Yes, parting. I was on my own. After all, with a Security disc--the
Amnesty, they called it--such as I possessed, and a collapser, I could
go anywhere, do anything, commandeer anything I might need. All with
no questions asked. Needless to say, I was feeling pretty chipper as I
entered the hangar housing _Phobos II_. At the moment, I was the most
influential human being in the known universe.
The pilot, as per my videophoned request, was waiting there for me. I
saw him as I stepped into the cool shadows of the building from the hot
yellow sunlight outside. He was tall, much taller than I, but he seemed
nervous as hell. At least he was pacing back and forth amid a litter
of half-smoked cigarette butts beside the gleaming tailfins of the
spaceship, and a fuming butt was puckered into place in his mouth.
"Anders?" I said, approaching to within five feet of him before
halting, to get the best psychological effect from my appearance.
He turned, saw me, and hurriedly spat the butt out onto the cement
floor. "Yes, sir!" he said loudly, throwing me a quivering salute. His
eyes were a bit wild as they took me in.
And well they might be. An Amnesty-bearer can suddenly decide a subject
is not answering questions to his satisfaction and simply blast the
annoying party to atoms. It makes for straight responses. Of course,
I was dressing the part, in a way. I wore the Amnesty suspended by a
thin golden chain from my neck, and for costume I wore a raven-black
blouse and matching uniform trousers and boots. I must have looked
quite sinister. I'm under six feet, but I'm angular and wiry. Thus,
in ominous black, with an Amnesty on my breast and a collapser in
my holster, I was a sight to strike even honest citizens into quick
examinations of conscience. I felt a little silly, but the outfit was
Baxter's idea.
"I understand you were aboard the _Phobos II_ when the incident
occurred?" I said sternly, which was unusual for my wonted demeanor.
"Yes, sir!" he replied swiftly, at stiff attention.
"I don't really have any details," I said, and waited for him to take
his cue. As an afterthought, to help him talk, I added, "At ease, by
the way, Anders."
"Thank you, sir," he said, not actually loosening much in his rigid
position, but his face looking happier. "See, I was supposed to pilot
the kids back here from Mars when their trip was done, and--" He gave
a helpless shrug. "I dunno, sir. I got 'em all aboard, made sure they
were secure in the takeoff racks, and then I set my coordinates for
Earth and took off. Just a run-of-the-mill takeoff, sir."
"And when did you notice they were missing?" I asked, looking at the
metallic bulk of the ship and wondering what alien force could snatch
fifteen fair-sized young boys through its impervious hull without
leaving a trace.
"Chow time, sir. That's when you expect to have the little--to have
the kids in your hair, sir. Everyone wants his rations first--You know
how kids are, sir. So I went to the galley and was about to open up
the ration packs, when I noticed how damned quiet it was aboard. And
especially funny that no one was in the galley waiting for me to start
passing the stuff out."
"So you searched," I said.
Anders nodded sorrowfully. "Not a trace of 'em, sir. Just some of their
junk left in their storage lockers."
I raised my eyebrows. "Really? I'd be interested in seeing this junk,
Anders."
"Oh, yes, sir. Right this way, sir. Watch out for these rungs, they're
slippery."
I ascended the retractable metal rungs that jutted from a point
between the tailfins to the open airlock, twenty feet over ground
level, and followed Anders inside the ship.
I trailed Anders through the ship, from the pilot's compartment--a
bewildering mass of dials, switches, signal lights and wire--through
the galley into the troop section. It was a cramped cubicle housing a
number of nylon-webbed foam rubber bunks. The bunks were empty, but I
looked them over anyhow. I carefully tugged back the canvas covering
that fitted envelope-fashion over a foam rubber pad, and ran my finger
over the surface of the pad. It came away just slightly gritty.
"Uh-huh!" I said, smiling. Anders just stared at me.
I turned to the storage lockers. "Let's see this junk they were
suddenly deprived of."
Anders, after a puzzled frown, obediently threw open the doors of
the riveted tiers of metal boxes along the rear wall; the wall next
to the firing chambers, which I had no particular desire to visit. I
glanced inside at the articles therein, and noted with interest their
similarity.
"Now, then," I resumed, "the thrust of this rocket to get from Mars to
Earth is calculated with regard to the mass on board, is that correct?"
He nodded. "Good, that clears up an important point. I'd also like to
know if this rocket has a dehumidifying system to keep the cast-off
moisture from the passengers out of the air?"
"Well, sure, sir!" said Anders. "Otherwise, we'd all be swimming in our
own sweat after a ten-hour trip across space!"
"Have you checked the storage tanks?" I asked. "Or is the cast-off
perspiration simply jetted into space?"
"No. It's saved, sir. It gets distilled and stored for washing and
drinking. Otherwise, we'd all dehydrate, with no water to replace the
water we lost."
"Check the tanks," I said.
Anders, shaking his head, moved into the pilot's section and looked at
a dial there. "Full, sir. But that's because I didn't drink very much,
and any sweating I did--which was a hell of a lot, in this case--was a
source of new water for the tanks."
