Doug stood motionless as his dress sword was whipped from its scabbard,
snapped across the bent knee of one of the Director's guards, and cast
at his feet. A second denuded him of the wide belt and narrow scabbard
which had held it.
"Sir, unless you are able to cite well-founded charges for this
outrageous action, I can assure you it will be reported to the Prelate
General at once!" Doug bit the words out knowing that as a defensive
threat they were hopelessly impotent, but he had to know what they had
done to Dot. He had to know that even if they were to kill him within
the next second. He sensed Tayne's presence behind him, could all but
feel his sword-point at his back. The cadets, a moment before formed as
a guard of honor, were suddenly in a bristling ring about him as though
from some melodrama from the pages of Roman history. Their faces were
impassive, their feet wide-spread, their swords hip-high, and pointed
unwaveringly at him.
And the sneer in the Director's voice was only carelessly concealed.
"This is hardly the time for jests, Quadrate. I hardly think I need
quote the Commandment sub-section setting forth the law concerning
the status of husband and wife when either is found guilty of heresy.
Your rank permits you to deny your wife's collusion if you wish,
but--unfortunately, Madame Blair has been unquestionably linked with
one of the pitiful but vicious little underground groups of men and
women whose constant and sole aim is not only to abolish the war games,
but to accomplish the eventual destruction of our sacred government.
She--as well as yourself, I might add--has been under painstaking
scrutiny for almost a year. I am informed that a carefully guarded
but all too unwise series of tele-calls to your home has at last
established the necessary link. Ever hear of the Saint Napoleon Culture
Society, Quadrate? No? No, of course you haven't! Quadrate Tayne!"
"Yes, your Very Grand Excellence!"
"I'm putting this man in your custody for the trip to Earth. Your
orders are to deliver him in person to the S-Council--you'll take-off
immediately. The games will be under my personal supervision until you
return. Any questions?"
"I am to deliver this man in person to the S-Council. No questions,
sir."
"Carry on, then." He returned Tayne's salute with a perfunctory dip of
his sword-point, then sheathed the weapon and followed Doug into the
waiting vehicle.
* * * * *
Take-off black-out was but momentary and wore off quickly. Escaping
Venus' lesser gravity was noticeably easier, and the fog-shrouded
planet still filled the viewscreen when Doug got to his feet. He
was half surprised to discover that there were no steel cuffs at his
wrists, and that he had not been bound other than by the safety belts
to the acceleration hammock. But it was logical enough. A robot-guided
ship in Space was quite efficiently escape-proof. It had been an
effective trap before, and now it was an equally effective prison. And
Tayne, who had already opened trajectory compensation communications
with Venus headquarters, was the one who had the sword.
Tayne's back was to him. A sudden leap--
No. With Tayne unconscious or dead, it would make little difference.
His presence aboard the ship was apparently only for the satisfaction
of protocol. Placed aboard it alone, Doug reasoned, he would have been
as well secured a prisoner as had he been accompanied by a guard of one
hundred men. It was not Tayne, but the autorobot guiding the ship that
was his jailer. Yet, Tayne had not removed his sword....
Doug watched the white mass of Venus as it receded with torturing
slowness in the screen, let it half-hypnotize him. There was something
stirring uneasily somewhere far back in his brain--something,
something--but it did not matter. Nothing at all mattered now. The
race--the great, hopeless race he had planned for freedom had never
even begun!
They had denied him even that satisfaction. Yes, he could attack Tayne,
and Tayne would kill him. But that would not be a fight. It would be
simply the choice of suicide, at the hands of the man who would derive
the most satisfaction from being its prime instrument. The man who
already signed the death warrants for Mike and Terry....
And Dot. Dot, after some awful agony would see him again perhaps, but
she would see with uncomprehending eyes, hear with unrecognizing ears.
If she lived through what they did to her, she would no longer be Dot
at all.
