The _Pleiades_ landed on Margonia's Galaxian Field, where the Tellurians
found the project running smoothly, a little ahead of schedule. Delcamp
and Fao were working at their fast and efficient pace, but the hairy
pair from Thaker seemed to be, literally, everywhere at once.
"Hi, Belle." Fao 'ported up and shook hands warmly. "I thought I was
going to have the first double-Prime baby, until _she_ appeared on the
scene."
"Didn't it make you mad? I'd've been furious."
"Maybe a little at first, but not after I'd talked with her for half a
minute. She'd never even thought of that angle. Besides, she thinks the
whole galaxy is fairly crawling with double-Primes."
"That's funny--so does Clee. But there are other things--strictly not
angles--that she hasn't thought of, too. If those coveralls were half an
inch tighter they'd choke her to death. You'd think she'd...."
"Huh?" Fao interrupted. "_You_ should scream--oh, that ridiculous
Tellurian prud...."
"It _isn't_ ridiculous!" Belle snapped. "And it isn't prudishness,
either--not with me, anyway. It's just that," she ran an indicative
glance over Fao's lean, trim flanks and hard, flat abdomen, "it spoils
your figure. It's only temporary, of course, but...."
"_Spoils_ it! Why, how _utterly_ idiotic! Why, it's magnificent! Just as
soon as it starts to show on me, Belle, I'm going to start wearing only
half as many clothes as I've got on now."
"You couldn't." Belle eyed the other girl's bathing-suit-like garment.
Except for being blue instead of yellow, it was the same as the one she
had worn before. "Not without the League for Public Decency sending the
wagon out after you."
"Oh, Miss Experience? Well, three-quarters, maybe...."
"Hey, you two!" came Delcamp's hail. "How about cutting the gab and
getting some work done?"
"Coming, boss! 'Scuse it, please!" and two fast and skillful women went
efficiently to work.
* * *
With six Prime Operators on the job the work went on very rapidly, yet
without error. The _Celestial Queen_ was finished, tested, and found
perfect, one full day ahead of James' most optimistic estimate for
construction alone. The six Primes conferred.
"Do you want us to help you pick up the other Primes?" Delcamp asked.
"Your Main, big as it is, will be crowded, and we have three ships here
now instead of one."
"I don't think so ... no," Garlock decided. "We told 'em we'd do it, and
in the _Pleiades_, so we'd better. Unless, Alsyne, you don't agree?"
"I agree. The point, while of course minor, is very well taken. We and
our Operators--we brought six along; experts in their various
fields--can serve best by working on Tellus with its Galaxian Society in
getting ready for the meeting."
"Oh, of course," Fao said. "Probably Deg and I should do the same
thing?"
"That would be our thought." The two Thakerns were thinking--and
lepping--in fusion. "However," they went on carefully, "it must not be
and is not our intent to sway you in any action or decision. While not
all of you four, perhaps, are as yet fully mature, not one of you should
be subjected to any additional exterior stresses."
"I hope you don't think that way about _all_ Primes," Garlock said,
grimly. "I'm going to smack some of those kids down so hard that their
shirt-tails will roll up their backs like window shades."
"If you find such action either necessary or desirable, we will join you
quite happily in it. We go."
The four remaining Primes looked at each other in puzzled surprise.
"_What_ do you think about _that_?" Garlock asked finally, of no one in
particular.
"I don't understand them," Fao said, "but they're mighty nice people."
"Do you suppose, Clee," Belle nibbled at her lower lip, "that we're
getting off on the wrong foot with uniforms and admirals and things?
That with really adult Primes running things the Galactic Service would
run itself? No bosses or anything?"
"Umnngk." Garlock grunted as though Belle had slugged him. "I hope not.
Or do I? Anyway, not enough data yet to make speculation profitable. But
I wonder, Miss Bellamy, if it would be considered an unjustifiable
attempt to sway you in any action or decision if I were to suggest--Oh,
ever so diffidently!--that if we're going to saddle up our bronks and
ride out on roundup tomorrow morning we ought to be logging some
sack-time right now?"
"Considering the source, as well as and/or in connection with the
admittedly extreme provocation," Belle straightened up into a regal
pose, "You may say, Mister Garlock, without fear of successful
contradiction, that in this instance no umbrage will be taken, at least
for the moment." She broke the pose and giggled infectiously. "'Night,
you two lovely people!"
* * *
Belle was still sunny and gay when the _Pleiades_ reached Lizoria;
Garlock was inwardly happy and outwardly content. Semolo, however, was
his usual intransigent self. In fact, if it had not been for Mirea
Mitala, and the fact that she--metaphorically--did pin Semolo's ears
back, Garlock would not have taken him aboard at all.
Thus, after loading on only one pair of Primes, that
auspiciously-beginning day had lost some of its luster; and as the day
wore on it got no better fast. Baver of Falne had not learned anything,
either--only Garlock's intervention saved the cocky and obstreperous
Semolo from a mental blast that would have knocked him out cold.
Then there were Onthave and Lerthe of Crenna; Korl and Kirl of Gleer;
Parleof and Ginseona of Pasquerone; Atnim and Sotara of Flandoon, and
eighty others. Very few of them were as bad as Semolo; some of them,
particularly the Pasqueronians and the Gleerans, were almost as good as
Delcamp and Fao.
