The Stainless Steel Rat's Revenge

by Harry Harrison

  This security blanket lasted right up to the invasion itself. We were seven boring days en route with nothing to drink and the ship piloted by the computer and the frozen rations barely edible. On a long term basis, without the ameliorating effects of alcohol, Otrov proved to be less than a sparkling companion. No matter where the conversation began it invariably ended up in repetitive anecdotes from his school days. I slept well, I'll say that, and usually while he was talking but he never seemed to mind. I also checked him out on the instruments with drills and dry runs, which may have done him some active good and certainly acquainted me with the controls and operation of the ship.

  Since the ship was completely automated, Otrov and I were the only crew members aboard. The single doorway to the troop area was sealed and my friend the surly colonel had the only key. He visited us once or twice which was no pleasure at all. On the seventh day he was standing behind us glowering at the back of my neck when we broke out of warpdrive and back into normal space.

  "Take this, inspect here, sign that," he snapped and we did all those things before he broke the seal on the flat case. This was labeled INVASION in large red letters which rather suggested that things would be honing up soon. My instructions were simple enough and I switched on the circuits as ordered so the ship could home on the squadron leader. A yellowish sun shone brightly off to one side and the blue sphere of a planet was on the other. The colonel glared at this planet as though he wanted to reach out and grab it and take a bite out of it, so future developments seemed obvious enough without asking questions.

  The invasion began. Most of the fleet was ahead of us, lost in the night of space and visible only occasionally as a network of sparks when they changed course. Our squadron of transports stayed together, automatically following the course set by the lead ship, and the planet grew in the screens ahead. It looked peaceful enough from this distance, though I knew the advance units of the fleet must be attacking by this time.

  I was not looking forward to this invasion--who but a madman can enjoy the prospect of approaching war?--but I was hoping to find out the answer to the question that had brought me here. I believed that interplanetary invasions were still impossible, despite the fact that I was now involved in one myself. I felt somewhat like the man who, upon seeing one of the most exotic animals in the zoo, said 'there ain't no such animal.' Interplanetary invasions just don't work.

  The interplanetary invading force rushed on, a mighty armada giving the lie to my theories. As the nameless planet grew larger and larger, filling the forward screens, I could see the first signs of the war that I knew was already in progress; tiny sparkles of light in the night hemisphere. Otrov saw them too and waved his fist and cheered.

  "Give it to them boys," he shouted.

  "Shut up and watch your instruments," I snarled. Suddenly hating him. And instantly relenting. He was a product of his environment. As the twig is bent so grows the bough and so forth. His twig had been bent nicely by the military boarding school into which he had been stuffed as a small child. Which, for some unknown reason, he still thought well of although every story he told me about it had some depressing or sadistic point to make. He had been raised never to question, to believe God had created Cliaand a bit better than all the other planets, and that they were therefore ordained to take care of the inferior races. It is amazing the things people will believe if you catch them early enough.

  Then we were turned loose as the individual transports scattered to home in on their separate targets. I fiddled with the radio and Silently cursed the Cliaandian passion for security and secrecy. Here I was landing a shipload of troops--and I didn't even know where! On the planet below, surely, they could not very well disguise that fact, but on what continent? At what city? All I knew was that pathfinder ships had gone in first and planted radio beacons. I had the frequency and the signal I was to listen for, and when I detected it I was to home in and land. And I knew that the target was a spaceport. With the final instructions I had received some large and clear photographs--the Cliaandian spies had obviously been hard at work--of a spaceport; aerial and wound views. A big red X was marked near the terminal buildings and I had to set the ship down as close to this site as I could. Fine.

  "That's the signal!" The dah-dah-dit-dah was loud and clear.

  "Strap in--here we go," I said, and fed instructions to the computer. It worked up landing orbit almost instantly and the main jets fired. "Give the colonel the first warning, then feed him proximity and altitude reports while I bring her in."

