by Ian Wallace
Dio quivered alert. “Then if the REM Device operates by —wait, let me say it slower. The REM Device, you tell me, can blow a continent-sized land mass off the surface of Earth. Suppose it does this by suddenly expanding the upper depths of mantle under that land mass; converting the mantle to a continent-sized volcano of gas and molten magma, using a method of increasing thermal energy by means of electromagnetic input Well: wouldn’t the pertinent series-progression be—ex tabula Contabulari?”
“I’m with you.”
“And—Guru Kali wanted that smuggled to him?”
“He wanted it and he got it—hold, something’s coming in—”
The transmission was from Captain Ilya Sarabin (I’d get to know many of these guys), and the highly (verbal) mentation seemed to be in rapid Russian (of which I know precisely two words, da and nyet—a girl has to know these in any language, if you don’t mind a plagiary from an old Doug Fairbanks film). Rourke listened with growing tension; and at a pause he interjected, “Do it all again, but try to think English.” It slowed Sarabin, and then his new mentation came through in English pure, with a few odd idioms but free of the sound distortions which tongue and lips impose.
The sense was utterly clear, and its imminent-threat meaning was unmistakable, and Ilya’s informant today had been no less an executive scientist than Dr. Rostov, who had developed the Russian REM. Russia had been maintaining a main headquarters and two widely dispersed alternate headquarters for REM activation, and another alternate headquarters was in the works. For the alternate headquarters, a multiselective switchboard-console, a power unit, a power-booster unit, and a directional transmission unit had been in storage awaiting assembly; the total weight of these units was about two tons. A month ago—with all storage-security locks in order, and without any discoverable complicity on the part of any worker—all four of these units had vanished....
“Wait, Ilya,” Rourke interrupted, “there’s another signal; stand by—”
Dio was on his feet, action-ready; Esther and I in our chairs were almost in foetal positions. Co-Captain Zeno Metropoulos laconically told Rourke: “Commodore, I thought you’d like to know something about yesterday’s minor earthquake on or in Alaska. It just came through that no seismologist so far questioned has been able to allocate any source of the disturbance except in the mantle directly underneath Alaska—and they all assert that this localized thermal expansion of the mantle is unexplainable by any present theory.”
Caught up in the mentation, Dio’s brain almost screamed: “Commodore, f’gossakes, emergency—don’t you agree? Kali swiped the formula, Kali teleported out the activation units, Kali was testing in Alaska—he’s ready to blow Alaska and stimulate an international exchange of REM-strikes! Have you forgotten his sardonic sense of humor? It’s like tossing a cork into the array of corked mousetraps—”
Mental silence. Then Zeno’s thought: “Who in hell was that?'
The physical Mallory-posture was catatonic. And then his brain yelled, while his silently moving lips mimed the yell: “ALL CAPTAINS! ALL CAPTAINS! CONDITION RED! CONDITION RED! CUT FOR SPACE, CONTINGENCY RENDEZVOUS Y!”
I was nausea-gripped as all external physical reality vanished. They and everything around me were gone. I was awash in evanished nothing.
When something like reality came clear again, it was a cosmic fantasy. All my visual field was a wide-screen cinema of star-studded black; and centered in the field was the seeming of a blue-white sphere made of agate....
The voice in my brain said, “That’s Earth.” Confused, I from 1952 pre-Apollo Earth protested, “I thought it would be blue-and-green—” The voice insisted, ‘That is Earth. Watch it!"
A mighty chunk flew off the sphere. The agate wobbled. Another chunk departed another quartile; then a third.
The agate entered into tremulous agitation
and disintegrated,
leaving black void in the center where Earth had been.
Part Six
SPACE
20.
The Ishtar and all other small and large ships in the RP Fleet had, as it turned out, a hidden capability. With foresight, Rourke in 1986, backed by a preponderant majority of his captains and in behind-scenes consultation with key leaders in the World Assembly, had ordered installation of this capability. Some of the newer larger ships like the Ishtar had been adaptable to it; but for most ships, total ship-replacement had been required. The replacement of the last and smallest boat had been completed a few months earlier: sixteen years at enormous cost of money and energy had brought off the fleet-conversion on a maximum secrecy level and with so few ships out of action at any given time that the public had not missed them.