This was the first time that any pair of them had ever come physically
close to any other Prime. Many of them had not really believed that any
Primes abler than themselves existed. The _Pleiades_ was crowded, and
Garlock and Belle were not giving to any of them the deference and
consideration and submissive respect which each considered his unique
due.
Wherefore the undertaking was neither easy nor pleasant; and both
Tellurians were tremendously relieved when, the last pair picked up,
they flashed the starship back to Tellus and Delcamp, Fao, and the
Thakerns 'ported themselves aboard.
"Give me your attention, please," Garlock said, crisply. Then, after a
moment, "Any and all who are not tuned to me in five seconds will be
returned immediately to their home planets and will lose all contact
with this group....
"That's better. For some of you this has been a very long day. For all
of you it has been a very trying day. You were all informed previously
as to what we had in mind. However, since you are young and callow, and
were thoroughly convinced of your own omniscience and omnipotence, it is
natural enough that you derived little or no benefit from that
information. You are now facing reality, not your own fantasies.
"Each pair of you has been assigned a suite of rooms in Galaxian Hall.
Each suite is furnished appropriately; each is fully Gunthered for
self-service.
"This meeting has not been announced to the public and, at least for the
present, will not be. Therefore none of you will attempt to communicate
with anyone outside Galaxian Hall. Anyone making any such attempt will
be surprised.
"The meeting will open at eight o'clock tomorrow morning in the
auditorium. The Thakerns and the Margonians will now inform you as to
your quarters." There was a moment of flashing thought. "Dismissed."
* * *
At one second before eight o'clock the auditorium was empty. At eight
o'clock, ninety-eight human beings appeared in it; six on the stage, the
rest occupying the first few rows of seats.
"Good morning, everybody," Garlock said, pleasantly. "Everyone being
rested, fed, and having had some time in which to consider the changed
reality faced by us all, I hope and am inclined to believe that we can
attain friendship and accord. We will spend the next hour in becoming
acquainted with each other. We will walk around, not teleport. We will
meet each other physically, as well as mentally. We will learn each
other's forms of greeting and we will use them. This meeting is
adjourned until nine o'clock--or, rather, the meeting will begin then."
For several minutes no one moved. All blocks were locked at maximum.
Each Prime used only his eyes.
Physically, it was a scene of almost overpowering perfection. The men
were, without exception, handsome, strong, and magnificently male. The
women, from heroically-framed Fao Talaho up--or down?--to surprisingly
slender Mirea Mitala, all were arrestingly beautiful; breathtakingly
proportioned; spectacularly female.
Clothing varied from complete absence to almost complete coverage, with
a bewildering variety of intermediate conditions. Color was rampant.
* * *
Hair--or lack of it--was also an individual and highly variant matter.
Some of the women, like Belle and Fao, were content with one solid but
unnatural shade. One shaven head--Mirea Mitala's--was deeply tanned, but
unadorned, even though the rest of her body was almost covered by
precious stones. Another was decorated with geometrical and esoteric
designs in eye-searing colors. A third supported a structure--it could
not possibly be called a hat--of spun metal and gems.
Among the medium-and long-hairs there were two-, three-, and multi-toned
jobs galore. Some of the color-combinations were harmonious; some were
sharply contrasting, such as black and white; some looked as though
their wearers had used the most violently-clashing colors they could
find.
The prize-winner, however, was Therea of Thaker's enormous, inexplicable
mop; and it was that phenomenon that first broke the ice.
The girl with the decorated scalp had been glancing questioningly at
neighbor after neighbor, only to be met by uncompromising stares.
Finally, however, her gaze met another, as interested as her own. This
second girl, whose coiffure was a high-piled confection of black, white,
yellow, red, blue, and green, half-masted her screen and said:
"Oh, thanks, Jethay of Lodie-Yann. I'm glad everybody isn't going to
stay locked up all day. I'm Ginseona of Pasquerone. They call me 'Jin'
whenever they want to call me anything printable. And _this_," she dug a
knuckle into her companion's short ribs, whereupon he jumped, whirled
around, lowered his screen, and grinned, "is my ... the boy friend,
Parleof. Also of Pasquerone, of course. Par, both Jethay and I...."
"Call me 'Jet'--everybody does," Jethay said: almost shyly, for a Prime.
"Both Jet and I have been wondering about that woman's hair--over there.
How could you _possibly_ give a head of hair a static charge of fifty or
a hundred kilovolts and not have it leak off?"
"You couldn't, unless it was a perfectly-insulated wig ... but it looks
as though she did, at that...." and Parleof paused in thought.
"Maybe Byuk would have an idea or two," and Jet uttered aloud a dozen or
so crackling syllables that sounded as though they could have been
ladylike profanity. Whatever they were, Byuk jumped, too, and tuned in
with the other three.
"Oh, it's quite easy, really," Therea said then. "Look." Her mass of
hair cascaded gracefully down around her neck and shoulders. "Look
again." Each hair stood fiercely out all by itself, exactly as before.
"All you young people will learn much more difficult and much more
important things before this meeting is over. I cannot tell you how glad
I am that so many of you are here."
* * *
And so it went, all over the auditorium. Once cracked, the ice broke up
fast.
Fao and Delcamp worked hard; so did Belle and Garlock. Alsyne was a
potent force indeed--his abounding vitality and his tremendous smile
broke down barriers that logic could not affect. And Therea worked
near-miracles; did more than the other five combined. Her sympathy, her
empathy, her understanding and feeling, were as great as Lola's own; her
operative ability was as much greater than Lola's as Lola's was greater
than that of a bobby-soxed babysitter.
