"Whispers. Nothing I could be sure of."
The question had come from the back, the answer was closer. I was
convinced that the reply came from one of the four students in the
booth not more than fifteen feet away from me.
Then I saw a hand move at the table of the last booth near the rear of
the restaurant. A man's hand stirring coffee absently. He sat with his
back toward me, concealed behind the high back of the booth. His was
the older, heavier mental voice.
"He must be found," the man's thought came.
"Could it be--a foreign intruder? Perhaps even one of us who--"
"No. Soon we will be many--when I come back. But now we are the only
ones. He must be human."
"But he speaks with the mind."
"That is not so strange. It is only strange that many do not do so, as
we do."
Listening, I felt a creeping contraction of horror as if I had touched
something cold and alien. My God, what did they mean? They believed
that I must be--human. And what were they?
"I would like to return with you--to assist in your expedition." The
bright young mind spoke.
"Your task is to find the human who speaks with his thoughts and
destroy him. If he is able to hear us he is dangerous. Once we are here
in force it will not matter. But now----"
The horror expanded in my mind, a revulsion exaggerated now by a
consciousness of danger, of menace that was suddenly close and real.
While they were hunting me, the listener, I had stumbled right into
their midst. Who they were or what I did not know, but they held power
in their minds beyond the scope of my imagination. And if they learned
that I was--
"When do you go?" the youthful one asked.
"Soon now. The launching will be in the final week of this month,
depending on suitable conditions."
"You will be able to effect the transfer?"
"There will be no difficulty in the actual change. I have already
picked out the human in the space colony. He is young and strong but
mentally very susceptible. Already he is under my control. I have only
to find the right moment alone with him. However, since this body I now
inhabit must be presumed dead when I leave it, and there will be no
visible remains, it will be necessary for me to devise an accident in
which the body would naturally be consumed or lost. Drowning may prove
most suitable."
Drowning! My recurrent nightmare came back to me in a rush. I felt the
blood drain from my face. My head felt light and faintly dizzy.
"I do not fully understand about the body," the young one thought.
"It is a superb instrument," the other replied, "but unfortunately
not as dense in its material structure as those we are accustomed to
inhabit. You will find that your energies will draw excessively on the
body's matter. You must take great care to maintain constant control
over the body shell to keep it from disintegrating too rapidly. At the
same time the vital organs must not be damaged. In time, perhaps, these
human bodies may adapt to our needs more satisfactorily. Until then
periodic changes will be needed. I have conserved my present form only
because it was vital to our plans."
"When will you make the exchange?"
"At the last possible moment--when close physical examination is no
longer likely and when it is too late for the launching to be delayed."
"You might require my services when you have to take over the ship--"
"No! It is vital that you remain behind. You must understand that I
might not return. Anything could happen in space. If I should fail
to come back, it is still possible that others of us will be brought
to earth on other ships. If the humans are more careful than before,
our brothers might never escape. It will be up to you to effect their
release."
"Yes, that is clear."
Suddenly I put my hands over my ears, pressing my palms hard against
my skull as if the barrier of bone and tissue might cut off the
bewildering voices that stole into my brain. This was not real, not
possible! This was madness. Not aliens from outer space, plotting to
take over the space ships and use them to bring back hordes of aliens.
Not beings who could possess and use human bodies. I couldn't believe
in these.
"Mr. Cameron?"
"What?" I looked up, startled and frightened, into the wondering blue
eyes of the blonde waitress.
"More coffee?"
"Oh. Yes. Yes, please."
My voice cracked. The hand that spooned sugar into the cup shook. My
body was seized by momentary spasms. Fear. Fear that demoralized body
and mind.
Then I realized that the strange voices were silent. But there was a
suspenseful quality to the silence, an indefinable tension of waiting.
Had I done something to betray myself? Had the lash of fear been
audible?
Slowly my gaze swung toward the booth in the back of the room. The
man had withdrawn further out of sight. Even his hand was no longer
visible. I forced myself to glance at the booth where the students
were still talking, low-voiced, the steady murmur split by wedges
of laughter. Laurie Hendricks' eyes met mine in a brief instant of
recognition. She was smiling and her green eyes were speculative. At
that moment, the blond youth spoke to her and she turned toward him,
red mouth opening in laughter.
I looked away. Several yards down the counter Lois was busily wiping
an imaginary spot on the gleaming surface. I lit a cigarette with a
painstaking effort at steadiness and sat staring at the curl of steam
rising from the coffee to blend with the denser cloud of cigarette
smoke.
And something probed at my brain. My reaction was instinctive, like a
turtle withdrawing under its shell with surprising speed. I froze my
mind, shutting off all thought. I was nothing. I was blankness. I was
neither thought nor emotion nor awareness. The eerie mental sensation
came again, like a child's stick prodding the turtle's shell to see
if it would move or to find a soft, vulnerable spot in the protective
casing. A thought probing at my brain, trying to force an entry, but
there was no opening.
The tentative pressure ceased. For a moment there was silence except
for the murmuring at the nearby booth and the clatter of dishes as Lois
piled them into a steel sink. Slowly I allowed awareness to return.
"All right." The older one was communicating again.
"What happened?"
"I was not certain. For a moment I thought----" The message broke off.
"I must leave."
"When shall we speak again?"
"We must avoid all contact unless absolutely necessary. There is too
much risk of detection. We should never be together again in the same
place until the listener is found."
"What shall I do when I find him?"
There was a brief pause. I found myself tense as I waited for the
reply, my hands clenching painfully.
"It must look like an accident."