What Rourke had just activated in emergency, with his general command RED ALERT, was precisely this hidden capability. All ships had pulled in sail, telescoped masts, closed over their decks with transparent shells rolling up in halves or quarters or hexagonal sections from the hull walls to lock hermetically overhead, activated nuclear rocket-drive, and departed Earth for space, to meet here at prearranged and rehearsed Rendezvous Y orbiting 50,000 kilometers out. And Rourke had succeeded in teleporting us four to the Ishtar just ahead of thrust-off.
Here on the bridge we had been watching, I came slowly to understand, not an actual disintegration of Earth, but an animated simulation on a large trivideo screen which now rolled up to reveal beyond us through the transparent hull-shell—dead ahead it seemed, dead ahead—the real blue-white agate, perfectly intact as of now....
I was hearing the commodore’s dry radio-commentary and comprehending that watchers on every bridge or in every chart room in the fleet had been witnessing that same disintegration on their own screens. Rourke was emergency-briefing all of them:
“You recognize this animation as Contingency Omega, the worst possibility if the REM Device should be activated. Our high-probability information and inferences now indicate that Contingency Omega is imminent It appears that Guru Kali may intend to REM Alaska or some equivalent area; and this will certainly be misinterpreted by the United States as a testing by either Russia or China, whereas both Russia and China will instantly anticipate this reaction by the United States. Almost inevitable result: mutual activation of Contingency Omega.
“In case personal survival means anything to any of you as reinforcement of your Earth-dedication, I remind you that destruction of our Earth base will leave us out here in space self-sufficient for no more than sixty to ninety days. There would have been no point in bringing you out here for that kind of limited survival. Rather, I brought you here for two reasons: to let us plan and then operate in a free-from-Earth environment, and to guard all of us against the possibility that only a single continent with some of us on it would be destroyed by a REM-action less than Omega.
“You are all enjoined now to concentrate on methods of preventing any REM-action whatsoever and bringing off this prevention with all dispatch: tomorrow may be too late, or we may have some few days beyond tomorrow. Our fleet-ethic prevents us from making any direct attack on Guru Kali in the absence of preponderant court-supportable indictment-evidence and a consequent World Assembly warrant, and we are far short of that level of evidence. Nevertheless^ Kali and his bootleg REM-capability have got to be quarantined almost instantly. Your assignment is to figure how, and to reach trial recommendations immediately.
“I will be back with all of you in two hours for the purpose of arriving at courses of action. This is the commodore. Out.”
Listening to his transmission, I had been musing space beyond Earth’s albedo and halo. The stars, of course, were electrifying; but here and there, this side of the stars, I could see pinpoints of glow which were presumably sun-reflections off the other listening ships....
Toward the end of the transmission, though, I concentrated on the figure of Rourke seated erect in the screwed-down swivel chair of the commodore. And as his transmission terminated, Rourke slumped; and my still—clinging headset told me tha
t his brain was going into lethargy. Something about the situation reminded me poignantly of Burk Halloran in 1948, and I hurried to him and grasped his shoulders from behind; one of his hands came up to close shakily on my hand.
I became aware that four pairs of eyes were on us: the others on the bridge were Dio, Esther, Captain Clarice Vanderkilt, and Commander Jean Duval. I released Rourke and stood erect, staring at Duval....
Rourke muttered at his own lap,“Now hear this, Captain Vanderkilt, Commander Duval. I am ill, but I continue in fleet command, being mentally competent. Captain, please call the roll of the fleet.”
Vanderkilt, grim: “Sir, roll call is in progress.”
Rourke: “Very good, Captain. Tell me, Commander Duval —did you expect this dismal result out of your flirtation with Guru Kali?”