Thus, when half of the hour was gone, Garlock heaved a profound sigh of
relief. He wouldn't have half the trouble he had expected--it was not
going to be a riot. And when he called the meeting to order he was
pleasanter and friendlier than Belle had ever before seen him.
"While I am calling this meeting to order, it is only in the widest
possible sense that I am its presiding officer, for we have as yet no
organization by the delegated authority of which any man or any woman
has any right to preside. Yesterday I ruled by force; simply because I
am stronger than any one of you or any pair of you. Today, in the light
of the developments of the last hour, that rule is done; except,
perhaps, for one or two isolated and non-representative cases which may
develop today. By this time tomorrow, I hope that we will be forever
done with the law of claw and fang. For, as a much abler man has
said--'To the really mature mind, the concept of status is completely
invalid.'"
"_He's putting that as a direct quote, Alsyne, and it isn't._" Belle
lanced the thought.
"_He thinks it is_," Alsyne flashed back. "_That is the way his
mathematician's mind recorded it._"
"This meeting is informal, preliminary and exploratory. A meeting of
minds from which, we hope, a useful and workable organization can be
developed. Since you all know what we think it basically should be,
there is no need to repeat it.
"I must now say something that a few of you will construe as a threat.
You are all Prime Operators. Each pair of you is the highest development
of a planet, perhaps of a solar system. You can learn if you will. You
can cooperate if you will. Any couple here who refuses to learn, and
hence to cooperate, will be returned to its native planet and will have
no further contact with this group.
"I now turn this meeting over to our first moderators, Alsyne and Therea
of Thaker; the oldest and ablest Prime Operators of us all."
"Thank you, Garlock of Tellus. One correction, however, if you please. I
who speak am neither this man nor this woman standing here, but both. I
am the Prime Unit of Thaker. For brevity, and for the purposes of this
meeting only, I could be called simply 'Thaker.' Before calling for
general discussion I wish to call particular attention to two points,
neither of which has been sufficiently emphasized.
"First, the purpose of a Prime Operator is to serve, not to rule. Thus,
no Prime should be or will be 'boss' of anything, except possibly of his
own starship.
"Second, since we have no data we do not know what form the proposed
Galactic Service will assume. One thing, however, is sure. Whatever
power of enforcement or of punishment it may have will derive, not from
its Primes, but from the fact that it will be an arm of the Galactic
Council, which will be composed of Operators only. No Prime will be
eligible for membership."
* * *
Thaker went on to explain how each pair could obtain instruction and
assistance in many projects, including starships. How each pair would,
when they were mature enough, be coached in the use of certain abilities
they did not as yet have. He suggested procedures and techniques to be
employed in the opening up of each pair's volume of space. He then asked
for questions and comments.
Semolo was the first. "If I'm a good little boy," he sneered, "and do
exactly as I'm told, and take over the region you tell me to and not the
one I want to, what assurance have I that some other Prime, just because
he's a year older than I am, won't come along and take it away from me?"
"Your question is meaningless," Thaker replied. "Since you will not
'take over,' or 'have,' or 'own,' any region, it cannot be 'taken away
from you.'"
"Then I will...." Semolo began.
"You will keep still!" came a clear, incisive thought, just as Garlock
was getting ready to intervene. Miss Mitala then switched from thought,
which everyone there could understand, and launched a ten-second blast
of furious speech. Semolo wilted and the girl went on in thought: "He'll
be good--or else."
A girl demanded recognition and got it. "Semolo's right. What's the use
of being Primes if we can't get any good out of it? We're the strongest
people of our respective worlds. I say we're bosses and should keep on
being bosses."
Garlock got ready to shut her up, then paused; holding his fire.
"Ah, yes, friend Garlock, you are maturing fast," came Thaker's thought
and, in answer to Garlock's surprise, it went on, "This situation will,
I think, be self-adjusting; just as will be those in the as yet
unexplored regions of space."
The girl kept on. "I, at least, am going to keep on bossing my own
planet, milking it just as I...."
Her companion had been trying to crack her shield. Failing in that, he
stepped in close and tapped her--solidly, but with carefully-measured
force--behind the ear. Before she could fall, he 'ported her back up
into their quarters. "This happens all the time," he explained to the
group at large. "Carry on."
Discussion went on, with less and less acrimony, all the rest of the
day. And the next day, and the next. Then, argument having reached the
point of diminishing returns, the three starships took the forty-six
couples home.
* * *
The six Primes went into Evans' office, where the lawyer was deeply
engaged with Gerald Banks, the Galaxians' Public Relations Chief. Banks
was holding his head in both hands.
"Garlock, maybe _you_ can tell me," Banks demanded. "How much of this
stuff, if any, can I publish? And if so, _how_?"
"Nothing," Garlock said, flatly.
"What do you think, Thaker?" Belle asked. "You're smarter than we are."
"What Thaker thinks has no bearing," Garlock said.
Belle, Fao, and Delcamp all began to protest at once, but they were
silenced by Thaker himself.
"Garlock is right. My people are not your people; I know not at all how
your people think or what they will or will not believe. I go."
"That lets Deg and me out too; then, double-plus," Fao said with a grin,
"so we'll leave that baby on your laps. We go, too."