  We were dropping towards the terminator, flying into the dawn. The computer had a fix on the transmitter and was bringing us down in a slow careful arc. When we broke through the cloud cover and the ground was visible far below I saw the first sign of any resistance. The black clouds of explosions springing up around us.

  "They're shooting at us!" Otrov gasped, shocked.

  "Well it's a shooting war, isn't it?" I wondered what kind of a veteran he was to be put off by a little gunfire, and at the same time I hit the computer override and turned off the main jets. We dropped into free fall and the next explosions appeared above and behind us as the gun computer was thrown off by our deceleration change.

  I caught sight of the spaceport below and hit the lateral jets to move us in that direction. But we were still falling. Our radar altimeter readings were being fed into the computer which kept flashing red warnings about the growing proximity of the ground. I gave it a quick program to hold landing deceleration as long as possible, to drop us at 10 G's to zero altitude. This meant we would be falling at maximum speed and slowing down for minimum time, which would decrease the time we would be exposed to ground fire And I wanted the colonel to have the 10 G's he had once warned me about.

  The jets fired at what looked like treetop height, slamming us down into our couches. I smiled, which is hard to do with ten gravities pulling at you, thinking about the expression on the colonel's face at that moment. Watching the screen I added some lateral drift until we were just over the hardstand which was our target area. After this it was up to the computer which did just fine and killed the engines just as our landing struts crunched down. As soon as all the engines cut off I hit the disembark button and the ship shivered as the ramps blew out and down.

  "That takes care of our part," I said, unbuckling and stretching.

  Otrov joined me at the viewport as we watched the troops rush down the ramps and run for cover. They did not seem to be taking any casualties at all which was surprising. There were some bomb craters visible nearby and heaps of rubble, while fighter-bombers still roared low giving cover. But it didn't seem possible that all resistance had been knocked out this quickly. Unless this world did not have much of a standing army. That might be one answer to explain the Cliaandian invasion success; only pick planets that are ripe for plucking. I made a mental note to look into this. Well behind his troops came the colonel in his command car. I hoped that his guts were still compressed from the landing.

  "Now we have to find some drink," Otrov said, smacking his lips with anticipation.

  "I'll go, "I said, taking my sidearm from the rack and buckling it on. "You stay with the radio and watch the ship."

  "That's what all the first pilots always say," he complained, so I knew I had called this one right.

  "Privilege of rank. Someday you will be exercising it too. I shouldn't be long."

  "Spaceport bar, that's where it usually is," he called after me.

  "Don't teach your grandpa to chew cheese," I sneered, having already figured that one out.

  All of the interior doors had unlocked automatically when we landed. I climbed the ladders down to the recently vacated combat deck and kicked my way through the discarded ration containers to the nearest ramp. The fresh sweet air of morning blew in, carrying with it the smell of dust and explosives. We had brought the benefits of Cliaandian culture to another planet.

  I could hear firing in the distance and a jet thundered by an
d was gone, but after this it was very quiet. The invasion had fanned out from the spaceport leaving a pocket of silence in its wake. Nor was anyone in sight when I walked, unexamined, through the customs area and, with reflex skill, found the bar. The first thing I did was to drain a flask of beer, then poured a small Antarean ladevandet to hold it down. There were ranked bottles behind the bar, new friends and old ones, and I made a good selection. I needed something to carry them in and opened one of the sliding doors beneath, looking for a box or a bag, and found myself staring into the frightened eyes of a young man.

  "Ne mortigu min!" he cried. I speak Esperanto like a native and answered in the same tongue.

  "We are here to liberate you so mean you no harm." Word of this conversation might get to the authorities and I wanted to make the right impression. "What is your name?"

  "Pire."

  "And the name of this world?" This seemed sort of a dim question for an arrogant invader to ask, but he was too frightened to question it.

  "Burada."

  "That's fine. I'm glad you decided to be truthful. And what can you tell me about Burada?"