Duval, icy: “Sir, I do not understand the reference—” Rourke: “You are under arrest, Commander. Wait, don’t go to your quarters until I dismiss you, I want you to hear this. Captain Vanderkilt, I think you know Mme. d’Illyria; and I want now to present Detective-Inspector Horse and Dr. Vogel, who have been invaluable in helping me pinpoint the high probability of Contingency Omega. Captain, you remain in full command of the Ishtar; but you are to understand, and you are directed to instruct the fleet, that Inspector Horse speaks for me as to fleet command, and that both Dr. Vogel and Mme. d'Illyria are to be accepted and responded to as top aides on the command staff. Any questions, Captain?”
While the captain with prim decisiveness responded, “None, Commodore, for now; understood and to be activated,” bewildered I looked around me at the people: Esther was meditative, Dio paralyzed, Duval impotently evil.
A lieutenant mounted the bridge: “Commodore, Captain, I am pleased to report that all captains answer roll call, have heard the commodore’s transmission, are activating discussions, are nearby here at rendezvous.”
“Good,” said Rourke. “Lieutenant, I regret to inform you that Commander Duval has been placed under arrest; pray accompany him to his quarters, and deactivate his radio, and lock him in. Duval, I will send for you later.”
My sense of Rourke’s brain was that of restored selfconfidence, although he was broadcasting no intelligible message. “Inspector Horse, do you accept this responsibility?”
Dio was rigid: “It’s too big, but if you say so, I guess I should. Yes.”
Rourke, gentle, almost wondering: “You know, Dio, every human responsibility is really too big for any human—” Then he clipped: “Good, I am glad. I beg that you will accompany Captain Vanderkilt to the visiradio room while she presents you visually to the fleet captains and asserts your deputy command; but Inspector, don’t say anything, merely nod acknowledgment and maybe let them have a restrained smile and let them recognize you during a few seconds, and then the captain will disconnect and you are to come to my quarters. Winning the captains will be your problem later. Mme. d'Illyria, pray accompany the captain and inspector and be recognized. Dr. Vogel, I will need you with me. Please activate, Captain.”
Vanderkilt nodded and led grim Horse and thoughtful d'Illyria off the bridge. Rourke and I were alone there, except for a watch officer, who seemed to be paying no mind.
Rourke said wearily, “Maybe I need you to help me physically, Lilith.”
With my help, he got to his feet Hanging his arm over my shoulders while I armed his waist, heavily he showed me. how to guide him to his quarters.
It was soon after 8:00 a.m. I’d had no supper or sleep or breakfast It didn’t matter. World’s end was what mattered.
I got Burk—Rourke—into his easy chair, and I sat on its arm and contemplated his face, trying to shake off my pervasive impression that this was Burk’s father, having many of the finest Burk-characteristics but otherwise a stranger. At first his eyes were closed while he slowly brought heavy breathing into tranquility; then his eyes flickered open and regarded me while I regarded him.
The old relationship was a remote memory. A new relationship was waiting to be bom.
He meditated aloud: “Our past was immeasurably good for me, and I hope that it had some good ingredients for you. I have never let myself believe that you gave yourself to me just as objective therapy. I wanted to seek you, but it wouldn’t have done because I had come to depend on you too much. I was totally sure that you could manage beautifully well without me, and I had to be able to manage well without you. Perhaps I should have sent you word about this, but I didn’t dare contact you even indirectly in any way at all. Do you understand?”
I smiled openly, finger-touching his cheek. “If I had been prescribing for you, that would have been the prescription. To see that such a prescription would have been right, this is an ego-booster—and a personally pleasing thing, because I did love you.”
He smiled back: “If this reunion were in nineteen forty-nine for both of us, I think we would be in bed together now as rhapsodic lovers vowing total fidelity forever. Agree, Ishtar?”
“Agree, Rourke, Burk.”
“I bless that vision. Often I have fantasized that vision.”
“I too, my friend.”
“Perhaps, as an as-of-then possibility, it is real.”
“I say that it is.” My heart was most full.
Long intergazing silence. No embrace, no thought of one.
He, then: “But for you it is four years later, and there have been some intervening men; and for me it is fifty-four years later, and there have been countless intervening women; and apart from our sexualities, there have been ambitions and ideals and drives. Maybe it is somewhat as though the father of Burk Halloran were meeting the twin sister of Lilith Vogel, both well-briefed by son and by sister about that old love, both curious about each other, both very ready for trust and even eventually for affection.”
