Night Walk

by Bob Shaw

  My eyes must be gone!

  TalIon had time for a moment of anguish; then all his consciousness contracted to focus on a new phenomenon: he was unable to breathe. With all physical sensation blanketed by the drug, he had no way of knowing why his breath had been shut off; but it was not too difficult to guess. Blinding him had been only the first installment; now Cherkassky was out to finish the job. Tallon discovered he was not very afraid, considering what was happening, perhaps because the ancient reaction of panic -- the downward, air-seeking thrust of the diaphragm -- Was blocked by his paralysis. If only he had kicked in Cherkassky's head while he had the chance.

  There was the sound of running feet drawing near, then voices:

  "Corporal! Lift Mr. Cherkassky to the car. It looks like he's seriously injured."

  "Right, Sarge."

  The second voice was followed by the sound of boots scufflng on the concrete, and Tallon suddenly gulped air. Cherkassky must have passed out and fallen across his face. Tallon accepted the air gratefully; then he heard voices again.

  "Sarge! Look at the Earther's eyes. Can a hornet gun do that ?"

  "You want me to show you? Get Mr. Cherkassky into the car, then shove the Earther in the tender."

  Vague shifts in his sense of balance told Tallon the orders were being carried out. Whistles sounded; vehicle turbines were spun up noisily. And indeterminate time went by; then Tallon began to feel pain. . . .

  Less than twenty-four hours had passed, but already Tallon thought he could feel the quickening of the other senses that accompanies the loss of sight.

  In the police headquarters in New Wittenburg somebody had jabbed a hypodermic into his neck, and he had regained consciousness with the comforting feeling of bandages across his face. He had been given a hot drink and escorted to a bed -- all without having a word addressed to him -- and, miraculously, had slept. While he was sleeping someone had removed his shoes and replaced them with thin-soled boots several sizes too large for him.

  Now he was being transported in another vehicle, accompanied by three or four anonymous E.L.S.P. officers, who communicated with him by occasional pushes and nudges. Tallon was too helpless to try to get them to talk to him. His mind was unable to encompass anything but the fact that he was unable to see.

  The vehicle slowed down, heeled twice as it turned corners, then stopped. When Tallon was helped out he knew with certainty he was on an airfield. He felt the random slap of air currents, which spoke of open space, and smelled aviation fuel; then, in confirmation, he heard the sound of huge turbines winding up near by.

  Tallon felt a faint flicker of interest. He had never flown on Emm Luther because it was expensive, and traveling this way would have made him too conspicuous. The civil aircraft were large, but carried comparatively small payloads owing to governmental regulations controlling their design. The fuselages were heavily armored, and the wings were inefficient by Earth standards, because they carried the complete power, fuel, and control systems. In the event of a crash landing the wings, with their deadly fuel load, were shed by explosive bolts. The planetary government had made flying safe on Emm Luther, regardless of economics, and in that respect had earned Tallon's reluctant approval. He wished the Temporal Moderator would display such good sense in the staffing of governmental agencies.

  Unseen hands helped him up steps into the warm, plastic-smelling interior of the plane and into a seat. Other hands fastened the safety webbing, and suddenly he was left alone. Tallon listened intently, using his newly discovered trick of consciously seeking different sound frequencies, but the only voices he picked up were those of the E.L.S.P. men conversing in whispers. Evidently they had laid on a special flight just for him. Feeling cold, Tallon slumped down in his seat and wished he could at least look through the windows.

  His eyes no longer hurt, but the outraged nerves were still throwing up pseudo images, some of which were painfully brilliant flashes of color. Tallon wondered how long it would be before they gave him proper medical attention. It was not until he heard the whump of the door closing, followed by an increase in engine pitch, that he wondered where he was being taken. There was, he decided, only one real possibility: the Pavilion.

  The prison reserved for political enemies of Emm Luther was on the southernmost tip of the single continent. It had originally been the winter residence of the first Termporal Moderator, who had intended to fill in the marshy region that joined the rocky islet to the mainland. But he had changed his mind and moved north instead. In those early days of colonization when construction materials were still scarce, some unknown civil servant had seen the possibilities of the Pavilion as an escape-proof prison. Several well-placed cutting charges had broken the spine of the little peninsula, allowing the warm waters of the Erfurt Sea to lap across it. Within a few years the original marshy area had become a superswamp that could be crossed only by air.

  The Pavilion held fewer prisoners now than in the years when the present political overlords were emerging. And it had confirmed the civil servant's foresight: Nobody had ever escaped from it.

  After an extremely smooth takeoff and a short climb the aircraft settled in its course, with near-silent engines; only an occasional slipping sensation let Tallon know he was moving through the sky. He sat listening to the whisper of air and the infrequent whine of control servos, then drifted into an uneasy sleep.

  He awoke to the sound of the engines in full throat, the big jets hammering fierce vibrations through the plane's structure. Tallon gripped the armrests of his seat. A few agonizing seconds went by in his private night-world before he realized what was happening: The big aircraft was making a vertical landing. At Emm Luther's gravity this maneuver involved such a prodigious expenditure of fuel that it would only be done either in an emergency or in a landing where there was no room for even a primitive airstrip. Tailon decided they had arrived at the Pavilion.

