Clans of the Alphane Moon (13 page)

Ahead in the hall the Ganymedean slime mold, in a huge yellow heap, manifested itself, blocking the way; it had flowed out of its conapt.

“Let us by,” the man with the gun said.

“I am sorry,” Lord Running Clam’s thoughts came to Chuck, “but I am a colleague of Mr. Rittersdorf’s and it is impractical for me to allow him to be carted off.”

The laser beam clacked on; red and thin it traveled by Chuck and disappeared into the center of the slime mold. With a crackling, tearing noise the slime mold shriveled up, dried into a black encrusted blob which smoked and sputtered, charring the wooden floor of the hallway.

“Move,” the man with the gun said to Chuck.

“He’s dead,” Chuck said. He couldn’t believe it.

“There’s some more of them,” the man with the gun said. “On Ganymede.” His fleshy face showed no emotion, only alertness. “When we get into the elevator press the up button; my ship’s on the roof, and what a louzled-up little field it is.”

Numbly, Chuck entered the elevator. The man with the gun followed and an instant later they had reached the roof; they stepped out into the cold of a foggy night. “Tell me your name,” Chuck said. “Just your name.”

“Why?”

“So I can find you again. For killing Lord Running Clam.” Sometime sooner or later he would be set down in the same vector with this person.

“I’ll be glad to tell you my name,” the man said as he herded Chuck into the parked hopper; its landing lights glowed and its turbine buzzed faintly. “Alf Cherigan,” he said as he stationed himself at the controls.

Chuck nodded.

“You like my name? You find it pleasant?”

Saying nothing Chuck stared ahead.

“You’ve stopped talking,” Cherigan observed. “Too bad, because you and I’ll be cooped up together until we reach Luna and Brahe City.” He reached to snap on the auto course-finding pilot.

Beneath them the hopper bucked and leaped but did not ascend.

“Wait here,” Cherigan said, with a wave of his laser pistol in Chuck’s direction. “Don’t touch any of the controls.” Opening the hatch of the hopper he irritably put his head out, peering to see in the darkness, what had stalled the lift-action. “Holy critter,” he said, “the outside conduit to the rear rubes–” His speech
stopped; he rapidly yanked himself back into the hopper once again, then fired with his laser beam.

From the darkness of the roof an answering beam paralleled his own, found its way through the open hatch and to him; Cherigan dropped his weapon and flopped convulsively against the hull of the cabin, then twisted and sagged like a gored animal, his mouth hanging, his eyes corrupted and vague.

Bending, Chuck picked up the discarded laser beam, looked out to see who it was, there in the darkness. It was Joan; she had followed him and Cherigan up the hall, had taken the manual emergency lift to the roof field and arrived behind them. He got hesitantly from the hopper and greeted her. Cherigan had made a mistake; he had not been informed that Joan was an armed policewoman and accustomed to emergencies. It was even hard for Chuck to realize what she had done so quickly, first with one shot at the guidance-system of the hopper, then the second shot which had killed Alf Cherigan.

“Are you getting out?” Joan asked. “I didn’t hit you, did I?”

“I’m untouched,” Chuck said.

“Listen.” She approached the hatch of the hopper, regarded the slumped, discarded shape that had just now been Alf Cherigan. “I can bring him back. Remember? Do you want me to, Chuck?”

He considered a moment; he remembered Lord Running Clam. And because of that he shook his head no.

“It’s up to you,” Joan said. “I’ll let him stay dead. I don’t like to but I understand.”

“How about Lord–”

“Chuck, I can’t do anything for him; it’s too late.
More than five minutes has passed, I had the choice of staying there with him or following you and trying to assist you.”

“I think it would have been better if you—”

“No,” Joan said firmly. “I did the right thing; you’ll see why. Do you have a magnifying glass?”

Startled, he said, “No, of course not.”

“Look in the repair case of the hopper, in the storage region under the control panel. There’re micro-tools for fixing the miniaturized portions of the ship’s circuits… you’ll find a loupe there.”

