The Psycho-Duel

by Perry Rhodan

  It was the most difficult decision Perry Rhodan had ever been forced to make--"Gentlemen, after due deliberation I find it necessary to declare a state of emergency and to place the Solar Imperium under a full military alert." Every one of his highest-ranking officers had to agree with his decision, even though they would soon have to face the most powerful force in the galaxy--the Regent. Each man knew what the end result would be ... the destruction of Earth!

  Perry Rhodan

  Posbis #116

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  THE PSYCHO DUEL

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  1/ IMPERIAL IMPASSE

  ASSAULT TROOPS!

  When Salor Henno, the Greater Imperium’s representative on Zalit, looked through the side window of his office, he could see the assault troops of the rebels who were making a breach in the barricades with the help of 2 combat robots. With him in the office were one modern robot and three Zalite officials. As for the latter there was no doubt where their sympathies lay and Henno didn’t dare turn his back on them.

  "Set the building on fire!" came a loud yell from outside. Henno was a chubby man with small eyes and short legs. He nodded to the robot. "It would be better if you took these three out of here," he ordered. "They might suddenly get an idea to attack me." The walking fighter machine silently opened the door and then raised its weapon arms threateningly. Henno noted the flash of angry defiance in the Zalites’ eyes, but they controlled themselves and went out of the room without a word.

  "Guard the door!" Henno added.

  He looked below again where the resistance of his guard troops was weakening rapidly. The clamor and tumult of the battle was indescribable. The rebels’ 2 robots seemed to be programmed by the Devil himself. In spite of their obvious vintage of design they continued to press forward ahead of their masters, their outer surfaces battered and dulled by the scuffings of battle. behind them came the Zalites who hurled themselves with deafening yells at the barriers and tore them down. It was a hodgepodge army equipped with a hodgepodge of arms and with only one thing in common: their greatest and most fervent desire was to kill Henno and take over the ruling power of Zalit.

  At the moment it looked very much as if they were about to get their wish. Henno stepped to his desk and obtained his service weapon from a lower drawer. He weighed it reflectively in his hand and then shoved it into his belt. When he came back to the window he saw a lone figure standing on top of the broken barricade. The man held a rock in his hand and carefully aimed it at the lower windows of the building. Henno used the butt of his weapon to break the window pane in front of him. The clattering of the glass could not be heard above the din of the fighting. A dark blue pillar of smoke was rising a few meters away. Evidently the lower floor was already in flames.

  Henno looked doubtfully at the radio transceiver. Two days ago he had sent out a distress call when the uprisings had begun. Did they expect him to wait around here until these raging rebels broke in upon him?

  If the Imperator failed to send a fleet to his aid, Henno didn’t see why he should stay here and sacrifice himself.

  All his life Salor Henno had been in the habit of carefully weighing events in his own favor. He knew very well when he was on the losing end of things and there was no motive of pride in him which could have moved him to hold out as a loser. The planetary official responded solely to the facts of any situation.

  Those wild attackers down there had achieved a forward momentum now; they had set the building on fire and were pressing in from all sides. The people were on their side, having been whipped into a frenzy by flaming speeches. They had drunk in the promises of liberation and now they were intoxicated by the heady wine of revolt. Once more the cry was: "Down with the Imperator!" The rising smoke irritated Henno’s nose and forced him to sneeze. The robot stood waiting at the door.

  "We’ll make a run for it," Henno decided. "You lead the way!" He pulled himself away from the window with the roar of the rebels still in his ears. Above the desk was a 3-D picture of himself which had the effect of making him look younger than he was. Henno raised his weapon and destroyed it because it made him uneasy to think of it gradually burning away in the flames of the rising fire.

  The combat robot had entered the passage in front of the office, its weapon arms raised in readiness to fire at any resistance forces.

  "Wait!" ordered Henno.