  Coming down the steps from the passenger door, Tallon's first impression was of the warmth of the air in contrast to the bitter winds of the New Wittenburg winter. He had forgotten that the thousand-mile flight would bring him close to the planet's tropics. As he was being guided across an area of rippled concrete, with heat coming through the soles of his thin boots, Tallon sensed the nearness of the sea with a sudden stab of anguish. He had always liked looking at the sea. He was led through a doorway and along a succession of echoing corridors, then finally into a quiet room, where he was pushed into a chair. The booted feet withdrew. Wondering if he was alone, Tallon turned his head from side to side, aware of his utter helplessness.

  "Well, Tallon, this is just about the end of the line for you. I guess you'll be glad to rest for a while." The voice was deep and strong. Tallon visualized its owner as a big man of about fifty. The important thing was that he had been spoken to personally, and not unkindly. Another human mind was reaching out through the darkness. He opened his mouth to reply, but his throat felt tight. He nodded his bead, feeling like a schoolboy.

  "Don't worry, Tallon. The reaction is catching up with you. I'll see you get something to help you over the next few days. I'm Dr. Muller, head of the psychology department attached to the prison. I'm going to give you a routine check to make sure that you-know-what has been permanently erased from your memory; then I'm going to hand you over to my colleague, Dr. Heck, who'll see what be can do about your eyes."

  "My eyes!" Tallon felt an irrational surge of hope. "Do you mean . . . ?"

  "That's not my department, Tallon. Dr. Heck will examine you as soon as I'm finished, and I'm sure he'll do everything that can be done."

  Absorbed with the idea that perhaps his eyes were not so badly damaged as he had imagined, Tallon sat patiently through the testing procedures, which took nearly an hour. The program involved more than a dozen tiny injections, some of which brought on sharp attacks of nausea and dizziness. Questions were thrown at him continually, often in women's voices, although he had heard nobody else enter the room. Sometimes the interro
gative voices seemed to be originating right inside his head -- persuasive, seductive, or frightening in turn, and always irresistible. Tallon heard his own voice gasping out incoherent replies. Finally he felt the terminals being stripped from his head and body.

  "That appears to be that, Tallon," Dr. Muller said. "As far as I'm concerned, you're clear. I'm going to certify you as a normal class-three security risk, which means you'll join the other detainees and will have all the customary privileges. In a way, you're lucky."

  "I take it you use the word in a very loose sense, Doctor." Tallon fingered the bandages over his eyes. "Or do you mean lucky in comparison with some of the others Cherkassky has brought in here?"

  "I mean, considering the sort of information you had, any other government in the universe, including that of Earth, would have executed you immediately."

  "Cherkassky tried to execute my mind. Do you know he kept on pressing the red button on that -- "

  "Enough!" Muller's voice had lost its friendliness. "That isn't my department."

  "My mistake, Doctor. I thought you said you were head of psychology. Or is it that you don't want to think too much about the kind of men you work for?"

  There was a long silence. When Muller spoke again he had regained his professional warmth. "I'm prescribing something to get you through the backlash period, Tallon. I'm sure you'll find you'll settle down here very well. Now Dr. Heck will see you."

  Muller must have given a signal of some kind, for a door opened quietly and Tallon felt a hand grasp his arm. He was led out of the room and along more corridors. The medical block, if that's what it was, seemed a lot bigger than he had expected. Although lagging behind Earth in many fields of research, it was possible that Emm Luther could be advanced in surgical techniques. After all, Tallon thought, this is the twenty-second century. There are all kinds of things that can be done for an injured person -- microsurgery, cell regeneration, electron surgery, tissue welding.

  By the time he was escorted into a room that smelled of antiseptics, Tallon was drenched with perspiration and shaking uncontrollably. Someone guided him to what felt like a high couch and made him lie down. A feeling of warmth on his forehead and lips told him that powerful lights were shining on his face. There was a short delay during which he heard soft footsteps and the rustle of clothing near by. He fought to check the trembling, but it was impossible; the single breath of hope had shattered his control.

  "Well now, Mr. Tallon." The man's voice had the slight German accent common on Emm Luther. "You're nervous, I see. Dr. Muller said you'd be in need of medication. I think we'll give you a couple of cc's of one of our blends of distilled tranquility."

  "I don't need it," Tallon said determinedly. "If it's all right with you, I'd just like to get on with the . . . with the . . ."

  "I understand. Let's see now."

  Tallon felt the bandages being gently cut away from his eyes; and then, incredibly, Dr. Heck began to whistle.

  "Oh, yes, I see . . . I see. An unfortunate accident, of course, but things could have been worse, Mr. Tallon. I think we can fix this up for you without too much difficulty. It will take a week or so, but we'll be able to patch you up all right."