He opened the cabinet, rummaged about, mindlessly obeying her. A moment later his hands found the jeweler’s loupe; he stepped from the hopper, holding it.

“We’ll go back below,” Joan said. “To where he is.”

Presently the two of them bent over the reduced cinder which had previously been their compatriot, the Ganymedean slime mold. “Stick the loupe in your eye,” Joan instructed, “and search around. Very closely, especially down in the pile of the carpet.”

“What for?”

Joan said, “His spores.”

Taken aback he said, “Did he have a chance to—”

“Sporification for them is automatic, the moment they’re attacked; it would have functioned instantaneously, I hope. They’ll be microscopic, brown and round; you should be able to find them with the loupe. It’s of course impossible to with the naked eye. While you’re doing that I’ll prepare a culture.” She disappeared into Chuck’s apt; he hesitated and then got down on his hands and knees to search the hall carpet for the spores of Lord Running Clam.

When Joan returned he had, in the palm of his
hand, seven tiny spheres; under the lens they were smooth and brown and shiny, definitely spores. And he had located them near the spot where the waste remains of the slime mold lay.

“They need soil,” Joan said as she watched him sprinkle the spores into the measuring cup which she had found in his kitchen. “And moisture. And time. Find at least twenty, because of course not all of them will survive.”

At last he managed to acquire, from the dirty, much-used carpet, twenty-five spores in all. These were transferred to the measuring cup and then he and Joan descended to the lowest floor of the building, made their way out into the backyard. In the darkness they clutched handfuls of dirt, deposited the loose, black soil into the measuring cup. Joan located a hose; she sprinkled drops of water onto the soil and then sealed the cup off from the air with a polyfilm wrapper.

“On Ganymede,” she explained, “the atmosphere is warm and dense; this is the best I can do to simulate proper conditions for the spores but I think it’ll work. Lord R.C. told me once that in an emergency Ganymedeans have managed to sporify successfully in open-air conditions on Terra. So let’s hope.” With Chuck she returned to the building, carrying the cup with great care.

“How long will it take?” he asked. “Before we know.”

“I’m not sure. As soon as two days or–and this has happened in some cases–depending on the phase of the moon as long as a month.” She explained, “It may sound like superstition but the moon will affect the activation of these spores. So resign yourself to that.
The fuller the better; we can look it up in tonight’s homeopape.” They ascended to the floor of his apt.

“How much memory will there be in the new–” He hesitated. “In the next generation of slime mold? Will it or they remember us and what took place here?”

As she sat examining the homeopape Joan said, “It depends entirely on how quickly he managed to act; if he got off spores from his–” She shut the ’pape. “The spores should react in a matter of days.”

“What would happen,” Chuck asked, “if I took them off Terra? Away from Luna’s influence?”

“They’d still grow. But it might take longer. What’s on your mind?”

“If the Hentman organization would send someone to find me,” Chuck said, “and something happened to him–”

“Oh yes of course,” Joan agreed. “They’ll be sending another. Probably in a few hours, as soon as they realize we got the first one. And he may have had a deadman’s-signal installed on him somewhere, so they had the information as soon as his heart stopped. I think you’re right; you should get off Terra as soon as possible. But how, Chuck? To really disappear you’d have to have resources, some money and support, and you don’t; you have no source of income at all now. Do you have anything at all saved up?”

“Mary got the joint account,” he said, pondering; he seated himself, lit a cigarette. “I have an idea,” he said at last, “of what I’m going to try. I’d prefer you didn’t hear. Do you understand? Or do I just sound neurotic and fearful?”

“You just sound anxious. And you ought to be.” She rose. “I’ll go out into the hall; I know you want to place a call. While you’re doing that I’ll contact the Ross Police Department and have them come here to
dispose of that man in the hopper up above us.” At the door of the apt she lingered, however. “Chuck, I’m glad I was able to keep them from taking you. I barely made it. Where was the hopper going?”

“I’d rather not tell you. For your own protection.”

She nodded. And the door shut after her. Now he was alone.