Laughter erupted from the booth nearby, raucous and free, the young gay
laughter of a normal, healthy world. I had the sudden, bitter feeling
that I had left this world forever and its laughter was rude and
jarring on my nerves, a bizarre punctuation to the sentence of death I
had just heard pronounced on myself.
Then the students were pushing out of their booth, moving toward the
door, passing near me.
"Hi, Mr. Cameron!" Laurie Hendricks called.
I nodded. My throat was constricted, unable to open for speech. The
group spilled out onto the sidewalk and I felt a stab of alarm. One of
them was an alien--but what could I do? How could I find out which one?
Should I follow them or the man in the booth?
I shot a glance toward the rear booth. I caught a fleeting glimpse of
a dark gray suit as the man disappeared down the narrow corridor which
led to the restrooms.
And to a rear exit.
I stumbled to my feet, throwing a coin onto the counter. For a second I
was caught in the dilemma of divided choice. Then I strode decisively
through the restaurant toward the back hall. When I reached it it was
empty. I whirled and raced to the front door.
The four students were across the street strolling onto the campus
grounds. I trotted after them. They seemed oblivious of me. I could see
the small dark-haired girl clinging to Mike Boyle's arm. The blond boy
spoke confidentially in Laurie Hendrick's ear. I stopped on the far
side of the street, hesitating, watching them walk slowly across the
green lawn. I couldn't follow them closely without being seen. I would
have to keep at a distance.
I glanced back toward the Dugout. A man stood on the sidewalk to the
left of the restaurant in the shadow of a store front. Even though I
couldn't see his face I could feel the impact of his eyes. He had not
been there when I came out of the Dugout. My scalp prickled. I started
at the shadowy figure. For a moment neither of us moved.
What I did then was incredibly foolish, and yet it was not a
consciously deliberate act, not even a careless impulse. Rather I spoke
to myself, voicing the question that filled my mind but unconsciously
projecting it toward the unknown man who watched me across the street.
"Who are you?"
Afterwards I could not be sure what happened, but in that split second
as the thought was directed toward the dark figure I seemed to catch a
quick reaction of startled surprise. I was immediately shocked by my
own stupidity. I had betrayed myself. Now they knew who I was.
And at that moment I saw the headlights of a car speeding toward me
along the near side of the street, its lights bouncing as the car rode
over a bump. Something held me there on the sidewalk close to the curb
as the car approached swiftly. And suddenly it was very close, the eyes
of its headlights holding my gaze hypnotized, the hum of its engine
swelling in my ears.
"Now! Into the street!"
The command struck my mind with the force of a blow. I tottered
forward, tripping clumsily over the curb. I had an awareness of
struggling feebly, of trying to control rubbery limbs with a mind that
was weak and confused, of flailing my arms wildly at the air.
"In front of the car! Fall!"
And I flung myself forward into the blinding glare of the onrushing
headlights. There was a tearing screech of brakes, a scream that seemed
far away, and a massive blur of metal brushing by me as I fell.
4
I seem to be swimming up through thick layers of black asphalt. There
were voices, angry and frightened, but they would never find me down
here under the surface.
"It wasn't my fault, dammit! He jumped right in front of me."
"You were going too fast."
"I tell you he was trying to kill himself! It wasn't my fault!"
"You're lucky he wasn't killed."
I opened my eyes. A ring of faces stared down at me. Eyes and mouths
round and big and open. For a moment I gazed at them numbly without
feeling or thought. The numbness began to fade and I felt the tickling
sensation of returning fear. All of the faces showed concern or
anxiety. One was the face of a stranger. The driver of the car, I
thought. And one of the faces was a mask behind which hid a thing
incomprehensible and terrible.
"Mr. Cameron! Are you all right?"
I looked into the large green eyes of Laurie Hendricks. They were
remarkably beautiful eyes, framed by thick dark lashes, their color
deep and vivid. Now they were very wide and troubled. The smooth plane
of her forehead was faintly creased with worry and her lips were parted
over even white teeth. She was someone I had never really seen before.
I had been abstractedly aware of red hair and a pair of slim calves
crossed and a figure that strained a sweater--but I had never clearly
seen the person.
Was she the one?
"You okay, professor?"
My eyes shifted to Mike Boyle and I had a quick impression of his
massive, powerful body towering over me.
"Yes, I--I think so."
I stared at each of them--Laurie, Boyle, the blond youth, the little
brunette with small, demure features, the red-faced stranger who
appeared to be more angry than concerned. The memory of the car's
fender brushing past me as I fell returned so vividly that a reaction
hit me. I had to fight down the impulse to get away, to run, to limp,
to hobble, even to crawl, just so that I could be away from the thing
that watched me, luring behind anxious human eyes.
"What the hell did you do that for?" It was the stranger speaking, the
driver of the car.
"I--I tripped."
"Jesus Christ, you could have got killed!"
"Yes. I'm sorry."
I sat up. Hands reached down to help me and I flinched at their touch.
I moved my legs and felt along my arms and ribs. Nothing seemed to be
broken. There were no sharp pains, only a mass of aches blending into
one. I had been very lucky. The next time they would make sure that I
wouldn't escape.
Mike Boyle put a meaty hand under my arm and lifted me to my feet with
the casual ease of an adult hoisting a child in the air. Could all that
muscle hide a super brain?
I steeled myself to peer across the street at the spot where the man
had stood watching me. The sidewalk was empty.
"You been drinking, Mr. Cameron?" the blond boy asked with a grin.
I smiled stiffly. "Coffee. I can't explain what happened. I just lost
my balance and fell. It was almost as if someone had pushed me."