by ALFRED COPPEL
Aram Jerrold watched helplessly as Santane's
beast-rockets screamed into the Void bearing
madness to the Thirty Suns, and knew that
this was cosmic Armageddon ... the crimson
horror of Space-war would smash Galactic
Civilization utterly and forever! Yet in his
tortured mind a voice from the past commanded:
"_You must save something from the ruins!_"
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Planet Stories November 1950.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
The verdict, thought Aram Jerrold wearily, would be death. The
Supreme Council itself would demand it. He had rebelled against the
Tetrarchy--rebelled senselessly, desperately, without hope of success
or escape--and the reckoning had come. The Government of the Thirty
Suns would demand his life ... more, if the science of the Security
Police were up to it. Aram repressed a shudder. He knew that science
well. No one rose to a position of command in the Thirty Suns Navy or
to membership in the Executive Committee of the Tetrarchy without
respect for the methods of the dread Greens.
The courtroom was dark, a pattern of sombre hues calculated to
impress a prisoner with the futility of hope. It had been weeks since
Jerrold had seen the sun. Weeks of endless interrogation and repeated
narcosynthesis. He had been shunted from Bureau to Bureau, from
Department to Department, each set of cogs in the vast governmental
machinery of the Terminus probing him for evidence of sabotage or
rebellion within its own structure. He had been badgered, beaten,
drugged and threatened. Now, at last, the end of the ordeal seemed
near. There remained only the sentence of death to be passed--the
method and place decided upon--and it would be done with. The ponderous
bureaucracy of the Tetrarchy had wrung him dry, and now it prepared
to cast him aside, satisfied that his rebellion was a purely personal
aberration and not part of a widespread plot against the stability of
galactic tyranny.
The drugs had clouded his vision, giving a nightmare mistiness to the
shadowy courtroom. Jerrold could see that the room was empty but for
the guards and clerks and the black-masked tribunes. It would not do,
of course, to let the people know that one of the chosen masters--a
member of the Executive Committee--had suddenly become an insubordinate
rebel and traitor.
Behind him a door opened, splitting the gloom with a fleeting wedge of
light. The wedge vanished and Aram Jerrold heard again the light, crisp
footsteps. He knew without looking that it was Deve Jennet. She had
been in the courtroom every day, giving testimony, slamming doors in
his face. Doors that might possibly have led to freedom. Every day she
had driven another rivet into the chains of evidence that bound him,
methodically, deliberately.
She passed by him without turning her head and took a seat near the
tribune's dais. Jerrold stared at her through the mist that swam
sickeningly before his eyes. Dimly, the memory of her as she had been
before this nightmare came to him. He remembered her, soft and yielding
in his arms through the long nights of Terminus. Nights filled with
tenderness and longing talk of freedom for the two of them somewhere
beyond the stars.
This was the same woman, but changed. The lustrous dark eyes were the
same, and the full lips. The same pale hair and slim body. But it sat
encased in a severely cut uniform, all femininity gone from it. The
uniform was green. The hated color of the Security Police....
Jerrold had heard again all the words that he had spoken to her through
those nights. Only this time the words had been retold to three masked
judges and their clerk. This time, the words had had a ring of doom.
At first Aram had suffered the tortures of the damned wondering why
Deve had betrayed him. He had known well enough her high connections in
the Supreme Council and he had known that she served as a member of the
Greens. But he had imagined that she loved him, and he had been stupid
enough to trust her. Now, after weeks of ordeal, it seemed to matter no
longer. Jerrold wanted only to rest.
* * * * *
On the dais, one of the black-masked figures was speaking. Aram leaned
forward painfully to catch what was being said.
"This court wishes to go on record as favoring a severe reprimand for
the Bureau of Psychometrics personnel involved in the testing of Aram
Jerrold. His inherent instability should have been uncovered long
before he was appointed to the Executive Committee. Only the chance use
of a mental probe on him--at the request of the Security Police--" he
nodded toward Deve Jennet, "--prevented serious inconvenience to the
Government of the Thirty Suns. Such negligence cannot be tolerated in
so vital a Bureau."