"Uh-huh." I paused and considered. "I suppose the tubing for these
tanks is all over the ship? In all the hollow bulkhead space, to take
up the moisture fast?"
Anders, hopelessly lost, could only nod wearily.
"Would it hold--" I did some quick mental arithmetic--"let's say, about
twenty-four extra cubic feet?"
He stared, then frowned, and thought hard. "Yes, sir," he said,
after a minute. "Even twice that, with no trouble, but--" He caught
himself short. It didn't pay to be too curious about the aims of an
Amnesty-bearer.
"It's all right, Anders. You've been a tremendous help. Just one thing.
When you left Mars, you took off from the night side, didn't you?"
"Why, yes, I did, sir. But how did you--?"
"No matter, Anders. That'll be all."
"Yes, sir!" He saluted sharply and started off.
I started back for Interplanetary Security, and my second--and I hoped,
last--interview with Chief Baxter. I had a slight inkling why the Brain
had chosen me; because, in the affair of the missing Space Scouts, my
infallible talent for spotting the True within the Apparent had come
through nicely. I had found a very interesting clinker.
4
"Strange," I remarked to Chief Baxter when I was seated once again in
his office, opposite his newly replaced desk. "I hardly acted like
myself out at that airfield. I was brusque, highhanded, austere, almost
malevolent with the pilot. And I'm ordinarily on the shy side, as a
matter of fact."
"It's the Amnesty that does it," he said, gesturing toward the disc. It
lay on his desk, now, along with the collapser. I felt, with the new
information I'd garnered, that my work was done, and that the new data
fed into the Brain would produce some other results, not involving me.
I looked at the Amnesty, then nodded. "Kind of gets you, after awhile.
To know that you are the most influential person in creation is to
automatically act the part. A shame, in a way."
"The hell it is!" Baxter snapped. "Good grief, man, why'd you think the
Amnesty was created in the first place?"
I sat up straight and scratched the back of my head. "Now you mention
it, I really don't know. It seems a pretty dangerous thing to have
about, the way people jump when they see it."
"It is dangerous, of course, but it's vitally necessary. You're young,
Jery Delvin, and even the finest history course available these days
is slanted in favor of World Government. So you have no idea how tough
things were before the Amnesty came along. Ever hear of red tape?"
I shook my head. "No, I don't believe so. Unless it had something to do
with the former communist menace? They called themselves the Reds, I
believe...."
He waved me silent. "No connection at all, son. No, red tape was, well,
involvement. Forms to be signed, certain factors to be considered,
protocol to be dealt with, government agencies to be checked with,
classifications, bureaus, sub-bureaus, congressional committees. It
was impossible, Jery, my boy, to get anything done whatsoever without
consulting someone else. And the time lag and paperwork involved made
accurate and swift action impossible, sometimes. What we needed, of
course, was a person who could simply have all authority, in order to
save the sometimes disastrous delays. So we came up with the Amnesty."
"But the danger. If you should pick the wrong man--"
Baxter smiled. "No chance of that, Jery. We didn't leave it up to any
committee or bureau or any other faction to do the picking. Hell, that
would have put us right back where we'd been before. No, we left it up
to the Brain. We'd find ourselves in a tight situation, and the Brain
after being fed the data, would come up with either a solution, or a
name."
I stared at him. "Then, when I was here before, I was here solely to
receive the Amnesty, is that it?"
Baxter nodded. "The Brain just picks the men. Then we tell the men the
situation, hand over the Amnesty, and pray."
I had a sudden thought. "Say, what happens if two men are selected by
the Brain? Who has authority over whom?"
Baxter grimaced and shivered. "Don't even think such a thing! Even
your mentioning such a contingency gives me a small migraine. It'd be
unprecedented in the history of the Brain or the Amnesty." He grinned,
suddenly. "Besides, it can't happen. There's only one of these--" he
tapped the medallion gently "--in existence, Jery. So we couldn't have
such a situation!"
I sank back into the contour chair, and glanced at my watch. Much too
late to go back to work. I'd done a lot in one day, I reasoned. Well,
the thing was out of my hands. Baxter had the information I'd come
up with, and it had been coded and fed to the Brain. As soon as the
solution came through, I could be on my way back to the world of hard
and soft sell.
"You understand," said Baxter suddenly, "that you're to say nothing
whatever about the disappearance of the Space Scouts until this office
makes the news public? You know what would happen if this thing should
leak!"
The intercom on Baxter's desk suddenly buzzed, and a bright red light
flashed on. "Ah!" he said, thumbing a knob. "Here we go, at last!"
As he exerted pressure on the knob, a thin slit in the side of the
intercom began feeding out a long sheet of paper; the new answer from
the Brain. It reached a certain length, then was automatically sheared
off within the intercom, and the sheet fell gently to the desktop.
Baxter picked it up and swiftly scanned its surface. A look of dismay
overrode his erstwhile genial features.