"Well, little Miss Weisenheimer," Garlock smiled quizzically at Belle,
"You grabbed the ball--what are you going to do with it?"
"Nothing, I guess...." Belle thought for a minute. "We couldn't stuff
any part of that down the throat of a simple-minded six-year-old. We
haven't really _got_ anything, anyway. Time enough, I think, when we
have six or seven hundred planets in each region, instead of only one
planet. Maybe we'll know something by then. Does that make sense?"
"It does to me," Garlock said, and the others agreed.
"That Thakern 'we go' business sounds rough at first, but it's
contagious. Fao and Deggi caught it, and I feel like I'm coming down
with it myself. How about you, Clee?"
"We go," Belle and Garlock said in unison, and vanished.
* * *
Aboard the _Pleiades_, the next few days passed quietly enough. James
set up, in the starship's memory banks, a sequence to mass-produce
instruction tapes and blueprints. Garlock and Belle began systematically
to explore the Tellurian Region. Now, however, their technique was
different. If either Prime of any world was not enthusiastic about the
project--
"Very well. Think it over," they would say. "We will get in touch with
you again in about a year," and the starship would go on to the next
planet.
On Earth, however, things became less and less tranquil with every day
that passed. For, in deciding not to publish anything, Garlock had not
considered at all the basic function and the tremendous ability, power,
and scope of _The Press_. And Galaxian Hall had never before been closed
to the public; not for any hour of any day of any year of its existence.
A non-profit organization, dependent upon the public for its tremendous
income, the Galaxian Society had always courted that public in every
possible ethical way.
Thus, in the first hour of closure, a bored reporter came out, read the
smoothly-phrased notice, and lepped it in to the desk. It might be
worth, he thought, half an inch.
Later in the day, however, the world's most sensitive news-nose began to
itch. Did, or did not, this quiet, unannounced closing smell
ever-so-slightly of cheese? Wherefore, Benjamin Bundy, the newscaster
who had covered the starship's maiden flight, went out himself to look
the thing over. He found the whole field closed. Not only closed, but
Gunther-blocked impenetrably tight. He studied the announcement, his
sixth sense--the born newsman's sense for news--probing every word.
"Regret ... research ... of such extreme delicacy ... vibration ...
temperature control ... one one-hundredth of one degree Centigrade...."
He sought out his long-time acquaintance Banks; finding him in a
temporary office half a block away from the Hall. "What's the story,
Jerry?" he asked. "The _real_ story, I mean?"
"You know, as much about it as I do, Ben. Garlock and James don't waste
time trying to detail me on that kind of business, you know."
This should have satisfied any newshawk, but Bundy's nose still itched.
He mulled things over for a minute, then probed, finding that he could
read nothing except Banks' outermost, most superficial thoughts.
"Well ... maybe ... but...." Then Bundy plunged. "All you have to do,
Jerry, is tell me screens-half-down that your damn story is true."
"And that's the one thing I can't do," Banks admitted; and Bundy could
not detect that any part of his sheepishness was feigned. "You're just
too damned smart, Ben."
"Oh--one of _those_ things? So that's it?"
"Yup. I told Evans it might not work."
That should have satisfied the reporter, but it didn't. "Now it doesn't
smell just a trifle cheesy; it stinks like rotten fish. You won't go
screens down on that one, either."
"No comment."
"Oh, joy!" Bundy exulted. "So big that Gerald Banks, the top press-agent
of all time, actually doesn't _want_ publicity! The starship works--this
lack-of-control stuff is the bunk--from here to another star in nothing
flat--Garlock's back, and he's brought--what _have_ you got in there,
Jerry?"
"The only way I can tell you is in confidence, for Evans' release. I'd
like to, Ben, believe me, but I can't."
"Confidence, hell! Do you think we won't get it?"
"In that case, no comment." The interview ended and the siege began.
* * *
Newshounds and detectives questioned and peered and probed. They dug
into morgues, tabulating and classifying. They recalled and taped and
sifted all the gossip they had heard. They got a picture of sorts, but
it was maddeningly confusing and incomplete. And, since it was certain
that inter-systemic matters were involved, they could not
extrapolate--any guess was far too apt to be wrong. Thus nothing went on
the air or appeared in print; and, although the surface remained calm,
all newsdom seethed to its depths.
Wherefore haggard Banks and harried Evans greeted Garlock with shouts of
joy when the four wanderers came back to spend the week end on Earth.
"I'll talk to 'em," Garlock decided, after the long story had been told.
"Have somebody get hold of Bundy and ask him to come out."
"Get _hold_ of him!" Banks snorted. "He's here. Twenty-four hours a day.
Eating sandwiches and cat-napping on chairs in the lobby. All you have
to do is unseal that door."
Garlock flung the door wide. Bundy rushed in, followed by a more-or-less
steady stream of some fifty other top-bracket newspeople, both men and
women.
"Well, Garlock, perhaps _you_ will give us some screens-down facts?"
Bundy asked, angrily.
"I'll give you _all_ the screens-down...."
"Clee!" "You're crazy!" "You can't!" "Don't!" Belle and all the
Operators protested at once.
* * *
Ignoring the objections, Garlock cut his shield to half and gave the
whole group a true account of everything that had happened in the
galaxy. Then, while they were all too stunned to speak, a grin of
saturnine amusement spread over his dark, five-o'clock-shadowed face.
"You pestiferous gnats insisted on grabbing the ball," he sneered. "Now
let's see you run with it."