He paused while the clerk recorded his remarks, then continued: "Aram
Jerrold, you have been convicted of treason against the Government of
the Thirty Suns. You have been proved guilty of attempting to use your
position as an officer of the Thirty Suns Navy to steal a spacecraft
and escape from the dominance of your government. You have disgraced
your uniform and your high office as a member of the Executive
Committee of the Supreme Council of the Government of the Thirty
Suns--" The hooded man rolled the sonorous phrases off his tongue with
obvious relish. "Have you anything to say before the sentence of the
court is passed?"
Jerrold looked at Deve Jennet. She sat motionless, her body tense
in the green Police uniform. It was hard for Jerrold to speak. The
druggings and violent interrogations had left him weak. Yet a spark of
rebellion remained. Enough to lash out against his tormentors for one
last time.
"I ... I want only to say," he began thickly, "that ... what I have
done ... I would do again, gladly. I was sick of oppression ... tired
of not ... daring even to think a thought of my own. Sick of pompous
bureaucratic tyranny...." Jerrold drew a shuddering breath. "The
Tetrarchy rules thirty star-systems ... but thirty star systems are not
the Universe. Somewhere, I thought ... there must be freedom. My
crime ... was _failure_ ... nothing more!"
"Enough!" The tribune's voice shook with sudden anger. "This court is
not convened to listen to treasonous tirades! The clerk will strike the
prisoner's remarks from the record!"
Darkness flickered momentarily at the edges of Jerrold's field of
vision. He felt spent by his effort at defiance. He forced himself to
stand erect.
"The sentencing will proceed!"
"The prisoner will face the Standard!" intoned the clerk.
* * * * *
Aram raised his eyes to the hated symbol on the wall behind the judges'
dais. Long habit made him square his shoulders under the tattered
remains of his blue uniform. He stared up at the Standard of the
Tetrarchy's Spaceship and Sun, despising everything it stood for.
"_Aram Jerrold, traitor and rebel: you are sentenced by this court to
death by slow disintegration!_ For the safety of the Tetrarchy!"
The words fell like stones from the lips of the masked tribune into the
fragile silence of the vaulted chamber.
In spite of himself, Jerrold flinched. Sometimes men survived weeks of
torment under the cancerous rays of the disintegrators....
One of the judges spoke in low tones to his colleagues.
"We have received a request from Kaidor V, gentlemen. Provincial
Governor Santane asks that this sentence be commuted to life
imprisonment on Kaidor V so that the prisoner may be used in some
experimental work now in progress there."
Aram could feel his stomach muscles tightening and the weakness seeping
into his knees. The disintegrators would be preferable to becoming an
experimental animal on Kaidor V. The Kaidor province was the farthest
of the Thirty Suns, and the arsenal of the Tetrarchy. The ghastliest
of the Tetrarchy's weapons came from Kaidor, and they had to be tested
there ... on living men.
"It seems," muttered one of the tribunes pettishly, "that every time
a naval officer is convicted of anything a request comes through from
Kaidor that he be turned over to Santane. One would imagine Governor
Santane is building a navy!" He shuffled the papers before him while
the others waited. "Still," he continued thoughtfully, "it would
be politically unwise to execute this prisoner here on Terminus.
The spacemen of his command are based here and there is no point
in stirring up trouble in the Fleet... I am inclined to recommend
acceptance of this offer to take him off our hands."
"_Objection, sirs!_" Jerrold looked about to see that Deve Jennet was
on her feet, addressing the members of the tribunal.
"As you know, sirs," she was saying crisply, "I have the good fortune
to be one of the lesser members of the Executive Committee in my office
as liaison officer from Security. I feel it only fair to warn you that
the Supreme Council would be extremely displeased if this prisoner
should escape with his life. It is felt that an example must be made of
him. If it is unwise to carry out the sentence here on Terminus, I will
be happy to arrange a transfer to Atmion IV. On the Green planet there
will be no possibility of trouble by Fleet members. I must insist that
you accede to the wishes of the Council. Aram Jerrold must die in the
disintegrators. No other course of action will be acceptable to the
Supreme Council!"
The three judges conferred among themselves and then the senior spoke
again. The tone of his voice indicated all too well the awe in which
the Supreme Council and all its appendages was held by members of the
Judicial Department of the Thirty Suns Government.
"This court was not aware that the Supreme Council had any special
desires concerning the disposition of this case. Had it been known to
us earlier, we would not have considered even for a moment the request
of Provincial Governor Santane."