  "Do you mean it?" Tallon drew in an ecstatic, shuddering breath. "Do you really mean you'll be able to do something with my eyes?"

  "Of course. We'll start work on the eyelids in the morning -- that's the trickiest part -- and we'll clean up the bridge of the nose and do something about the brows."

  "But my eyes -- what about my eyes?"

  "No problem. What color would you like?"

  "Color?" Tallon felt a chill of fear.

  "Yes," Heck said cheerfully. "It's small recompense for being blind, but we can give you a really beautiful pair of brown plastic eyes. Or you can have blue -- but with your coloring I wouldn't recommend it."

  Tallon made no reply. An icy eternity went by before he felt the welcome needle slide into his arm.

  five

  The daily routine at the Pavilion, as explained to Tallon, was a simple one -- simpler for him than for the other prisoners, for he was excused from all activities except the three daily prayer sessions. As far as he could tell, the Pavilion was more like an army training camp than a prison. The inmates worked seven hours a day at a variety of menial jobs, with a minimum of regimentation, and had a library and sports facilities. In a way it was quite a pleasant place to be, except that there was only one sentence -- life.

  Taken to the exercise ground on his first day out of the medical block, Tallon settled on the ground with his back to a sun-warmed wall. It was a calm morning, with almost no breeze, and the prison yard was filled with overlapping layers of sound -- footsteps, voices, and other noises still to be identified -- and beyond them, the audible movement of he sea. Tallon leaned his head back on the warm stones and tried to make himself comfortable.

  "You're on your own now, Tallon," the guard said. The others will show you where everything is. Have fun."

  "How can I miss?"

  The guard laughed sardonically and moved away. His footsteps had barely faded when Tallon felt something flick lightly against his outstretched leg. He froze, trying to remember if the southern part of the continent had any particularly unpleasant insects.

  "Excuse me, sir. You are Mr. Sam Tallon?" The voice carried with it the image of a white-haired, red-faced, backwoods politician.

  "That's right." Tallon brushed uneasily at his leg, but felt nothing unusual. "Sam Tallon."

  "A great pleasure to meet you, Sam." The newcomer sat down beside Tallon, grunting fiercely in the process. "I'm Logan Winfield. You're quite a hero here in the Pavilion, you know."

  "I didn't know."

  "Oh, yes. None of us here have any great regard for Mr. Lorin Cherkassky," Winfield boomed, "but neither had we the enterprise to send him into the hospital for an extended stay."

  "I wasn't trying to hospitalize him. I meant to kill him."

  "A laudable ambition, son. What a pity you didn't succeed. However, your endeavor has made every man in the prison your friend for life; that's how long you're in for, I take it."

  "I guess so."

  "You guess correctly, son. One of the great benefits of mixing Lutheranism, of the variety we have here, with government is that it simplifies the procedure for dealing with politicos. The theory appears to be that as we have cheerfully condemned ourselves to everlasting torment in the hereafter by our own actions, we will hardly even notice a mortal lifetime in prison."

  "A neat theory. What are you in for?" Tallon asked out of politeness, but all he really wanted to do was to sit in the sun and doze. He had discovered he could still dream, and in dreams his brown plastic eyes were as good as real eyes.

  "I'm a doctor of medicine. I came here from Louisiana when this planet was first reached. It wasn't called Emm Luther in those days, of course. I put a lifetime of hard work into this world, and I love it. So when it broke away from the empire I worked to bring it back to its true destiny."

  Tallon snorted with bitter amusement. "I take it that when you get down to the practical details of working to bring a world back to its true destiny, the job includes getting rid of obstinate politicians?"

  "Well, son, we had a saying back home that you can't reason a man out of something he hasn't been reasoned into. So . . ."

  "So you're in prison doing life for something that would have got you the same sentence, or worse, under any other political regime." Tallon spoke angrily, and there was a long silence when he had finished. An insect hummed near his face, then drifted away in the warm air.

  "I'm surprised to hear you speak like that, son. I thought we'd have common interests, but I fear I've intruded. I'll go."

  Tallon nodded and listened as Winfield struggled heavily to his feet. Again something flicked lightly against his leg. This time he grabbed for it and found himself holding the end of a cane.

  "My apologies," Winfield said. "The cane is an ancient device for the
members of our fraternity, but it is undeniably useful. Without it I would have fallen over your legs, with consequent embarrassment to both parties."

  A few seconds passed before Tallon absorbed the full meaning of the other man's rounded, rolling phrases.

  "Hold on a minute, Do you mean that you're -- ?"

  " Blind is the word, son. You get used to saying it after a few years."

  "Why didn't you tell me earlier? I didn't know. Please sit down again." Tallon's hand found the man's arm and held on. Winfield seemed to consider the idea; then he sat down, again with furious grunting. Tallon guessed he was very fat and out of condition. He found Winfield's pomposity irritating, especially his use of the word son, but here was a man who had already explored the road Tallon was destined to walk. They sat in silence for a while, listening to the rhythmic crunch of gravel as the rest of the prisoners exercised in another part of the yard.