them both. "No, Ollie—don't move!"
"What is all this?" Ollie was bewildered by this sudden incident.
"Just don't move," said David quietly. "Do as the man says." He was staring steadily into the eyes of the man facing them.
A man of medium height, an ordinary-looking man, wearing racing cover
alls with the Carasel Motors' emblem on its breast pocket. He was sallow faced with high cheekbones, and thick black eyebrows formed a lowering line shadowing light-gray eyes. The eyes stared, as if they didn't see. It gave Ollie a peculiar feeling, but he couldn't know that David understood the meaning of this man's appearance.
"Just do as Lester tells us," said David, calmly and almost soothingly. "Lester knows just what he's doing. Don't you, old man?"
"Sure," said Lester. "Sure I know what I'm doing. You just stay where you are and I drive away in my car."
"Don't be silly!" said Ollie. "D'you think you can threaten me, and be up here on a vantage point when you're supposed to be back at the test track, and get away with it?"
"Oh, I don't think Lester wants to get away with anything," said David. "Lester is doing what he knows is best."
"That's right," said Lester. He moved his head slowly from side to side. "You shouldn't have done that, Mister," he said. "Why did you do that?"
"I knew you didn't mean it," said David. "And I didn't want you to make a mistake."
"Will you quit talking to him like he was some kid out of its mind?" said Ollie.
"Will you shut up," said David, not removing his gaze from Lester Shalk's eyes. "Lester and I understand each other, don't we, Lester?"
"You shouldn't have done it," said Lester, "You weren't supposed to do it."
"Ah! But I was," said David. He moved a couple of paces closer, opened his cigarette case. "Would you like a smoke, Lester?"
"I don't smoke."
"D'you mind if I have one?" David put the cigarette in his mouth, then shut the case and held it edge-on toward Lester Shalk. "I'll light it in a minute. But hadn't you better give me the atomizer?"
Ollie suddenly moved, stepped across the space between the other two men as he went and looked at the car.
"Hey! Who told you to bring a Breeze-along up here?"
"Damn you, Ollie!" David snapped. Then added urgently, "Don't do it, Lester—don't do it!"
But Lester Shalk already was raising the atomizer, which he had lowered under the influence of David's steady gaze and quiet voice. David had no other course but to fire the mercury gun. As he fired, he fell sideways, knocking into Ollie, who stumbled, and they both fell to the ground near the car.
The ray burner—or atomizer as David had called it—hissed once as Lester Shalk staggered back. It cut a swathe of burning light across the ground in front of him where David had, a second or two before, stood facing him.
Then the object dropped from Lester Shalk's hand as a glowing light appeared in his chest.
David gripped Ollie's arm to prevent him from rising. But after the first few seconds Ollie didn't need any holding. He couldn't move. He stared with wide eyes and open mouth at the unbelievable sight.
"Cover your eyes, quickly—quickly!" David warned him, thrusting Ollie's head on one side.
David flung himself on top of Ollie, head cradled in his arm. The incandescent brilliance seared the air behind them. Then it was all over.
Slowly David helped Ollie to his feet. A very shaken, white-faced Ollie.
"Oh, my God!" Ollie gasped. "I'm going to be sick." He turned away, heaving.
David gave him time. He needed time himself. This was something he hadn't reckoned on, although he blamed himself for not counting on it. This was the crux, the whole meaning of his fight with the aliens. He had to realize that every second of every minute would contain danger from attack such as this. It was the object of the exercise in putting himself up as a target. To follow the pattern he had learned was the best one in dealing with an investigation. Yet, being human, he had not anticipated this action under these circumstances.
When Ollie recovered he stood staring at the whitish, powdery-looking area where Lester Shalk had stood.
"Dreaming," said Ollie huskily. "I must be damn well dreaming. It's a nightmare! It didn't happen!" He turned and fiercely grabbed David by the shoulders. "Who are you? Come on, fella, who are you?"
In the heat of the exertion, the perspiration caused through natural effort and the burying of his face in his arms, David's false mustache and sideburns, which he wore to change his facial outline, had moved.
Ollie reached up and ripped them off. It was a painful process, but David, although wincing, held steady.
"I know you," said Ollie. "Yes, by God, I know you. Vincent—David Vincent." He lowered his hands and looked again at the whitish area, then followed the line of the scorch mark on the ground. "So it really did happen," he said quietly. "I've known something was wrong…" He clenched one fist and hammered it against his thigh. "Knew it. Knew it. Knew it!" He turned again to face David, calmer now, his eyes back to normal, the color returning to his face. "So, we've got them among us, have we?"