Dully, he could hear Tayne's words in a background that was a thousand
miles away. "_Reconciled and steady as she blasts. This is QT to
Control, C-Limit check--trajectory secure. Out._"
And again, there was something far back in Doug's brain, struggling
harder....
Then even as Tayne turned toward him from the dial consoles, it
burst into the forefront of his mind like a flare in the darkness.
_Twelve hundred Kemps at three hundred milliamperes, sir....
Genemotor, type A-26-F modified.... Sergeant! The neuro-tablets at
once.... Commandments Four, Part 3, Sub-section 12 as amended ... all
space craft shall be robot-controlled and shall fly predetermined
trajectories, save (1) when bearing members of the Science Council
and/or their certified representatives, to whom manual operation
and navigation at will is singularly permissible, or (2) when
insurmountable emergency shall occur...._
And suddenly, Doug's brain vaulted from the lethargy of hopelessness
and it was again at his command, a sharp, poised weapon of battle. _For
Tayne knew! Yet he would die before he would tell--unless, somehow...._
"Such confidence, Quadrate Tayne! Admirable! But you would look so
much more fit for your role with your sword in your hand, not in your
scabbard!"
Tayne reddened. "If it were not for my orders, Blair--"
"Why, such a lack of conditioning, Quadrate! Don't you know killing me
is supposed to be so repulsive to you that you couldn't even stomach
the thought of it? Tell me, don't I make you sick, Quadrate?"
* * * * *
Tayne's hand went to the hilt of his weapon. He half-drew it, slammed
it back in its scabbard.
"Blair, we have twenty hours aboard this ship together. We can be at
each other's throats like children. Or not, as you please."
Doug sat down on the edge of the acceleration hammock. Perhaps it would
not be so difficult. Carefully, he entered the role further. He must
have just the right kind of smile.
"Ah, but think of all the trouble I can get you in if I make you lose
your temper and kill me! And you have got to admit, where I'm going, it
doesn't make much difference--to me, I mean."
Tayne turned back to the instrument panel as though to signify that he
had suddenly become a deaf man. And Doug kept talking, as though to
signify a complete lack of interest in whether Tayne was a deaf man or
not.
"As the matter stands, they took my sword away. So you'd never get
anywhere with a self-defense alibi. Lord, how they'd make you sweat!
By Saint Napoleon's mother I like the thought of that! And, after all,
since this is going to be my last flight, I really think I'm entitled
to a little amusement."
Silence.
"You know, Quadrate," Doug kept on relentlessly, "I don't imagine you
expected even me to act like this, did you? No, of course not. Not
very much the officer and gentleman. But that makes us more or less
even. You don't know what a gentleman is. You're so stupid you don't
even know who the next President of the United States is going to
be!--Oh, sorry. I keep forgetting--I don't think I ever told you that
I'm not the real Senior Quadrate Blair, and that I'm not from your
universe at all, did I, Tayne? Ever hear of the World Series? Oh, there
I--"
Tayne turned his head.
"Easy does it! I imagine you must think I've gone mad. Don't blame
you. I don't act at all like the Blair you know. Of course if I am
mad, you'd better be careful. And if I am from another universe, you'd
better be even more careful. As a matter of fact, at the moment,
Quadrate, your life may not be worth very much."
Doug rubbed his fingernails on his tunic, inspected their new sheen.
Then he looked up at Tayne.
Tayne stood, face mottled, an uneasy little thread of uncertainty deep
under the surface of his eyes.
"Very well, just to make it easy for you, Mr. Tayne, we shall say I am
mad, because that's easy to believe, and I can see you're quite sure of
it already. Yet just the same I can outwit you, Quadrate. That is, I
think that in the twenty hours of our flight together I can reduce you
to a gibbering idiot, far worse off than myself! Why, I may even have
you mumbling that you're Saint Napoleon himself! Now wouldn't that be a
picture!" Blair slapped his right hand to his tunic-front.
And Tayne drew his sword.