"The Supreme Council, gentlemen," returned Deve Jennet stiffly, "_has_
an interest in this case, as I have indicated to you. It has been
communicated to you in the proper time and form. I await your action on
it."
"Of course, Leader Jennet, of course. It was not our intention to
question the policies of the Council!" The judge signalled the guards.
"Aram Jerrold is hereby remanded to the custody of the Security Police,
to be transported by first available spaceship to Atmion IV, there to
be put to death in the manner prescribed by Directive 25-A-38 governing
Execution of Convicted Persons Above the Rank of Commander. Remove the
prisoner!"
Aram passed near Deve Jennet as she replied: "It will be so reported,
gentlemen." And then looking somberly at Jerrold she added, "I myself
will go to Atmion IV to see to it that this prisoner is accorded the
treatment he deserves."
Aram stumbled out of the courtroom under guard. Deve's final words rang
strangely in his ears, a perplexing threnody of the dreams they had
shared in the hazy past. He had the odd feeling that in spite of the
things that had passed, the end was not yet....
* * * * *
Of the flight out to Atmion, Jerrold remembered almost nothing. The
iron determination that had kept him on his feet during the last days
of his trial failed him at last and the reaction of the druggings he
had suffered hit him ... hard. He writhed in the agonies of addiction
for the duration of the trip out from Terminus. He knew vaguely that he
lay in the prison ship's infirmary, strapped to a bunk. The discomforts
of acceleration and the shift into second-stage flight above light
speed added themselves to his tortures and filled his nightmares with
nauseating spectres. For two weeks Jerrold went through sheer hell as
his drug-saturated system screamed for more narcotics. None were given.
By the time the huge prison ship touched down on the dread world of the
Greens, Aram Jerrold was on his way back. Spent, weak and emaciated,
he heard the landing alarms and knew that he would live to face the
disintegrators.
* * * * *
Atmion IV, the only habitable planet of a star-system bizarre and
hateful! Three suns in the smoky sky, air that tasted of brimstone and
ashes. Heavy, deadening gravity. A world of hot rain that fell daily
out of the hazy cloud canopy, a desert at periaston and quagmire at
apastron. Barren ground and a turbulent, sulphuric sea.
The three suns blazed through the overcast as the prison ship settled
into the steaming mud that was the spaceport. Scalding rain sluiced
down the long flanks of the vessel, corrosive and fetid.
Aram Jerrold knew of Atmion IV. No officer in the Fleet did not. It
was a foul planet, a world unwanted by any of the many Bureaus, and
as such the perfect prison world. The planet of the Greens. On all
its vast hulk there was only one settlement. The Green Fortress.
Political exiles and condemned prisoners from all over the Tetrarchy of
the Thirty Suns were brought to the Fortress on Atmion IV. None ever
returned.
Aram remembered that Atmion lay in the Twenty Ninth Decant, only four
light years from Kaidor on the very periphery of the Tetrarchy. These
were the outpost systems, the suns far from mighty Terminus and the
center of the teeming life of the galaxy. These were the hinterlands of
empire, sullen, unknown, unwanted.
The Green Fortress proper stood on a high crag, etched against the
smoky grey of Atmion IV's eternal overcast. Standing in the open port
of the prison ship, Jerrold could see the black bulk of the turreted
stronghold through the curtain of driving rain. The spaceport was a
sea of mud that still boiled in places from the heat of the great
starship's landing jets.
Chained in a long line, the human cargo of the vessel was herded
through the rain and mud toward an electrified wire enclosure. Aram
smiled wryly at that evidence of "Security." What need was there for
it on this world? Where could a prisoner go if he should find himself
on the other side of the wire barrier? It was likely, Jerrold thought,
that there was a Directive on it from Terminus, and that accounted for
the electrified wire.
He estimated that there were perhaps nine hundred men and women in the
human chain that stretched from the starship to the long reception
buildings within the enclosure. The chaff of heterodoxy--cast off by
the single-track machinery of galactic bureaucracy.
The Greens drove the sodden prisoners through the gates without rancor
or interest. It was as though the prisoners had ceased to be human once
they crossed the line that excluded them from the society of free men.
Inside the long, draughty shelters, the prisoners were stripped naked,
men and women alike, run through cleansing water jets, dried, clothed
and photographed. Then they were broken into groups and registered
by Greens sitting in armored cubicles within the walls. There was a
machine-like efficiency to the bureaucratic procedure on this level.