I frowned down, hurting. He was formulating what I was feeling; and my headphones assured me that his brain-mind meant it. . . . Abruptly I snatched off the hateful-lovable headphones and threw them on the carpeted floor of his cabin; and I grabbed his neck and hugged him with closed eyes, trying to stifle my sobbing, while he held me tightly and rubbed and patted my back....
Pushing away from him, I gazed with my blurring eyes into Ms wet eyes and strove to make my mouth smile. I articulated: “I’m an ass.”
He was smiling quite easily, although his eyes were wet “I know. Thank God. And I’m equally an ass. Thank God.”
We interstudied.
I sat up on the chair ann and finger-dried eyes and worked with my hair, while I observed with a voice that was nearly normal: “All right, I’m glad that happened, we two won’t forget it. Now. Rourke Mallory. Commodore Mallory, with allegiance to no woman and with colossal responsibilities and concerns and with a great deal of bothersome mystification involving an evil semi-double. I am Dr. Lilith Vogel, a psychologist out of a time primitive for you, probably unable to pass a today-exam for whatever your equivalent of doctor may be, but nevertheless, that is what I am. If the time and the situation confuse me, I shall try to approach them as though they were a patient new to me: it is merely that I have a lot of learning to do before I can act, and that’s part of my professional discipline. Please guide me, Commodore.”
He said: “During your time with Horse, have you come to respect him?”
“Endlessly.”
“Thank you, I hoped it would be like that. Well: he’ll be here shortly, and so will Esther, and I think we four should continue working it out together. Meanwhile I feel more rested now—I guess this virus periodically attacks and then allows remissions. But you’ve had a murderous time in a cave, and three traumatic teleportations with a vicious time-change, and no sleep at all during most of twenty-four hours. Do you want to nap?”
“No.”
“Then are you up to a fast game of pingpong?”
Dio sat zombielike before the transmitting visicamera while Captain Vanderkilt introduced him to the fleet captains. His photographic eyes darted among numerous tri-d images in front of hi
m and above him: Chloris, Zeno, Ilya, Giuseppe, Ladyrna, Colette, many others. He heard Vanderkilt asserting duty-crisp: “Inspector Horse for the time being is the commodore’s deputy for fleet command; you will accept his word as the commodore’s word.” Then, either forgetting or contravening the commodore’s injunction on Dio to be silent for now, the captain invited unrefusably, “Inspector, I’m sure you must have a few opening remarks for the fleet.”
It threw Dio, but not visibly; he knew he had to say something. For some reason, his eyes fixated themselves on the image of Captain Colette Perpignan—who immediately knew this, and so did the others. He licked lips and sheathed teeth and cleared throat and uttered: “I guess it has to turn out that I’m a lot older than I look or feel. When I was an army major in World War Two, I had a bright dream of a fleet precisely like this one and having the same purposes. But I didn’t follow through on the idea. Rourke Mallory did, and I’m thrilled to the soul to be impossibly associated with all of you. I’m a raw newcomer, not only to this fleet but even to this era. My last memories are from the year nineteen fifty-two, which is ancient history to all of you, and I don’t know how the hell I got here or why, and I don’t have the foggiest why the commodore gave me this assignment. But he gave it to me, and I respect him, and I have to accept it—with enthusiasm—until I goof it up. I will intend not to goof it up. I hope I can count on your help and guidance”—his teeth abruptly flashed—“even if some of you would like to murder me!”
He waited, holding the grin with difficulty, while Esther (off camera now) admired and loved and prayed for him....
Colette’s answering grin came and went so fast that strobe light would have been needed to photograph it, but Dio had caught it and so had most of the others; and as now austerely she frowned at him, the lips of Chloris and Zeno and Joe were twitching, while Ilya and Ladyma gazed at Dio with introverted eyes. Perhaps all of them deep-comprehended what Rourke knew: that none of them was really ready for fleet-command succession, that new extra-sharp blood was needed, that just maybe this Horse might prove to be the one....