Bundy came out of his trance. "_What_ a story!" he yelled. "We'll
plaster it...."
"Yeah," Garlock said, dryly. "_What_ a story. Exactly."
"Oh." Bundy deflated suddenly. "You'll have to prove it--demonstrate
it--of course."
"Of course? You tickle me. Not only do I not have to prove it, I won't.
I won't even confirm it."
Bundy glared at Garlock, then whirled on Banks. "If you don't give me
this in shape to use, you'll never get another line or mention
anywhere!"
"Oh, no?" For the first time in his professional life Banks gloated,
openly and avidly. "From now on, my friend, who is in the saddle? Who is
going to come to whom? Oh, _brother_!"
When the fuming newsmen had gone, Garlock said, "It'll leak, of course."
"Of course," Banks agreed. "'It is rumored ...' 'from a usually reliable
source ...' and so on. Nothing definite, but each one of them will want
to put out the first and biggest."
"That's what I figured. It'll have to break sometime and I thought
easing it out would be best ... but wait a minute...." he thought for
two solid minutes. "But we're going to need a lot of money, and we're
just about broke, aren't we?" This thought was addressed to Frank Macey,
the Galaxians' treasurer.
"Worse than broke--much worse."
"I could loan you a couple of credits, Frank," Belle said, brightly.
"But go ahead, Clee."
"People like to be sidewalk superintendents. Suppose they could watch
the construction of an outpost so far away that nobody ever dreamed of
ever getting there. Could you do anything with that, Jerry?"
"_Could I! Just!_" and Banks, went into a rhapsody.
"That's the first good idea any one of you crackpots has had for five
years," Macey said, suddenly. "But wouldn't transportation of material
and so on present problems?"
"No; just buying it," Garlock said, soberly. "Oh, rather, paying for
it."
"No trouble there...."
"What?" Belle exclaimed. "'No trouble,' it says here in fine print? How
the old skinflint has changed--instead of screaming his head off about
spending money he's actually _offering_ to. Frank, I'll loan you _three_
credits!"
"Hush, honey-chile, the men-folks are talking man-business. Look, Clee.
We'll use the _Pleiades_ at first, while we're building a regular
transport. A hundred passengers per trip, one thousand credits one
way...."
"Wow!" Belle put in. "Our ex-skinflint is now a bare-faced,
legally-protected robber."
"By no means, Belle," Evans said. "How much would that be per mile?"
"Say ten round trips per day. That would be twenty million a day gross
for a small ship not intended for passenger service. When we get ships
built ... and the extras...." The money-man went into a financial revel
of his own.
"Lots of extras," Banks agreed. "And oh, _brother_, what a
public-relations dream of heaven!"
"Maybe I'm dumb," Garlock broke in, "but just what are you going to use
for money to get started?"
"The minute we confirm any part of the story, the credit of the Galaxian
Society will jump from X-O to AA-A1."
"Oh. So Belle and I will have to lose our _Pleiades_ for a while. I
don't like that, but we do need the money ... but we can have her for
this coming week?"
"Of course."
"So maybe we'd better break the story now, instead of letting it leak."
"Can you, after what you just told them?"
"Sure I can." He set his mind and searched. "Bundy, this is Garlock...."
"So what am I supposed to do--burst into tears of joy?"
"Save it. I changed my mind. You can break it as fast and as hard as you
like. I'll play along."
* * *
"Yeah? Why the switch? What's the angle?"
"Strictly commercial. Get it from Banks."
"And you'll--personally--go on my hour with it?"
"Yes. Also, we'll demonstrate--take you to any star-system in the
galaxy. You and all the rest of the newshawks who were here and any
fifty VIP's you want to invite. Tomorrow morning all right with you?"
"You, personally, in the _Pleiades_?" Bundy insisted.
"Better than that. The other two starships, too. You've got
them--particularly those four Primes--clearly in mind?"
"Not exactly, there was so much of it. Spread it on me now, huh?"
Garlock did so. "Thanks, pal, for the scoop. I'll crash it right now,
and follow up with Banks. 'Bye!"
"Think you can deliver on that, Clee?" Banks asked.
"Sure. Both Deggi and Alsyne will need a lot of extra money, fast.
They'll play along."
They did; and that three-starship tour--which visited twenty solar
systems instead of one--was the most sensational thing old Earth had
ever spawned.
Belle and Garlock did not spend that week end on Earth. "We go," they
said, as soon as the _Pleiades_ was empty of pressmen, and they took
James and Lola along. "If we _never_ see another such brawl as this is
going to be," Belle told Banks, who was basking in glory and entreating
them to stay on for the show, "it will be exactly twenty minutes too
soon."
Thus it came about that Earth's first four deep-spacemen were completely
out of reach when unexpected developments began.
* * *
Alonzo P. Ferber was one of the VIP's on Bundy's personally-conducted
tour of the stars. As has been said, he was a very able executive. He
had an extremely keen profit-sense. This new thing smelled--simply
reeked--of money. SSE would _have_ to get in on it.
Ferber was not thin-skinned; where money was concerned it would never
even occur to him to cherish grudges or to retain animosities. Wherefore
SSE's purchasing department suggested to the Galaxian Society that
negotiations be opened concerning licenses, franchises, royalties, and
so on. These suggestions were politely but firmly brushed off. Then
emissaries were sent, of ever-increasing caliber and weight. Next,
Ferber himself tried the tri-di; and finally, he came in person.
