[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Galaxy Science Fiction April 1951.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
Obviously, no conqueror wants his subjects to
revolt against his rule. Obviously? This one
would go to any lengths to start a rebellion!
I
The biotechnicians had been very thorough. I was already a little
undersized, which meant that my height and build were suitable--I
could pass for a big Earthling. And of course my face and hands and so
on were all right, the Earthlings being a remarkably humanoid race.
But the technicians had had to remodel my ears, blunting the tips and
grafting on lobes and cutting the muscles that move them. My crest had
to go and a scalp covered with revolting hair was now on the top of my
skull.
Finally, and most difficult, there had been the matter of skin color.
It just wasn't possible to eliminate my natural coppery pigmentation.
So they had injected a substance akin to melanin, together with a virus
which would manufacture it in my body, the result being a leathery
brown. I could pass for a member of the so-called "white" subspecies,
one who had spent most of his life in the open.
The mimicry was perfect. I hardly recognized the creature that looked
out of the mirror. My lean, square, blunt-nosed face, gray eyes,
and big hands were the same or nearly so. But my black crest had
been replaced with a shock of blond hair, my ears were small and
immobile, my skin a dull bronze, and several of Earth's languages were
hypnotically implanted in my brain--together with a set of habits and
reflexes making up a pseudo-personality which should be immune to any
tests that the rebels could think of.
I _was_ Earthling! And the disguise was self-perpetuating: the hair
grew and the skin color was kept permanent by the artificial "disease."
The biotechnicians had told me that if I kept the disguise long enough,
till I began to age--say, in a century or so--the hair would actually
thin and turn white as it did with the natives.
It was reassuring to think that once my job was over, I could be
restored to normal. It would need another series of operations and as
much time as the original transformation, but it would be as complete
and scarless. I'd be human again.
I put on the clothes they had furnished me, typical Earthly
garments--rough trousers and shirt of bleached plant fibers, jacket and
heavy shoes of animal skin, a battered old hat of matted fur known as
felt. There were objects in my pockets, the usual money and papers, a
claspknife, the pipe and tobacco I had trained myself to smoke and even
to like. It all fitted into my character of a wandering, outdoors sort
of man, an educated atavist.
I went out of the hospital with the long swinging stride of one
accustomed to walking great distances.
* * * * *
The Center was busy around me. Behind me, the hospital and laboratories
occupied a fairly small building, some eighty stories of stone and
steel and plastic. On either side loomed the great warehouses, military
barracks, officers' apartments, civilian concessions, filled with the
vigorous life of the starways. Behind the monstrous wall, a mile to my
right, was the spaceport, and I knew that a troopship had just lately
dropped gravs from Valgolia herself.
The Center swarmed with young recruits off duty, gaping at the sights,
swaggering in their new uniforms. Their skins shone like polished
copper in the blistering sunlight, and their crests were beginning to
wilt a little. All Earth is not the tropical jungle most Valgolians
think it is--northern Europe is very pleasant, and Greenland is even a
little on the cold side--but it gets hot enough at North America Center
in midsummer to fry a shilast.
A cosmopolitan throng filled the walkways. Soldiers predominated--huge,
shy Dacors, little slant-eyed Yangtusans, brawling Gorrads, all the
manhood of Valgolia. Then there were other races, blue-skinned Vegans,
furry Proximans, completely non-humanoid Sirians and Antarians.
They were here as traders, observers, tourists, whatever else of a
non-military nature one can imagine.
I made an absent-minded way through the crowds. A sudden crack on the
side of my head, nearly bowling me over, brought me to awareness. I
looked up into the arrogant face of one of the new recruits and heard
him rasp, "Watch where you're going, Terrie!"
The young blood in the Valgolian military is deliberately trained
to harshness, even brutality, for our militarism must impress such
backward colonies as Earth. It goes against our grain, but it is
necessary. At another time this might have annoyed me. I could have
pulled rank on him. Not only was I an officer, but such treatment must
be used with intellectual deliberation. The occasional young garrison
trooper who comes here with the idea that the natives are an inferior
breed to be kicked around misses the whole point of Empire. If, indeed,
Earth's millions were an inferior breed, I wouldn't have been here at
all. Valgol needs an economic empire, but if all we had in mind was
serfdom we'd be perfectly content with the plodding animal life of
Deneb VII or a hundred other worlds.
I cringed appropriately, as if I didn't understand Valgolian Universal,
and slunk past him. But it griped me to be taken for a Terrie. If I was
to become an Earthling, I would at least be a self-respecting one.
* * * * *
There were plenty of Terries--Terrestrials--around, of course, moving
with their odd combination of slavish deference toward Valgolians and
arrogant superiority toward mere Earthlings. They have adopted the
habits and customs of civilization, entered the Imperial service, speak
Valgolian even with their families. Many of them shave their heads save
for a scalp lock, in imitation of the crest, and wear white robes
suggesting those of civil functionaries at home.
I've always felt a little sorry for the class. They work, and study,
and toady to us, and try so hard to be like us. It's frustrating,
because that's exactly what we don't want. Valgolians are Valgolians
and Earthlings are men of Earth. Well, Terries are important to the
ultimate aims of the Empire, but not in the way they think they are.
They serve as another symbol of Valgolian conquest for Earth to hate.
I entered the Administration Building. They expected me there and took
me at once to the office of General Vorka, who's a general only as
far as this solar system is concerned. Had there been any Earthlings
around, I would have saluted to conform to the show of militarism, but
General Vorka sat alone behind his desk, and I merely said, "Hello,
Coordinator."
The sleeves of his tunic rolled up, the heat of North America beading
his forehead with sweat, the big man looked up at me. "Ah, yes. I'm
glad you're finally prepared. The sooner we get this thing started--"
He extended a silver galla-dust box. "Sniff? Have a seat, Conru."
I inhaled gratefully and relaxed. The Coordinator picked up a sheaf of
papers on his desk and leafed through them. "Umm-mm, only fifty-two
years old and a captain already. Remarkably able, a young man
like you. And your work hitherto has been outstanding. That Vegan
business...."
I said yes, I knew, but could he please get down to business. You
couldn't blame me for being a bit anxious to begin. Disguised as I was
as an Earthman, I felt uncomfortable, embarrassed, almost, at being
with my ex-countrymen.
The Coordinator shrugged. "Well, if you can carry this business
off--fine. If you fail, you may die quite unpleasantly. That's their
trouble, Conru: you wouldn't be regarded as an individual, but as a
Valgolian. Did you know that they even make such distinctions among
themselves? I mean races and sub-races and social castes and the like;
it's keeping them divided and impotent, Conru. It's also keeping them
out of the Empire. A shame."
* * * * *
I knew all that, of course, but I merely nodded. Coordinator Vorka was
a wonderful man in his field, and if he tended to be on the garrulous
side, what could I do? I said, "I know that, sir. I also know I was
picked for a dangerous job because you thought I could fill the role.
But I still don't know exactly what the job is."
Coordinator Vorka smiled. "I'm afraid I can't tell you much more
than you must already have guessed," he said. "The anarch movement
here--the rebels, that is--is getting no place, primarily because of
internal difficulties. When members of the same group spit epithets
at each other referring to what they consider racial or national
distinctions which determine superiority or inferiority, the group is
bound to be an insecure one. Such insecurity just does not make for a
strong rebellion, Conru. They try, and we goad them--but dissention
splits them constantly and their revolutions fizzle out.
"They just can't unite against us, can't unite at all. Conru, you know
how we've tried to educate them. It's worked, too, to some extent.
But you can't educate three billion people who have a whole cultural
pattern behind them."