At once he placed a call to the San Francisco CIA office. It took some time, but at last he was able to trace down his former boss, Jack Elwood. At home with his family, Elwood answered the vidphone with irritation. Nor was he pleased to see who it was.

“I’ll make a deal with you,” Chuck said.

“A deal! We believe you directly or indirectly tipped off Hentman so that he had the opportunity to escape. Isn’t that what happened? We even know whom you worked through: that starlet in Santa Monica that’s Hentman’s current mistress.” Elwood scowled.

This was news to Chuck; he hadn’t realized this about Patty Weaver. However, it hardly mattered now. “The deal,” Chuck said, “that I intend to make with you—with the CIA, officially—is this.
I know where Hentman is.
”

“That doesn’t surprise me. What does surprise me is that you’re willing to tell us. Why is that, Chuck? A falling-out within the Hentman happy family, with you on the outside?”

“The Hentman organization has already sent one nurt out,” Chuck said. “We were able to stop him but there’ll be another and then another until finally Hentman gets me.” He did not bother to try to explain his difficult situation to Elwood; his former boss wouldn’t believe him and anyhow his wants would remain the same. “I’ll tell you where Hentman is hiding
out in exchange for a CIA C-plus ship. An intersystem ship, one of those small military-style pursuit-class vessels. I know you’ve got a few of them; you can spare one, and you’re getting back something of enormous value.” He added, “And I’ll return the ship—eventually. It’s just the use of it that I want.”

“You actually do sound as if you’re trying to get away,” Elwood said with acuity.

“I am.”

“Okay.” Elwood shrugged. “I’ll believe you; why not? And so what? Tell me where Hentman is; I’ll have the ship for you within five hours.”

In other words, Chuck realized, they’ll hold up delivery until they have had a chance to check my information. If Hentman isn’t found, there will be no ship; I’ll be waiting in vain. But it was hopeless to expect the pros of the CIA to operate in any other fashion; this was their business—life for them was one great card game.

Resignedly he said, “Hentman is on Luna, at Brahe City.”

“Wait at your apt,” Elwood said instantly. “The ship will be there by two this morning.
If.
” He eyed Chuck.

Breaking the connection Chuck went to pick up his burned down cigarette from the edge of the living room coffee table. Well, if the ship did not show up then this was the end; he had no other plans, no alternative solution. Joan Trieste might save him again, might even bring him back after a nurt of Hentman’s had actually killed him… but if he stayed on Terra eventually they would find and destroy him or at the very least capture him: detection devices were simply too good, now. Given sufficient time they always found the target if it were still somewhere on the
planet. But Luna, unlike Terra, had uncharted areas; detection there posed a problem. And there existed remote moons and planets where detection, by anyone, was a near impossibility.

One of those areas was the Alpha system. For example Alpha III and its several moons, including M2; most especially M2. And with a CIA faster-than-light ship he could reach it in a matter of days. As had Mary and the gang with her.

Opening the door to the hall he said to Joan, “Okay, I made my one puny call. That’s that.”

“
Are
you leaving Terra?” Her eyes were enormous and dark.

“We’ll see.” He seated himself, prepared to wait it out.

With great care Joan set the measuring cup of Lord Running Clam’s spores on the arm of the couch by Chuck. “I’ll give these to you. I know you want them; it was you he gave his life for and you feel responsible. Better let me tell you what to do as soon as the spores become active.”

He got pen and paper in order to write down her instructions.

It was actually several hours later—the Ross Police Department had shown up and lugged off the dead man on the roof, and Joan Trieste had departed—that he realized what he had done. Now Bunny Hentman was right; he
had
betrayed Hentman to the CIA. But he had done it to save his life. That, however, would hardly justify it in Hentman’s eyes; he, too, was trying to save
his
life.

In any case it was done. He continued to wait, alone in his apt, for the C-plus ship from CIA. A ship which very likely was never going to arrive. And what then? Then, he decided, I’ll be sitting here and
waiting for something else, for the next nurt from the Hentman organization. And my life can be measured out in teaspoonfuls.

It was one hell of a long wait.