Aram Jerrold had the impression that the operation would continue to
run by sheer momentum should higher authority suddenly try to halt
it....
* * * * *
Jerrold presented himself before a Green of about forty, a man with
a thin, tired face and colorless eyes, who codified the information
given him, looking up at the prisoner with no apparent interest. Quite
abruptly, he emerged from his cubicle, signalling another Green to take
his place.
"You," he said to Aram; "come with me."
Jerrold followed the Green out of the reception building and out into
the rain. For a wild moment, Aram had the impulse to try an escape, but
the thought died stillborn. Escape was plainly impossible. There was
simply no place to go--even if he could shake free of his guard and
the others stationed about the enclosure. The prison ship was being
refuelled a short distance from the reception pen, but the valves were
closed and guarded.
Presently Jerrold and his guide reached a shaft imbedded in the side
of the crag, atop which sat the grim Fortress. Aram turned his eyes
upward. The great, bastioned stronghold seemed to crouch on the crest
of the cliff. On the highest turret, a green banner emblazoned with a
golden Spaceship and Sun hung sodden and limp in the falling rain.
With no hesitation, the Green stationed at the guard-post by the shaft
entrance signalled Aram and his guide through. There was a short walk
up a spiralling ramp and then they stood before what appeared to be
simply a blank wall. Jerrold stared in perplexity as his guard took a
bit of metal from his tunic and held it to the wall.
"Isotope," said the guard shortly, "It acts as a key to the scanner ...
below."
Before Aram could question him, the section of wall slid back
soundlessly and they stepped into a tubecar. Quickly, the Green set up
a complicated series of stops on the tubecar controls and the vehicle
started downward with a rush.
Aram clutched at the man for support. Something was not as it should
be. Then, quite suddenly, he realized what it was. The tubecar was
travelling _down_ ... and the Fortress lay above!
"Where are we going?" he asked cautiously.
The Green shook his head.
"Aren't the condemned cells above in the Fortress?"
"Be quiet. Talk is dangerous!"
"But...."
"Be quiet," the Green said again. "You'll understand soon enough. We
have to be careful. Not all of us here are of the Group." He turned
his back on Jerrold.
Aram's head was spinning. What was there on Atmion that a Green need
fear? And what was this ... Group?
With a wisdom born of his long imprisonment, Aram Jerrold decided
to hold his peace. What would be would be, and it was becoming
increasingly plain that he was about to learn of things that he had not
dreamed existed.
After what seemed to be an interminable period, the tubecar began to
slow. The hum of atomics died and the car came to a stop. They must
be well below the level of the Fortress now, reflected Jerrold, and
very likely under the sea. The panels slid away and in front of them
stretched a long white corridor lighted by dim bulbs set in the curved
ceiling.
"There are miles of tubeways down here," said the guard, "and only the
isotope key gives entrance. The central pattern on the tubecar has been
altered, too ... for the safety of the Group. Follow me."
At the end of the corridor, a steelite door barred further progress.
The Green produced his isotope key again and touched it to the metal.
"A word of advice," he said to Jerrold coolly. "Listen and believe.
A great many risks have been taken and a vast amount of work done to
bring you this far."
He leaned forward and shoved the metal door open. Within lay a brightly
lit chamber. The glare of it hurt Jerrold's eyes and he stood a moment,
blinking on the threshold. Slowly, as his eyes accustomed themselves to
the light, Aram became aware of a group of men and women who watched
him impassively. There were a few in Fleet uniform. One or two of them
casual acquaintances he had thought lost in space or imprisoned by the
Greens. There were others in prison garb, and here and there he could
see the dread color of the Security Police. His heart began to pound.
Another trap? But why?
One slight figure in green stood a little apart, watching him through
shadowed eyes. Jerrold felt the breath catch in his throat.
It was Deve Jennet!
* * * * *
With a cry Deve ran to him. Jerrold felt a surge of mixed fury and
desire. Almost defensively, he lifted his hand and struck Deve across
the face.
She gasped and stepped back, eyes suddenly bright with tears, a thin
streak of blood marking her pale face. The gathered strangers muttered
angrily. Aram turned to stare at them; his face set and grim. Anger was
pulsing within him, a deep, consuming anger born of the tortures he had
suffered--he looked at the stunned girl--because of _her_.