Rebuffed, he made such legally-sound threats that Evans and Macey agreed
to a meeting; stating flatly, however, that no commitments could
possibly be made without the knowledge and approval of the Society's
president, Cleander Garlock. Thus, at the meeting, the Galaxians made
only two statements that were even approximately definite. One was that
Garlock would probably return to Earth during the afternoon or evening
of the following Friday; the other that they would take the matter up
with Garlock as soon as they could.
After that meeting Macey was unperturbed, but Evans was a deeply worried
man.
"You see," he explained, "the real crux was not even mentioned."
"No? What is it, then?"
"Operators, Primes, and the practically non-existent laws pertaining to
their ... what? Labor? Skill? Genius? For instance, could Garlock be
forced to do whatever it is that he does? On the other hand, if Ferber
offered Belle Bellamy five million credits a year to 'work' for SSE, is
there anything we could do about it?"
"Oh. I thought all there was to it was that you'd delay 'em for a year
or so and that'd be it."
"Far from it. To date I have listed fifty-eight points for which, as far
as we can learn, there are no precedents," and the lawyer called a
meeting of his staff.
For Belle and Garlock, the week went fast. On Friday afternoon, high
above Earth's Galaxian Field, Garlock said, more than half regretfully,
"No more fun. Back to the desk. Back to the salt-mines."
"I weep for you," Belle snickered. "Sob, sob. Shed him a tear, Lola."
"One tear coming up. Oh, woe; oh, woe...."
"Oh, whoa!" James snorted. "Why the sob-and-moan routine, Clee, from a
guy who's going to be monarch of all he surveys?"
"His conscience aches him," Belle explained. "This monarching business
is tough if you haven't thought about how to monarch, and he hasn't.
Have you, Clee?"
"Not a lick." Garlock smiled slightly. "I been busy."
"You better start to," she advised, darkly. "You aren't busy now and we
have an hour. We better confer--I'll make like a slave-driver."
They 'ported into his room and he set the blocks. His attitude changed
instantly. "Nice act, Belle. What was it all about?"
"That theory of yours. Your predictions are too uncannily accurate to be
guesswork, and the more times you dead-center the bullseye the worse
scared I get. I really want to know, Clee."
"Okay. It isn't complete--I need a lot more data--but I'll show you what
I have. It's fairly strong medicine and it comes in big chunks."
"It would have to--it covers the whole macrocosmic universe, doesn't
it?"
"Yes. I'll start with the striking fact that, on every out-galaxy planet
we visited, the human beings were _Homo sapiens_ to N decimal places.
Fertile with each other and, according to expert testimony, with us. All
planets had humanoid 'guardians,' the Arpalones and Arpales. Some, but
not all, had one or more non-human, more-or-less-intelligent races, such
as the Fumapties, the Lemarts, the Sencors, and so on. These other races
never seemed to fight each other, but both races of Guardians fought any
and all of them, on sight and to the death. What do those facts mean to
you?"
* * *
"Nothing beyond face value. I've thought about them but I haven't been
able to come up with anything."
"I have." He unrolled a sheet of drafting paper covered with diagrams,
symbols, and equations. "But before I go into this stuff, consider the
human body. How many red cells are there in your blood stream?"
"Billions, I suppose."
"And there are billions of human beings on billions of planets; each
having red blood cells identical, as far as we know, with yours and
mine. Also white cells. Also, sometimes, various kinds of pathogenic
micro-organisms, such as staphs, streps, viruses, spiros, and so on.
"Okay. My thought is that the Lemarts, Ozobes, and the like are
analogous to disease-producing organisms. We saw the full range of
effects--from none at all up to death itself."
"But they--the Ozobes and so on--died, too."
* * *
"How long do disease germs live in a human body after they've killed
it?"
"But that horrible Dilipic--the golop. They don't seem to fit."
"Try that on for size as cancer. Also, the Arpalones typed us before
they'd let us land on any planet. Why didn't we blast them out of the
way and land anyway?"
"Why, we didn't want to. It wasn't worth while."
"We couldn't. Psychic block. And if we had, we would have died.
Different blood-types don't mix."
"So you and I are merely two red cells in the bloodstream of a
super-dooper-galactic super-monster? Phooie!" she jeered. "That chestnut
was propounded a thousand years ago. Are you trying to take me for a
ride on _that_ old sawhorse?"
"That's the attitude I had at first. So now we're ready for the chart."
He pointed to a group of symbols. "We start with symbolic logic;
manipulating like so to get this." There was a long mathematical
dissertation; a mind-to-mind, rigorous, point-by-point proof.
"Q. E. D." Garlock concluded.
"I see your math, and if I believed half of it I'd be scared witless.
Those few pieces fit, but they're scattered around in vast areas of
blankness and you're jumping around like the Swiss miss leaping from Alp
to Alp. And how about our own galaxy, the most important piece of all?
It's different, and we're different, mentally. That wrecks your whole
theory."
"No. I told you I need a lot more data. Also, beyond a certain point the
analogy appears to get looser."
"_Appears_ to! It's as loose as a goose!"
"Think a minute. Is it actually loose, or are we getting up into
concepts that no human mind can grasp? That might be the case, you
know."
"Oh.... You're quite a salesman, Clee, but I'm still not buying."
"Our galaxy is a bit of specialized tissue--part of a ganglion, maybe.