Bowing slightly, Gabriel Baines said, “We constitute the sine qua non council possessing overall authority on this world, an ultimate form of authority which can’t be overruled by anyone.” He, with stark, cold politeness, drew back a chair for the Terran psychologist, Dr. Mary Rittersdorf; she accepted it with a brief smile. It seemed to him that she looked tired. The smile showed genuine gratitude.

The other members of the council introduced themselves to Dr. Rittersdorf in their several idiosyncratic fashions.

“Howard Straw.
Mans.
”

“J-jacob Simion.” Simion could not suppress his moronic grin. “From the Heebs, where your ship set down.”

“Annette Golding. Poly.” Her eyes were alert and she sat erectly, watchful of the female psychologist who had barged into their lives.

“Ingred Hibbler. One, two, three. Ob-Com.”

Dr. Rittersdorf said, “And that would be—” She nodded. “Oh yes, of course. Obsessive-compulsive.”

“Omar Diamond. I will let you guess what clan I am from.” Diamond glanced about remotely; he seemed withdrawn into his private world, much to Gabriel Baines’ annoyance. This was scarcely a time
for individual activity, even of a mystical order; this was the moment in which they had to function as a whole or not at all.

In a hollow, despairing voice the Dep spoke up. “Dino Watters.” He struggled to say more, then gave up; the weight of pessimism, of sheer hopelessness, was too great for him. Once more he sat staring down, rubbing his forehead in a miserable tic-like motion.

“And you know who I am, Dr. Rittersdorf,” Baines said, and rattled the document which lay before him; it represented the joint efforts of the council members, their manifesto. “Thank you for coming here!” he began, and cleared his throat; his voice had become husky with tension.

“Thank you for allowing me to,” Dr. Rittersdorf said in a formal but—to him—distinctly menacing tone. Her eyes were opaque.

Baines said, “You have asked to be permitted to visit settlements other than Gandhitown. In particular you requested permission to examine Da Vinci Heights. We have discussed this. We decided to decline.”

Nodding, Dr. Rittersdorf said, “I see.”

“Tell her why,” Howard Straw spoke up. His face was ugly; he had not for an instant taken his eyes from the lady psychologist from Terra: his hatred for her filled the room and tainted the atmosphere. Gabriel Baines felt as if he were choking in it.

Raising her hand Dr. Rittersdorf said, “Wait. Before you read me your statement.” She looked at each of them in turn, a slow, steady and totally professional scrutiny. Howard Straw returned it with malignance. Jacob Simion ducked his head, smiled emptily, letting her attention simply pass. Annette Golding nervously scratched at the cuticle of her thumbnail, her face
pale. The Dep never noticed that he was under observation; he never once raised his head. The Skitz, Omar Diamond, returned Mrs. Rittersdorf’s stare with sweet sublimity, yet underneath it, Baines guessed, there was anxiety; Diamond looked as if at any moment he might bolt.

As for himself he found Dr. Mary Rittersdorf physically attractive. And he wondered—idly—if the fact that she had arrived without her husband signified anything. She was, in fact, sexy. As an inexplicable incongruity, considering the purpose of this meeting, Dr. Rittersdorf wore a distinctly feminine outfit: black sweater and skirt, no stockings, gilded slippers with turned-up elfish toes. The sweater, Baines observed, was just a fraction too tight. Did Mrs. Rittersdorf realize this? He could not tell, but in any case he found his attention drawn away from what she was saying to her well-articulated breasts. They were admittedly small but quite distinct as regard to angle. He liked them.

I wonder, he wondered, if this woman—she was, he surmised, in her early thirties, certainly in her physical, nubile prime—if she is looking for something more than professional success, here. He had a powerful affective insight that Dr. Rittersdorf was animated by a personal spirit as well as a task-oriented one; again, she perhaps was not conscious of this. The body, he reflected, possesses ways of its own, sometimes in contradistinction to the purposes of the mind. This morning, on arising, Dr. Rittersdorf might merely have thought that she would like to wear this black sweater, without thinking any more about it. But the body, the well-formed gynecologic apparatus within, knew better.