"Oh, Aram ... what have they done to you?" whispered Deve.
"What have _they_ done to me?" he asked thickly. "_They?_ Now tell me
you had no part in it!" He was hemmed in, lost in a sea of treachery
and formless dangers. For a few moments he had dared to let himself
hope...! And this was the end of it. Deve again. And another trap!
"What more do you want from me? Is this just entertainment for you? To
raise my hopes and then step on them again? Maybe you'd like to open my
veins and have a drink of my blood?"
"Aram ... _stop it_!"
"You lying, cheating wench! Was it you that brought me to the Fortress?
Was it you that spilled all my stupid dreams to those black ghouls who
tried me?" he asked bitterly.
"Yes! Yes, it was me!" sobbed Deve, "but can you listen to me? Aram, I
beg you! Listen to me!"
Aram felt some of the rage draining out of him. He stared at Deve in
confusion. There were tears streaking her face. There was no reason for
her to cry now, he thought heavily. Her job was done. Done well.
"I had to do it that way, Aram. You can't know how I've suffered for
you ... every minute of the time. But it had to be done, I swear it!
There was no other way I could get you here to the Group! If I had let
you go your own way, you'd have been killed, Aram. I'd have died with
you gladly, but there are other things that must be done. And we can
live, Aram! Do you understand me? We can live!"
Jerrold looked about him. The group had gathered around him. Someone
said: "Listen to Deve Jennet, Jerrold!"
Dave stepped close to him again, her face upturned. He felt again the
old desire for her, even here--now. Did it matter that she had betrayed
him? Did anything matter any more to him? The last ebb of fury flowed
out of him, leaving him silent and relaxed at last. If this was a
trap ... what did it matter? He had nothing to lose now.
He realized quite suddenly then that he wanted very much to believe
what Deve said. He wanted it so badly that he reacted defensively, not
daring to let himself be hurt by her again. Very cautiously, he let
down the barriers that he had erected against her since the very first
day of the trial when he had known for the first time that she had been
his betrayer.
Deve sensed the change in him and laid a hand on his arm. "You ... you
will listen now?" she asked quietly.
Aram nodded, his eyes fixed on her face. The bruise on her lips was
dark and painful looking.
"I heard of your arrest the day it happened, Aram," she said. "I knew
what the end of it would be if they could find no real evidence against
you--you'd have been subjected to an extensive mental probing that
would have left you ... an ... an idiot. That's true. You know it is."
Aram nodded agreement.
"You would have been lost to _us_," Deve said, "and Aram, we need you!
Need you desperately!"
Aram looked about him in confusion. Still weak from his bout with the
drugs, he was having difficulty marshalling his thoughts.
"Who are you people?" he demanded. "_What_ are you?"
* * * * *
A grizzled naval officer stepped forward. Aram recognized him as Kant
Mikal, recorded in the headquarters of the Thirty Suns Navy as having
been lost in space two years earlier while on a routine exploration
into the Thirtieth Decant.
"We have no name, other than 'the Group,'" he said simply. "We have as
our purpose the prevention of a disastrous war ... possibly even the
destruction of civilization as we have known it."
"You don't make any sense," Jerrold said confusedly. "What is there
in the galaxy that can threaten the Tetrarchy with a war such as you
describe?"
"There is a very real and present danger, Aram Jerrold," Mikal said
flatly. "_Santane_...."
Aram felt a chilling premonition. Santane again. He remembered the
testy words of the black judge who had condemned him: "One would think
Santane were building a fleet...."
Mikal seemed to read his thoughts. "Yes," he said, "Provincial Governor
Santane."
"I don't ask you to join us for the sake of the Tetrarchy, Aram,"
pleaded Deve Jennet earnestly, "or because of any personal relationship
between you and me. If the Thirty Suns Government knew of the Group,
and of the manipulations we've performed to get equipment and personnel
for our mission, not one of us would be left alive by the Greens. We've
penetrated the highest circles, we've subverted loyal people. We've
used every trick and subterfuge to get the men and women we need out
here without giving away our secret." She smiled ruefully. "We've even
had men arrested and condemned so that we could gather them here on
Atmion IV...."
Aram felt a terrible load being lifted from his shoulders. No matter
what happened next, it was good to know that Deve had not betrayed him
as he had thought.