David nodded slowly. "I'm afraid so, Ollie."
"Why didn't you tell me? Why didn't you tell me who you were, and why you were here?" When David didn't answer him immediately he nodded slowly. "Ah! now I understand. You can't really tell anybody, can you?
You don't know where they might be, or who they might be." He laughed softly. "I believe in them, you see. I always have. I followed every case they reported about you. I've been in fights through talking about it. I've been beaten up because I dared to say it was possible." He shrugged. "So now I don't say anything. I don't talk to anyone about it. I tried to, but things began to happen to me so I said the hell with it. If these bastards are going to take us over, then they'll take the lot and I'm not sacrificing myself and my family while my own people beat me up because I hold the views that men like you do. There aren't many of you, though, are there, David?"
"No, Ollie—not many. And I wish I could have told you. After a while I think I would, because I might have had to."
"Well, you have to now," said Ollie. "This isn't going to be easy to explain away."
"You don't explain it, Ollie. You just don't explain anything. You just accept it." He pointed to the white patch. "There it is and there it was, and now it is no more. So what are you going to talk about? What proof are you going to give? And to whom are you going to give it? Because if you give it to the wrong person, you'll die before you give it to anybody else. Or, rather, you'll die that you may live again as he did. Tell me, Ollie—when did Lester Shalk crash?"
Ollie didn't seem surprised at the question.
"He was in one of those multiple crackups on Highway 640 about four months ago. But he came out of it okay. At least, he appeared to. And didn't have any injury, but…"
"But he's been a little strange ever since?" David suggested.
"Damned right he has!" Ollie declared. "Never was an easy guy to work with. Kind of moody. Got wife trouble. Money trouble, too, I guess. Then after the accident he didn't seem to be worried about his wife, or about money. Just up and left her, which made her come running after him. You know what some women are—always hammering at a guy, saying what would he do without 'em. Lester's wife was like that. After his accident he showed her. No fuss, no rows. Lester just wouldn't rise to the bait any more. I guess that upset her because she couldn't get to him."
"And this change affected his work. He was one of your testers, wasn't he?"
"Yes, but not on the big stuff. Sure he changed. Before the crash he was a worrier, everything had to be just right. Used to sit up nights rewriting reports because he'd got a comma in the wrong place. Silly as that After the crash he did the job perhaps even better, but his whole attitude changed. Only last week I told him his reports weren't as detailed as they used to be. He just shrugged and said, 'I've written it, you've got it. What d'you want, Ollie, a best-selling novel?' All out of character, see what I mean?"
David used the car mirror to reset his face fungus.
"So you're with me, Ollie?"
"Am I? I dunno, fella. This day is turning into a crisis point with me. Like it's big—way, way bigger than anything I've ever known. So what do I do? Keep my trap shut and just go along with the job? What happen
s if I don't?"
"I can't give you a straight answer," said David. "I wish I could. I can't ask anything of you; it's not my job to do that."
"Just what is your job?"
David shrugged. "In the big way, to prevent the complete domination by the aliens of your main industry in Auto City. Ask me how I do it. I don't know. Ask me when. I don't know. Perhaps I have already done it? Perhaps I haven't even begun. All I know is that I work through the very few people who believe and trust me, and whom I can trust, and they are pitifully few, believe me. Some of them are at the moment forging my link into the aliens' chain of power by following the jobs they are especially equipped to do."
"Such as who?"
"Willard Knight, the chief of police. District Attorney Shelden. Wayne Draycott, and some of your own security staff."
"The Rumbolds?"
"No, not the Rumbolds. I believe Gineas Rumbold is an alien."
"I'm not surprised to learn that," said Ollie calmly. "Gin was always ambitious." He stared at David. "Holy cow! Gin had a car crash too, and he's changed since it happened. Not like Lester. More ruthless, and a bigger power seeker than ever before."
David nodded. "He'd be a key man for the aliens."
"This crash business," said Ollie. "Significant, huh?"
"Part of the pattern, Ollie. In each investigation I've made, the aliens form a certain pattern. At first they couldn't master the transmutations. They used then-very considerable and highly intelligent power to influence human minds. But strong minds cannot be influenced unless the pressure is kept up for a long time. The aliens don't have time on their side. Nor, as yet, do they have a great deal of experience of our materialistic civilization, but they're learning fast. Transmutation—the actual entering of a human mind and body by the alien force—is a shortcut. But they have to enter them at precisely the right second, and the human body must not be badly damaged because, although the aliens are a life force, just as our spirit is a life force, they do not possess powers of healing—only powers of maintaining bodily functions."