  Opening a secret compartment in the desk, he took out a pouch containing paper currency. He grinned as he secured the pouch in his belt. Very calmly he aimed his beamer at the desk and opened fire, causing it to burst into flames immediately.

  "Too bad about your tax money, Imperator!" he said scornfully. After one last look around in these familiar surroundings he turned toward the robot. "Alright, let’s go!" As they ran out into the passage they encountered the first of the retreating guard troops who were pouring out of the lifts and storming up the staircase. Their sweat-gleaming faces stared at him in desperation. Henno blocked their way. "We must fight!" he shouted at them. "If we give up, all of us will be lost!"

  He brandished his own weapon and the soldiers reluctantly turned back to the fighting again. Henno smiled, satisfied. If these fools could delay the attackers long enough for him to get to the roof, nothing more would happen to him. The glider would take him safely to the spaceport where he could continue his flight in a robotship. It was unlikely that the spaceport had fallen already because it had been strongly fortified long since as a matter of policy. Ever since the earlier Arkonides had colonized Zalit, the planet had been a focal point of seething unrest.

  Henno turned in an opposite direction to continue his retreat and the robot glided along soundlessly beside him. But at the end of the hallway a man appeared in front of him. He was neither a Zalite nor a pure line Arkonide but he moved toward Henno so casually that it bordered on recklessness. Henno signaled to the robot and came to a stop as he drew his weapon.

  The stranger was not especially tall but he was broad in the shoulders and on his angular face was what seemed to be an expression of mockery or scorn. He was wearing an Arkonide combat suit and leisurely carried a weapon under his arm. When he had approached to within 5 meters or so, Henno called out a warning. "That’s far enough," he said. "Who are you?" The stranger grinned with an almost childish frankness. He did not seem to be worried about the swiftly approaching sounds of battle. "My name is Tate," he drawled as he looked at Henno closely. "And you are obviously the Imperator’s representative on Zalit." Although he spoke Arkonide with a strange accent he made no errors in the process.

  Henno regarded him suspiciously. "What do you want?" he asked irritably. "Do you want to wait around here until they shoot us?"

  Tate merely smiled. "I was going to give you some help," he said, "that is—to quell this rebellion." Henno was too surprised to speak for a moment but finally he blurted out incredulously: "You surely don’t mean that the two of us could handle this mob?!"

  Tate nodded affirmatively. "The two of us and Granny." He patted the strange weapon he was carrying. The amazing part of it was that he actually seemed to be convinced of what he was saying. Henno was sure that he was looking at a madman who was merely wasting his time. "Get out of my way!" he shouted. "I’m heading to the spaceport with this robot. There’s a glider on the roof. If you have any sense you’ll come along. Within a few hours the Fleet will be taking over here." Tate lifted the Granny and aimed it at Henno point blank. His casual expression hardened instantly. "You don’t understand me," he said quietly. "Not a single ship is going to land on Zalit."The dark muzzle of the Granny seemed to stare balefully at Henno. The Arkon representative paled visibly but he still hesitated to tell the rob
ot to move in. "Let me explain something quickly," suggested Tate. "But don’t try anything foolish. I can fire this before you can even blink at that tin soldier of yours." This was no madman talking now. Never in his life had Henno seen such self-confidence in a man. "Then speak!" he said hoarsely.

  "I am a Terran agent on Zalit," Tate confessed. "Until now my job here has been merely to observe from a safe distance and send out periodic reports."

  "You are actually a Terran?!" exclaimed Henno.

  The weapon wavered slightly as Tate nodded affirmatively. "The battleship Troy and 6 light cruisers of the Solar Fleet were on their way to Zalit escorted by 44 heavy-class robot warships of the Greater Imperium," reported the agent.

  "They were? " repeated Henno in amazement.

  "Now we’re on our own resources. Effective as of now I am in command here. You will soon receive instructions from the Imperator which will explain everything."

  A hand-thrown bomb exploded at the far end of the corridor.

  "Let me get out of here!" begged Henno.