"The Tetrarchy would not allow the existence of such a unit as the
Group for a moment. Every hour that passes increases our danger. But
we must finish our mission, Aram; we can do nothing else!" Deve said
fervently.
"If Santane overthrows the Tetrarchy," said Kant Mikal bleakly, "the
dark ages will descend. The man is mad for power, cruel and intelligent
enough to hold it."
Aram thought swiftly. Santane was a relative unknown back on Terminus,
was merely one of the thirty civil servants that held the Governorships
of the Thirty star-systems making up the Tetrarchy. The Tetrarchy
was a tyrannous bureaucracy ... but at least it was not a one-man
government. As bad as it was, Santane's iron hand would be infinitely
worse.
"But how," protested Jerrold. "With what? How can Santane hope to
withstand the whole of the Tetrarchy's power?"
"As you have guessed," Mikal said, "he is building a fleet; new
construction and better than anything in the Thirty Suns Navy. However,
if it were only that, there would be no real need for us to interfere.
The Fleet is antiquated, as you know, but able to muster a force of
more than ten thousand first line battlecraft. No matter how good
Santane's ships might be, they could not handle an attack by that kind
of numbers. The Kaidor system would take a terrible beating, and most
probably Kaidor V would be bombed to rubble. That would be the end
of it. The destruction would be strictly localized in the Thirtieth
Decant. But there is, unfortunately more ... much more."
"Aram," exclaimed Deve, "it's horrible!"
"Santane has developed interstellar guided missiles, Jerrold," said
Kant Mikal. "Faster than any Fleet vessel and impossible to intercept.
But that isn't the worst of it. It's the stuff he has developed for
these missiles to carry...."
"Biological weapon?" asked Aram with a sinking feeling in his heart.
Mikal nodded. "Follow me," he said.
* * * * *
Aram Jerrold followed the grizzled naval officer into an antechamber.
With Deve Jennet at his side he let Mikal lead him down a narrow,
zig-zagging ramp into a stone room below the meeting hall. The place
was dimly lit and there was a smell in the air that reminded Aram of
a zoological garden. A strong wire mesh had been stretched across the
room to divide it roughly into two sections. In the corner of the
interior division, a figure squatted, gnawing on a piece of bone. The
sound of its teeth scraping the bits of flesh off the shank made Aram
shudder.
Mikal led him up to the wire.
"That," he said, "was a man. Santane's weapon did what you see there."
Jerrold's stomach muscles knotted. The figure in the cage was roughly
human, but it squatted on greatly foreshortened hams and waved long,
hairy arms at them angrily. The forehead sloped back from a face
completely bestial, and as Aram stood there, sickened and fascinated,
the hirsute apparition flung the chewed bone at him and bared its fangs
in a blood-chilling howl.
Aram turned away, white-faced. "Is ... is there no cure for this
thing?" he asked.
Mikal shook his head. "We have been able to develop none. This was
an agent of ours who was taken on Kaidor IV by Santane's raiders. We
tried to establish a surveillance point there and failed--the planet is
hardly livable--and Santane has been able to maintain a very complete
coverage of the two planets nearest his capital. The inoculation was
made on Kaidor V, and Santane sent him back here, thinking him an
agent of the Greens. He is laying the foundations of his psychological
attack, you see. A few cases like this, and then the shocker--the
announcement that every planet in the Thirty Suns can expect an attack
by guided missiles loaded with that virus unless his demands are
acceded to."
"But surely there must be a specific for this thing," pursued Aram. "It
would be valueless as a weapon unless there is."
"The virus attacks the higher cerebral centers first," explained
Mikal. "Then the endocrine balance. First memory goes. Our medical
people believe that Santane _has_ an antidote for this thing, but in
very limited amounts. They tell me that if caught soon enough, it can
be stopped. But within hours after infection permanent damage to the
higher nervous system is done. They suspect that even if a very small
amount of serum is introduced into the body after infection, _physical_
damage can be completely avoided. What the effect on the mind might be,
they do not care to say. Complete loss of memory certainly. A lessening
of the ability to relearn the forgotten is also probable."
The creature behind the wire howled again, plaintively now.
"Let's get out of here," breathed Deve faintly.