"If you killed me, Quadrate, you would have no proof of my madness for
the others--and I'm sure that our standing enmity would be reasoned as
the far more credible motive. Reasonable people, yours. Very. So much
so that they're all above making a rather ridiculous harangue like
this. Face the S-Council rather stoically, I should imagine. Quietly,
as befits their dignity. _Right?_"
Tayne almost jumped clear of the deck.
"By jingo, you're nervous, man! Sweating, too. And twenty more hours.
Let's see--what'll we talk about?"
Tayne was tense, immobile, undisguisedly confused.
"I bet you're thinking that if you could get me in a state of--shall
we say, unconsciousness, your troubles would be over. But you'd have
to get close to me to do that. And we both know that sword of yours
is no threat. Besides, I'm a madman. Either mad, or from another
universe--ha!--and then I might be able to kill you with a glance! Of
course, you can suppose this is all just an act, but even if I told you
it was you wouldn't be exactly sure, would you? Would you, now?"
* * * * *
Tayne sheathed the sword. And slowly, as though he had reached some
desperate decision, he turned to the control panels. But not to the
ones at which he'd stood before. He touched one of a row of white studs
above which were the words S-C ONLY. And a rectangle of metal hardly
more than a foot in length and half as much in width slid back beneath
his fingertips, exposing a compact console of control keys.
_Or (2) when an insurmountable emergency should occur...._
Tayne was pressing buttons, and Doug knew that the trajectory had been
broken, and that the ship was free of its autorobot and under Tayne's
sole command.
The manual control console. Tayne had had enough! Were he an Earthman
as Doug was an Earthman--but he was not! He was a creature of pattern,
and there was only the pattern to follow. And an 'insurmountable
emergency' had indeed arisen. Flight with a madman who spoke of other
universes, and who, by definition of orders, dare not be killed.
Doug, still seated, braced his feet on the hammock's bottom edge, and
checked his spring even with his muscles tensed.
For Tayne turned suddenly. And the fear, the confusion were gone!
"Thank you, Quadrate Blair!" he said. "Madman, I am convinced--yet
brilliant to the last! I admit, I may not have thought of our personal
enmity as a motive for my actions--as a motive, I mean, that would
justify them!"
Something turned to ice in Doug's stomach. It was going wrong, somehow.
Tayne drew the sword slowly. "I shall kill you now. You see, you hated
me so much that I am afraid your hatred broke its bounds. And you not
only attacked me but--but I'm afraid you also attempted to take over
manual control of the ship in your madness. And for that of course--"
The sword was descending even as Doug launched his body from the
hammock.
They went down then, and the sword clattered from Tayne's grasp. The
blade-edge was speckled with red, and there was a searing pain across
Doug's back. But his hands were on Tayne's throat, and they were
closing.
And then they opened. The whistle of air into Tayne's lungs as he
fought for breath and for consciousness told Doug he had only seconds
before there was full life in the Quadrate's body again.
But the seconds were enough, for within them, he had the sword's hilt
firmly in his own hand. And then he had its tip at the Quadrate's
swollen, pulsing throat.
"You damn near threw me off schedule, Grand Imperial Wizard. Come on
get up."
Doug felt little rivulets of blood trickle down his spine. The wound
still stung, but it was not deep.
Slowly, Tayne rose, the sword-point beneath his chin.
"Don't make me nervous," Doug said. "Sudden moves get me all jittery,
and sometimes when I'm jittery I kill stuffed shirts just to ease the
tension. Back up. Now around--slow, Noble Grand Knight, or you'll
fall down without your head." The sword-point traced a thin line
of red half-way around Tayne's neck as the man turned. "Now we're
going to have some fun--only wish you were a tax-writer and I'd get
a bigger kick out of this. Venus, James. And at the first peculiar
maneuver--such as maybe cutting out the pseudograv or dumping us on the
carpet without enough back-blast and your nice uniform will get all
gooked up. Blood, you know." He dug the point deeper into Tayne's flesh
until some of it was red, the rest white with pain.