  "Too late!" retorted Tate as he nodded toward the other end of the hall. Henno whirled around and saw the first group of rebels storming through the bomb smoke. They were shouting and raving, some of them carrying bottles which they were nipping at as they went along.

  "We’re lost!" exclaimed Henno.

  Tate dove to one side as a shot from an energy gun hissed by. Henno felt the impact of the near miss and was thrown to the floor. In the midst of a rising bedlam, the Arkonide turned over in time to see Tate aim his weapon at the attackers.

  For the first time, the Granny went into action. Its superior fire power swept the hall clear of rebels, ripped out a segment of the wall and split the staircase in two. Tate chuckled in satisfaction while Henno gasped for breath and his eyes watered from the acrid smoke around him. By now Tate had regained his feet and was charging toward a new group of attackers who were surging up over the ruins of the staircase while yelling battle cries and firing wildly. Henno also started to take part in the fight but he had to be careful not to hit the Terran who seemed to be everywhere at once, driving back the assault forces with murderous fire from his weapon. Meanwhile the Arkonide was asking himself what could have happened to keep the Fleet from coming to their aid. He heard the Terran shouting an order but at first didn’t grasp what he was saying.

  "The robot!" shouted Tate a second time. "Send that thing into the fight!" Within a few minutes the Terran had become the epitome of courage and decisiveness for Henno. The only thing he doubted was that the agent could ultimately hold off the attacks in the long run. He saw the other’s warlike figure standing at the top of the shattered stairs, half-enshrouded by a pall of dust and smoke. As usual, he weighed his chances, realizing that in spite of it all the percentages weren’t too favorable for him if he were to remain. Above all he had to get the Terran’s attention distracted from his own activities. So he gave an order to the combat chapek and the machine moved forward at once to give assistance to Tate.

  For one last moment Henno registered-the battle scene in his mind and then he ran. He heard the thunderous voice of Granny again and its shockwave reached him with unexpected impact even at the entrance to the roof-lift. Henno swung into the lift and pressed buttons. His heart was practically in his mouth yet the sense of relief at his escape began to calm him down. The elevator came to a stop and the Imperator’s deputy stepped out onto the roof.

  When he felt the fresh air against his face he sighed with relief. Although the sound of the battle below was only muffled here, a number of explosions made the building tremble. Dark grey columns of smoke were rising up in many places around the edges of the roof.

  The glider was still there in its parking slot, undamaged. Salor Henno patted the money purse at his belt with grim satisfaction. Again, he thought, there was no situation that a shrewd head couldn’t handle. All one had to do was keep his senses about him and not go crazy like this fellow Tate. Henno shook himself. Actually he should be grateful to this Terran because he was furnishing him with an excellent cover for his retreat.

  Henno reached the glider and climbed aboard. Two minutes later he ran into an unpleasant surprise because he discovered that both the automatic and manual flight controls were locked or blocked off in some manner. Henno uttered a dark curse and began frantically to search for the cause of the trouble. Although he worked until he was in a sweat he finally came to the realization that it was useless. A few levels below the battle still appeared to be in progress. Now actual flames were whipping up past the edges of the roof. Henno felt the return of his fear of death. Without knowing where he was going, he tumbled out of the glider. At first he was not even thinking of defending himself. Like a frightened animal he searched about blindly for a hiding place.

  A figure stepped out of the elevator shed. The man seemed to stagger slightly but he was close to Henno and grasped him with one free hand—while in the other he carried the Granny. Tate was shaking him. "What’s the matter with you??" he shouted. Henno pulled his wits together. "You’re still alive?" he muttered. Tate chuckled and released him. "Naturally," he answered with incredible casualness.

  "The glider’s controls won’t work!" reported Henno hopefully. It occurred to him that this man might he able to solve the problem.

  "I know," said Tate calmly. "I took the liberty of making a few adjustments in your aircar, in case you got the idea to leave me and Granny in the lurch."