* * * * *
"You see what Santane will use to seize the Tetrarchy," Mikal went on
when they were once again in the meeting hall. "He imagines that the
mere threat of it will subdue the Supreme Council."
"But that's wrong!" exclaimed Aram: "The Tetrarchy will fight! There
has never been a bureaucracy in the history of mankind that didn't
imagine itself invincible!"
"Yes, the Tetrarchy will fight," agreed Mikal. "And a war of absolute
destruction will engulf the Thirty Suns. Unless...."
"Unless what?" demanded Jerrold.
"Unless Santane can be convinced of that. Unless he can be prevailed
upon to give up his ambition and content himself with being a balance
for the rest of the Tetrarchy's power. Where there's one power only,
tyranny results invariably. But if there are two, co-equal and
autonomous, then they must compete for the favor of the people. Only
in such a way can the civilization of the Thirty Suns survive, and the
slavish lot of the people of the inhabited worlds be improved.
"That, then, is the purpose of the Group. We are pledged to stop--if
we can--the impending struggle for power between Santane and the
Tetrarchy. Savagery is the price we will pay for failure!"
* * * * *
In the days that followed, Aram Jerrold grew to despise the name of
Santane more than he had ever despised the Tetrarchy. Deep under the
turbulent sea of Atmion IV, he rested--recuperating from his ordeals
and making ready for the time when the small band of peacemakers would
move to forestall Santane's bid for galactic dominion.
The plan, as Kant Mikal outlined it, was simple and direct. In the
colony under the sea there were forty-five men and women. These were
mainly scientists and soldiers who had incurred the wrath of the
Government of the Thirty Suns, though there were some, like Leader
Deve Jennet of the Security Police, who carried on a double existence
on Atmion IV, living both above in the Green Fortress and in the
tunnels....
Of the more than three thousand Greens stationed on the prison planet,
some fifty knew of the Group, and of the fifty, perhaps ten had access
to the secret quarters. These Greens, at great personal risk, supplied
the scientists and workers of the Group with the materials needed for
their medical and physical researches.
A falsified report of Aram Jerrold's death under the disintegrators
was sent to Terminus under the personal cachet of Leader Deve Jennet
of the Security Police; so for the first time in many weeks Aram had a
semblance of peace.
Mikal's plan was for the Group to divide into two units. One, the
larger of the two, would go--at the proper time--to Kaidor V, there to
establish contact with the Provincial Governor and try by any means to
dissuade him from his plan to defy the Thirty Suns Government. There
were several among the Group who felt that such an approach to Santane
would succeed where harsher methods might well fail in the face of
the Thirtieth Decant's hidden power. It was Mikal's plan to lead this
delegation himself in a starship now being fitted in the central pit of
the tunnel maze.
But Kant Mikal did not delude himself that Santane could be won by
arguments. Another expedition to the Kaidor Sun would be dispatched at
the same time. A small two-man destroyer that had been rendered--Mikal
claimed--"undetectable," would leave the Atmion system with the larger
vessel and land on Kaidor III, a planet uninhabited save for a few
bands of degenerated experimental subjects dumped there by Santane's
biological ecologists. Mikal took care to point out that Kaidor III had
two large land-masses, and the landing by the two members of the Group
selected for that duty would be made on the land-mass unoccupied by the
unfortunate subhumans.
This expedition would remain on Kaidor III to await word from the first
as to the success or failure of the Group's plan. Failing to hear from
them, or hearing of failure, the small ship would proceed to Kaidor V
and try to wrest the secret of the virus weapon from Santane. Plainly
enough, the second expedition into the Thirtieth Decant would be a
last, spasmodic attempt to save something from the ruins of galactic
war. That phrase stayed with Jerrold as he listened to Kant Mikal. _To
save something from the ruins._ That, he told himself, might well be
the best the Group could accomplish with their meager resources.
* * * * *
During the hours that Deve was working in the Fortress, Jerrold
wandered freely through the maze of underground tunnels and chambers
that the Group had built. The original catacombs had been built a
thousand years earlier, and the men and women of the Group had expanded
and refurbished the forgotten maze to suit their purposes. Jerrold was
continually amazed at what they had been able to accomplish with so
little at their command and under a shroud of almost complete secrecy.