And again, there was nothing to do but play the gamble out. How brave,
Doug wondered, was a creature of pattern?
* * * * *
Venus filled the viewscreen, the white sea of the planet's sky
stretching unruffled beneath them.
"Northern land mass, Tayne. Your Quadrant. Thirtieth Division, Second
Regiment, First Battalion, Company 'A'."
Tayne still said nothing. Doug kept the steady pressure on the sword
point.
The round, black buttons were arranged like an inverted T. Beneath
them were three square, flush-set dials. One was easily recognizable
as an artificial horizon-ecliptic indicator. The second, Doug thought,
indicated both plus and minus acceleration. And the third, simple
velocity and altitude.
Tayne's fingers had not punched the buttons, but had played them almost
as though they were the keys of a musical instrument. The horizontal
row was for change of direction to either left or right. The vertical,
change in axial thrust, for either upward accelerations or forward,
depending upon flight attitude. A slow turn executed by pressing
the buttons of desired intensity of power in both horizontal and
vertical columns simultaneously, with turn sharpness simply a matter of
coordinated button selection.
The top button was for full thrust--full speed in level flight,
blast-off from take-off position, or full deceleration in landing
attitude. Those below it were for power in progressively lesser
amounts. A twist of a fingertip would lock any of the buttons at any
degree of power output desired. With practiced co-ordination, simple
enough. Yet--what about climb or dip from the horizontal? Or inversion
for landing? That was something for which he must wait.
The cut across his back throbbed now, and he dared not brush his hands
across his eyes to smear the sweat from them.
And suddenly, Tayne's voice grated, "You had better drop the sword,
Blair." There was the tightness of pain in his words, but they were
clear. "I refuse to invert the ship. If we are to land, it must be
inverted in sixty seconds. If you kill me, you kill yourself, for you
do not know how to operate the panel beyond what you have seen--and you
have not seen the operation for inversion. If you give me the sword,
you will land alive."
"You're out of your head, Mr. Tayne! I'm Senior Quadrate Blair,
remember? I know how to operate the panel as well or better than you
do. Get going!" He dug the tip deeper, and fresh blood started.
But, Tayne's fingers remained immobile.
"Mad or sane, Senior Quadrate Blair or--or something else, if you knew
how to use the panel, you would not have taken the risk of forcing me
to do it! I would already be dead--"
There was a sudden, empty space in Doug's stomach.
"Thirty seconds, Blair."
The white mass of the sky was scant miles below them. He would need all
of the thirty seconds, and there was no time to think--only time to
realize that if he were to live, he must kill Tayne. It was like that
time so long ago on the beaches of Normandy....
With all his strength he plunged the sword through Tayne's neck. And
his own hands were at the control panel before Tayne's gurgling corpse
had slumped to the deck. The life-blood seeped from it far more slowly
than the seconds slipped beneath Doug's taut fingers.
Not the buttons, not the dials, for he had seen them. But part of the
panel itself--it had to be!
The panel _itself_!
He pressed one side, the other. Nothing. Ten seconds perhaps....
The bottom or the top next. But which? If it moved on a lateral
axis--that would be it, for elevation or depression from the
horizontal! But to accomplish what would amount to a half-loop....
He pressed the top of the panel. And it gave beneath his touch. In the
viewscreen, the white mass which rushed to envelop him seemed to shift--
Further down--that was it, all the way around!
Slowly, against an unseen source of pressure, he revolved the panel
a half-revolution about its lateral axis. Already he could see its
reverse side--on it in the same pattern there was an identical set of
control buttons, dials.
In the viewscreen there was a half-second's glimpse of the blackness of
Space before the inverted ship tumbled tail-first into the white ocean
of the Venus sky.
And again there was the awful sensation of falling through infinity.
Desperately, he pushed the top button.