  Henno began to ask himself if being shrewd alone was enough, as compared to this combination of shrewdness and courage which Tate seemed to embody. "What about the rebels?" he asked. The agent made a vague gesture with his hand "They’re down there," he said. "They managed to snuff out your robot but I’ve given them something to keep them busy for awhile. We’re free to fly to the spaceport now."

  Henno felt flustered and embarrassed. "I couldn’t have left you alone here that would have been preposterous to fly off without you."

  Tate didn’t seem to be giving the matter much thought. He merely beckoned to him with easy confidence. "Come on!" he said, and he led the way to the glider. They climbed in and Tate brought the controls to life with a few quick adjustments. Meanwhile he whistled happily to himself, making sure that Granny lay close at hand.

  "What kind of a weapon is that?" asked Henno hesitantly.

  "It’s old, out-dated and it really has no business being in service anymore," the Terran told him. "It’s a high-speed grenade thrower. Aside from being. messy its main advantage is noise. When those grenades explode it sounds like a bomb raid."

  He started the glider and they rose up from the roof. Henno looked down into the street where the rebels were still ensconced around the burning building and were starting to celebrate their victory. If at this moment the Arkonide felt any regrets they were related more to his own losses than to those of the Imperium.

  Sooner or later those in power would be swept aside by another revolution, new names would emerge and new usurpers would decide the fate of Zalit. Zalit was a restless world because the colonists were never satisfied. Their centuries-long fight for independence had left them excitable and perpetually unruly. The only way-to overcome them would be by the intervention of the Fleet. But the Terran had told him that no ships would be coming here. For Henno, Zalit was merely a small episode in his life; for Tate it had been a mere assignment to intrigue and battle; for the rebel—a symbol of freedom. For many men a planet could mean many things. It all depended on the point of view. As Henno saw the countryside glide past beneath him was only vaguely aware of movement and color. He was staring at the broad back of the Terran who was bent over the flight controls. He thought fleetingly that he might be able to strike him down from behind but he dismissed the idea because he knew only too well how dependent he was upon this agent.

  "Alright," said Tate finally; "now I can tell you finally what happened to those ships you alerted with your distress call." He turned around, supporting himself casual
ly on the barrel of Granny, and began to tell his story.

  • • •

  The mission directive came through a few minutes after 07:00, standard time. Commodore Michael Fellman was on board the heavy cruiser Troy, which was scouting certain regions of star cluster M-13

  along with 6 light cruisers and a backup escort of 44 robotships of the Greater Imperium. As he took the dispatch from his Com Officer, MacDanies, he said: "Give them a confirmation, Sparks. We’ll lay a course for Zalit at once."

  Fellman was a quiet type who almost gave the impression of being melancholy but it was said of him that he was unusually capable. His blond hair was combed back flat against his head and carefully parted. His heavy eyebrows gave him a gloomy expression. No one had ever heard him laugh out loud and when he spoke it was merely with a movement of his lips like a toothless old man. The Commodore was never unfriendly but at times there was a barely perceptible note of scorn in his voice. He and the crew always communicated with a reserve that was neither sullen nor tense. It was merely the result of Fellman’s taciturnity which in a way was reassuring. He had graduated from the Space Academy with honors and his missions had been successful.

  "It’s a personal order from the Administrator," Fellman explained to his First Officer, who was an African named Donald Suwari. "Our task group is to fly immediately to Zalit. There’s an uprising there and the Imperial representative, a certain Salor Henno, has put out a call for help. Meanwhile we’ll get in touch with our Zalit agent, Wayne Tate.

  Suwari’s eyes flashed brightly in his dark face. He smiled. "I know Tate, sir. We were on a mission together 4 years ago. He’s a pretty wild go-getter. He always carries an out-dated weapon around with him. I think he even has a name for the thing."

  "Granny," commented Fellman incidentally, but once more it was a demonstration of how well informed he was about everything.