Over here, see? I'll have to leave it dangling until we find some more
like it."
"I see. But anyway, you haven't a tenth's worth of real material on that
whole sheet. Feed everything you have there into a computer and it'd
just laugh at you."
"Sure it would. The great advantage of the human brain is its ability to
arrive at valid conclusions from incomplete data. For instance, what
would your computer do with the figures you shot at me the day we
started out? 'Thirty-nine, twenty-two, thirty-nine. Five seven. One
thirty-five.' Yet they're completely informative."
"To anyone interested in that kind of figures, yes."
"Which includes practically all adults. Then take the figure three point
one four one five nine. Compy would still be baffled; but, unlike the
first set, most people would be, too."
"Yes. Perhaps two out of ten would get your message."
"Now take something really new, like the original work on gravitation or
relativity. No possible computer would be of any use. That takes a
_brain_!"
"The brain of a Newton or an Einstein, yes." Belle thought for a minute,
then grinned at him impishly. "Now watch the brain of a Bellamy perform.
Get into high gear, brain.... I wish I knew something about biochemical
embryology; but I read somewhere that ova are sterile, so our galaxy is
an ovum. Therefore our super-galooper is a gal--which incontrovertible
fact accounts for and explains rigorously the long-known truth that
women always have been, are now, and always will be vastly superior to
men in every quality, aspect, and...."
"Hold it!" Garlock snapped. His face hardened into intense
concentration. Then: "Do you think you're kidding, Belle?"
"Why, of _course_ I'm kidding, you big...."
"Look here, then." He picked up a pencil and filled in blank after blank
after blank. "I'm making one unjustifiable assumption--that the
_Pleiades_ is the first intergalactic starship. The super-being is a
female, and she is just becoming pregnant...."
"Flapdoodle! There are no blood cells in a sperm, and I don't think
there are any in an ovum."
"I didn't mention either sperm or ovum. The analogy is so loose here
that it holds only in the broadest, most general terms. The actual
process of reproduction is unknowable. But wherever we went, we changed
things. Not only by what we actually did, but also as a
catalyst--no...."
"No, not a catalyst. A hormone."
"Exactly. Each of these changes would cause others, and so on. An
infinite series. Calling the first three terms alpha, beta, and gamma,
we operate like this...." Garlock's pencil was flying now. "Following
me?"
"On your tail." Belle was breathing hard; as the blank spaces became
fewer and fewer her face began to turn white.
"From this we get that ... and _that_ makes the whole bracket tie into
the same conclusion I had before. So, except for that one assumption,
it's solid."
* * *
"My Lord, Clee!" Belle studied the chart. "I mentioned Newton and
Einstein ... add to that 'the brain of a Garlock, better than either.'"
Then, seeing his reaction, "You're blushing. I didn't think...."
"Cut the comedy. You know I couldn't carry either of their hats to a
dog-fight."
"And I would _never_ have believed that you are basically modest."
"I said cut out the kidding, Belle."
"I'm deadly serious. A brain that could do _that_," she waved at the
chart, "... well, even I am not enough of a heel to belittle one of the
most tremendous intuitions ever achieved by man. Not that I like it.
It's horrible. It denies mankind everything that made him come up from
the slime--everything that made him man."
* * *
"Not at all. Nothing is changed, in man's own frame of reference. It
merely takes our thinking one step farther. That step, of course, isn't
easy."
"_That_ is the understatement of all time. What it will _do_, though, is
set up an inferiority complex that would wipe out the whole human race."
"There might be some slight tendency. Also, since my basic assumption
can't be justified, the whole thing may be fallacious. So I'm not going
to publish it." He glanced at the chart and it vanished.
"Clee!" Belle stared, almost goggle-eyed. "With your name? The
tremendous splash ... I see. You're really grown up."
"Not all the way, probably; but pretty nearly--I hope."
"But some of the ... not exactly corollaries, but...." Belle's face,
which had regained some of its color, began again to pale.
"Which one of the many?"
"The most shattering one, to me, concerns intelligence. If it is true
that our vaunted mentality is only that of one blood cell compared to
that of a whole brain ... and that intelligence is banked, level upon
level ... well, it's simply mind-wrecking. I've been trying madly not to
think of that concept, at all, but I can't put it off much longer."
"Now's as good a time as any. I'll hold your hand."
"You'd better hold more of me than that, I think."
"I'll do even that, in a good cause." He put his arms around her; held
her close. "Go ahead. Face it. All the way down and all the way up.
You've got what it takes. You'll come back sane and it'll never bother
you again."
She closed her eyes, put her head on his shoulder. Her every muscle went
tense.
Neither of them ever knew how long they stood there, close-clasped and
motionless in silence; but finally her muscles loosened. She lifted her
head; raised her brimming eyes.
"All the way down?" he asked.
"To almost a geometrical point."
"And all the way up?"
"I touched the fringe of infinity."
"Intelligence all the way?"
"All the way. I couldn't understand any of them, of course, but I looked
each one squarely in the eye."
"Good girl. And you're still sane."
"As much so as ever ... more so, maybe." She disengaged herself, sat
down on the bed, lighted a cigarette, and smoked half of it. Then she
stood up. "Clee, if anything in the whole universe ever knocked hell out
of anything, that did out of me. I'm going to do something that will
take about ten minutes. Will you wait right here?"
"Of course. Take all the time you want."