  Badly phrased, admittedly, and he was too stunned to answer. He gaped for a moment, then climbed out of the cabinet and turned to root about in it. He came up with a booklet that he passed over in silence. It had a 3D cover of an ocean with graceful trees on the bordering shore, that sprang to life as soon as the heat of my hand touched it; the waves crashed silently on the golden sands and the trees moved to the touch of unfelt breezes. Letters formed of clouds moved across the sky and I read BEAUTIFUL BURADA . . . HOLIDAY WORLD OF THE WESTERN WARP . . .

  "Looting and consorting with the enemy," a familiar, and detested, voice said from the doorway. I turned slowly to see my friend the colonel from our ship standing there fingering his gauss-rifle with what can only be termed a filthy grin on his face.

  "And 10 G landing too," he added, undoubtedly the real cause of his unhappiness. "Which is not a shooting offense although the other two are."

  Chapter 12

  Pire shrieked in a muffled manner and drew back, not understanding the colonel's words but recognizing his manner and his weapon. I smiled, as coldly as I could, as I saw that my hands were out of sight below the bar. Turning to the youth I pointed to the far end of the room and ordered him there. He scuttled nicely and while this bit of mis-direction was going on I slipped the tourist book into my pocket and eased my gausspistol out of its holster. When I turned back to the colonel I saw that he had half raised his rifle.

  "You are wrong," I said, "and insulting as well to a fellow officer who recently was a flight-major. I am aiding our invading forces by securing this drinking establishment to prevent any of your troops from becoming drunk on duty and therefore injuring our all-out efforts. And while in this place I took a prisoner who was hiding here. That is what happened and it is my word against yours, colonel."

  He raised his gun barrel towards me and said, "It is only my word that I caught you looting and was forced to shoot you when you resisted arrest."

  "I am a hard one to shoot," I said, letting the muzzle of my pistol slide up over the edge of the bar until it was centered between his eyes. "I am an expert shot and one of these explosive slugs will take the top of your head off."

  Apparently he had not expected this kind of instant response from a flying officer and he hesitated for a moment. Pire squealed faintly and there was a thud. I assumed he had fainted but was too busy to look. This murderous tableau held for a moment and there was no way of knowing how it might have ended if a soldier had not rushed into view with a field radio. The colonel took the phone and went back to the war while I stuffed two bottles into the back of my jacket and went out the other exit, stepping over Pire who was unconscious on the floor and undoubtedly better off that way. I was gone before the colonel realized it and I took the drink back to the ship and sent it up the service lift to Otrov. "And don't drink more than one," I ordered and his voice responded with a happy cry over the intercom.

  I was on my own now and I meant to make the most of the opportunity. With the battle still being waged my movements would not be watched and I could make my observations. Of course I might also be killed, but that is one of the occupational hazards of the service. Once the invasion had succeeded movement would be sharply restricted and I would probably be on my way back to Cliaand. The guide booklet was still in my pocket, the heat of my hip keeping the action going on the cover. I opened it and flipped through the pages which were heavy on pictures and short on copy. This was the hard sell all right with low music coming from the illustration of the floating orchestra on beautiful Sabun Bay and the scent of flowers from the Kanape fields. I expected some snow to fall out of the picture of skiing in the Kar mountains, but the technology of advertising did not extend this far. There was a map showing the airport and the city, diagrammatic and worthless for the most part, though it did tell me I was standing in Sucuk Spaceport close by Sucuk City. I threw away the book and went to see the sights.

  Depressing. It would be a long time before the tourists came back to these sunny shores. I walked through the empty streets, peeked by explosions and charred by fire, and wondered what the purpose of this could possibly be. War, always a foolish business, seemed even more infantile at this moment. Horrible might be a better word; I saw my first corpses. There was the sound of dragging feet and a horde of prisoners appeared in the street ahead, guarded on all sides by alert Cliaandian troops. Many of the prisoners were wounded and few bandaged. The sergeant in charge saluted when they went by and gave a wave of victory. I smiled in return but it took an effort. What I had to do now was to find some responsible citizen of Sucuk City who was not yet a prisoner or dead and get the answers to some questions.