Life in the tunnels centered on the central pit--the spaceport. This,
as Kant Mikal explained with considerable pride, was connected with the
surface by a series of locks that emerged through the bottom of the sea
in the offshore shallows down the coast from the Green Fortress. Under
cover of night, a spaceship could emerge from the tunnels and lift into
space without arousing the garrison of Greens who served on Atmion IV
never dreaming of the quiet life beneath their feet.
Two spacecraft rested in their cradles in the pit, a medium sized
merchantman, the "Star Cluster," and a Fleet scout-destroyer,
"Serpent." Jerrold recognized both vessels as craft that had long ago
been reported lost in space in Admiralty headquarters back on Terminus.
The Serpent still carried its Fleet insigne of the Spaceship and Sun,
a reminder to Aram of his former life and of the immense power of the
Thirty Suns Navy. He knew only too well the position of the Group in
the coming silent struggle between the galactic Tetrarchy and the
rebellious Santane. They were the smallest, weakest corner in a vicious
triangular madness that threatened to smash the entire civilization of
the Thirty Suns.
His personal happiness at being with Deve Jennet again, and free
of the haunting pain of her supposed betrayal, was mitigated by a
realization of the dangers they would soon face when the Group's
quixotic plan went into operation. Nor were these forebodings lessened
when Kant Mikal informed him that he and Deve were the unanimous
choices of the Group for the second--and secret--expedition into the
Kaidor Province.
"It will be your purpose," Kant Mikal told him again, "to save
something from the wreckage if all else fails...."
* * * * *
Aram lay comfortably under the bank of sun-lamps in the underground
infirmary. The days of rest and treatment had brought him back into
condition again, and he felt fit and ready for action. He had begun to
chafe at the inactivity, but Kant Mikal insisted that the time to move
out against Kaidor had not come, and Jerrold was forced to be content
with the older man's judgment.
Deve sat with him in the infirmary, her slim body golden under the
glowing lamps. Sitting near her, watching the graceful sweep of her
pale hair as it brushed her shoulders, Aram was filled with a sense of
well-being and contentment.
"Aram," asked Deve, "have you had time to examine the Serpent? Are you
familiar with that class of ship?"
"I spent three years on Periphery Patrol with Serpent class scouts,
Deve," murmured Aram sleepily. "There won't be any trouble...." He
stretched himself and sat up. "But there's one thing I'd like more
information on ... if I can be trusted with it."
"Aram! We trust you! You know we do ..." protested Deve.
"Kant Mikal told me the Serpent was ... undetectable. In all my
years with the Fleet, I never heard of a spaceship that could not be
detected."
"Avon Marsh--one of our scientists--has developed an energy shield,
Aram."
"That's nothing new, Deve," said Aram. "The Fleet vessels have had them
for years. They use them against attack by ray weapons of all kinds."
"But this reaches into the highest frequencies," Deve explained. "It
shunts all radiation around the ship. Of course, it can't be used
during second order flight above light speed, but it wouldn't be of any
value then, anyway."
"You mean it shunts _all_ radiation around the ship? All? Even light?"
demanded Jerrold with sudden interest.
"Yes. At close observational ranges it results in a slight
distortion--like a very clear lens, but--"
"Then the ship is ... invisible?" Aram asked incredulously.
Deve Jennet smiled. "Yes, among other things. And it prevents a radio
echo being sent back to a detector, too."
* * * * *
Aram sank back thoughtfully. An invisible ship! His spaceman's mind
toyed with the thought. It was like something from a naval officer's
dream fantasies. A battleship so equipped could very nearly rule the
plenum...! But Deve's next words cut that dream short.
"The field is so limited, though," she said, "that only a two-man scout
can be equipped with it. And since the shield works two ways, the
occupants of the ship are blind. Nothing outside the ship itself can be
seen."
Jerrold was about to reply when Kant Mikal burst into the room. His
grey hair was matted with blood, and his face was pale and drawn with
pain and anxiety.
"I should have listened to you, Jerrold," he breathed heavily. "We
should have moved out long ago!"
"Kant! You're hurt," cried Deve.
Mikal gestured impatiently. "It's nothing! We have to get out
immediately! Get ready...!"
Jerrold and Deve were on their feet, reaching for their cloaks.
"What's happened?" asked Aram.
"The Greens have found the tunnel entrance. I think they must have
caught one of our topside people with a mental probe, I don't know for
sure. But there's fighting in the tube-shafts now. We have to get to
the ships!"