* * *
When she came back Garlock leaped to his feet and stared speechlessly.
He could not even whistle. Belle's hair was now its natural deep, rich
chestnut, her lipstick was red, her nails were bare, and she wore a
white shirt and an almost-knee-length crimson skirt.
"Here's what I'm going to do," she said, quietly. "I'm going to be a
plain, ordinary brownette. I'm going to marry you as soon as we land;
registered permanent family. I'm going to have six kids and spoil them
rotten. In short, I have grown up--partly up, at least--too."
"Plain?" he managed, finally. "Ordinary? You? Yes--like a super-nova
going off under a man's feet!" With a visible effort, Garlock pulled
himself together. "I don't need to tell you what a surprise this is, and
can't tell you what it means to me. But you never have said you love me.
Hadn't you better?"
"I'm afraid to. Our next kiss will be different. I'd spoil all this nice
new make-up." She tried to grin in her old-time fashion, but failed. She
sobered, then, and went on with a completely new intensity. "Listen,
Clee. I'm all done--forever--lying and pretending to you. I love you so
much that ... well, there simply aren't any thoughts. And when I think
of how I acted, it hurts--Lord, how it hurts! I don't see how you can
love me at all. It'd take a miracle."
"Miracles happen, then." He put both arms around her, very gently. "For
the first time in my life I'm cutting my screens to zero. Come in."
"What?" For a moment she was unable to believe the thought. Then,
cutting her own shield, she went fully into his mind. "Oh, I didn't dare
hope you could _possibly_ feel.... Oh, this is wonderful, Clee--simply
_wonderful_!"
As the two fully-opened minds met and joined she threw both arms around
him and their embrace tightened as though their bodies were trying to
become as nearly one as were their minds. Finally she pulled herself
away and put up a solid block.
"What a mess!" she said, shakily. "Lipstick all _over_ you."
"Why words, sweetheart? That was perfect."
"Oh, it was ... but wide open, with such a mind as yours...." she
paused, then came back to normal almost with a snap. "... but say; I'll
bet that's what Therea and Alsyne were doing. That 'fusion' thing. We'll
practise it tonight."
He pondered briefly. "Sure it was."
"But he said they learned it from us. How could he have, when we.... Oh,
we did, of course, in moments of high stress ... but we didn't actually
_know_ it...." She paused.
"We wouldn't admit it, you mean, even to ourselves."
"Maybe; and of course it never occurred to us--callow youngsters we were
then, weren't we?--that it could be done for more than a microsecond at
a time. Or that two people could ever, possibly, _live_ that way."
"Or what a life it would be. So let's chop this and get back to you and
me."
"Uh-huh, let's," she agreed, but in a severely practical tone. "You've
got lipstick even on your shirt. So change it and I'll go put on a new
face and bring over some stuff and clean you up."
While she cleaned, she talked. "I told you our next kiss would be
different, but I had no idea ... wow! _That_ will be as much different,
too, I'm sure.... Hm-h-h-nh?" Again she pressed herself against him;
this time in a somewhat different fashion.
"Stop that, you little devil, or I'll...." His arms came up of
themselves, but he forced them back down. "... No, I won't. We'll save
that for tonight, too."
"I'll behave myself!" She laughed, pure joy in voice, eyes, and smile.
"I bet myself you wouldn't and I won! You're tall, solid gold, Clee
darling--the absolute top."
"Thanks, sweetheart. I wish that were true," he said, soberly. "But I
can't help wondering if two such hellions as you and I are can make a go
of marriage--no, cancel that. We'll do it--all we have to figure out is
how."
"I know what you mean. Not at first--it'll be purely wonderful then.
After five years, say, when the glamor has worn off and I've had three
of our six children and two of them are in bed with the epizootic and
I'm all frazzled out and you're strung up tight as a bowstring with
overwork and...."
"Hold it! Uh-uh. No. If we can live together six months--or even six
weeks--without killing each other, we'll have it made. It's at first
that it'll be rugged. No matter how rugged it gets, though, we'll know
one thing for certain sure. We _couldn't_ live apart. That'll give us
enough leverage. Check?"
"And double check." She giggled sunnily. "I'll take care of any and all
situations, whatever they are, that arise in the first six months.
You'll be responsible for the next sixty years. That's a perfectly fair
and equitable division of responsibility. Now kiss me and we'll go."
* * *
When Garlock cut the Gunther blocks, however, James' thought came
instantly in. "Been trying to get you for twenty minutes," and in a
couple of seconds he brought Garlock and Belle up to date. "So Fatso's
been waiting in Evans' office. He's throwing fits all over the place and
Evans and Macey are going quietly mad."
"He'll have to wait," Garlock decided instantly. "No matter how many
fits he has, no such decision is going to be made until there's enough
of a Galactic Council to make it."
"Well, you'll have to tell him that yourself. In person."
"I'll do just that, and tell him so he'll stay told."
"Okay, but shake a...."
Belle and Garlock 'ported out into the Main, arms around each other like
a couple of college freshmen.
"... leg-g--ug--gug...." James gurgled.
"_Belle!_" Lola shrieked. "_Why--Belle--Bellamy!_"
"_What_ goes _on_ here?" James demanded.
"Nothing much," Garlock replied, although he blushed almost as deeply as
Belle did. "We just decided to quit fighting, is all. Cut the rope,
Junior, and let the old bucket drop."
THE END