  The citizen found me first. I left the main road and turned down a narrow winding street ominously labeled Matbaacilik-sasurtmek--any street with a name like that could not be all good. My suspicions had some justification in fact. I discovered this when I turned a sharp corner and found myself facing a young woman who was pointing a large bore hunting rifle at me. I was waving my little fingers in the air even before she spoke.

  "Surrender or die!"

  "I've surrendered--can't you see! Long live Burada, rah-rah . . ."

  "None of your sickening jokes, you foul war-mongering male, or I'll shoot you on the spot."

  "I'm on your side, believe me. Peace on Burada, good will to men--and women too of course."

  She snorted at this and waved me towards a dark doorway with the gun. Even in anger she was a handsome woman, wide-faced with flaring nostrils and black hair hanging straight to her shoulders. She wore a dark green uniform, high boots, leather straps and all, with some kind of insignia on the sleeve. She was feminine despite this; no uniform could be made to disguise the magnificent swell of that bosom. I entered the doorway as she demanded and she reached to take my pistol as I passed. I could have done some quick business then with her arm and the gun barrel and ended up with both weapons, but I restrained myself. As long as she felt she was in charge she might talk more easily. We entered a dark inner room with a single window, an office of some kind, where another girl in uniform was stretched out on the desk. Her eyes were closed and the leg of her uniform had been cut away to disclose an ugly wound now bound with clumsy bandages. Blood had seeped through them and pooled upon the desk top.

  "You have medicine?" my captress asked.

  "I do," I said, opening the medpack at my waist. "But I don't think it will do much good. She appears to have lost a lot of blood and needs medical attention."

  "Where will she get it? Not from you swine invaders."

  "Perhaps." I was busy with pressure points, tearing off the old bandages, sprinkling on antiseptic powder and applying better bandages. "Her pulse is slow and very weak. I don't think she will make it."

  "If she doesn't--you killed her." Tears were in my opponent's eyes, though this did not stop her from keeping the blunderbuss pointed a
t my midriff.

  "I'm trying to save her, remember? And you can call me Vaska."

  "Taze," she said automatically. "Sergeant in the Guard before they took over."

  "They?" I felt slightly confused. "You mean them, us, the army of Cliaand?"

  "No, of course not. But why am I talking to you when I should be killing you . . ."

  "You shouldn't. Kill me I mean. Would you believe me if I told you I was a friend?"

  "No."

  "That I was a spy from elsewhere now working against the Cliaands although I am in their Space Armada?"

  "I would say that you are a worm pleading for your worthless life and willing to say anything."

  "Well it's true, anyway," I grumbled, realizing she wasn't going to take my revelations on faith.

  "Taze . . ." the girl on the table said weakly and we both turned that way. Then "Taze" again and died.

  I thought I was dead as well. Taze swung the rifle up and I could see her knuckles whiten as she squeezed. I did a lot of things quickly, starting with a dive to get under the gun and a roll right into her. The gun fired--the blast almost taking my head off in the confined space--but I wasn't hit. Before she could fire again I had the barrel in my hand and did a quick chop at the muscles in her arm and a few other things one does not normally do to women except in an emergency like this. Then I had the rifle, as well as my pistol back, and she was lying against the wall with something to really cry about this time. It would be a number of minutes before she could use her fingers again; I had stopped just short of breaking the bone.

  "Look I'm sorry," I said, putting my pistol away and fumbling with the archaic mechanism of the rifle. "I just didn't feel like getting killed at the moment and this was the only way that I could stop you." I worked the bolt and ejected all the cartridges, then squinted inside to make sure I hadn't missed any. "What I told you was true. I am on your side and want to help you. But you will have to help me first."