And to this an analogous portion of himself responded.
However in his case it was a conscious reaction. And, he thought,
perhaps this can be turned to our group’s advantage.
This dimension of involvement might not be the liability for us that it surely is for our antagonists. Thinking this he felt himself slide into a posture of contrived defense; he had schemes, automatic and plentiful, by which to protect not only himself but also his colleagues.

“Dr. Rittersdorf,” he said smoothly, “before we could permit you to enter our several settlements, a delegation representing our clans would have to inspect your ship to see what armaments—if any—you have along with you. Anything else is unworthy of even cursory consideration.”

“We’re not armed,” Dr. Rittersdorf said.

“Nevertheless,” Gabriel Baines said, “I propose to you that you allow me and perhaps one other individual here to accompany you to your base. I have a proclamation here”—he rattled the manifesto—“which calls for your ship to vacate Gandhitown within forty-eight Terran hours. If you don’t comply—” He glanced at Straw, who nodded. “We will initiate military operations against you on the grounds that you are hostile, uninvited invaders.”

In a low, modulated voice Dr. Rittersdorf said, “I understand your comprehension. You’ve lived here in isolation for quite a time. But—” She was speaking directly to him; her fine, intelligent eyes confronted him purposefully. “I am afraid I have to call attention to a fact which you all may find distasteful.
You are, individually and collectively, mentally ill.
”

There was a taut, prolonged silence.

“Hell,” Straw said to no one in particular, “we blew that place sky high years ago. That so-called ‘hospital.’
Which was really a concentration camp.” His lips twisted. “For purposes of slave labor.”

“I am sorry to say it,” Dr. Rittersdorf said, “but you are wrong; it was a legitimate hospital, and you must include the realization of this as a factor in any plans you might make regarding us. I’m not lying to you; I’m speaking the plain, simple truth.”

“‘Quid est veritas?’” Baines murmured.

“Pardon?” Dr. Rittersdorf said.

Baines said, “‘What is truth?’ Hasn’t it occurred to you, Doctor, that in the last decade we here might have risen above our initial problems of group adaptation and become—” He gestured. “Adjusted? Or whatever term you prefer… in any case capable of possessing adequate interpersonal relationships, such as you’re witnessing here in this chamber. Surely if we can work together
we are not sick.
There’s no other test you can apply except that of group-workability.” He sat back, pleased with himself.

With care Dr. Rittersdorf said, “You are, admittedly, unified against a common enemy… against us. But—I’d be willing to place a bet that before we arrived, and again after we depart, you will fragment into isolated individuals, mistrustful and frightened of one another, unable to collaborate.” She smiled disarmingly, but it was far too wise a smile for him to accept; it too much underscored her very clever statement.

Because of course she was right; she had put her finger on it. They did not function together regularly. But—she was also wrong.

This was her error. She supposed, probably as a matter of self-justifying protection, that the origin of the fear and hostility lay with the council. But in fact it was Terra who displayed menacing tactics; the
landing of their ship was de facto a hostile act…
were it not, an attempt would have been made to secure permission.
These Terrans themselves had manifested initial distrust; they alone were responsible for the present pattern of mutual suspicion. Had they wanted to they could readily have avoided it.

“Dr. Rittersdorf,” he said bluntly, “the Alphane traders contact us when they want permission to land. We notice that you did not. And we have no problems in our dealings with them; we trade back and forth on a regular, constant basis.”

Obviously his gauntlet had been thrown down to good effect; the woman hesitated, did not have an answer. While she pondered, everyone in the room rustled with amusement, contempt, and, as in the case of Howard Straw, pitiless animosity.

“We assumed,” Dr. Rittersdorf said at last, “that had we formally requested permission to land you would have refused us.”

Smiling, feeling calm, Baines said, “But you didn’t try. You ‘assumed.’ And now, of course, you’ll never know, because—”

“Would you have granted us permission?” Her voice snapped at him, firm and authoritative, penetrating and shattering the continuity of his utterance; he blinked, involuntarily paused. “No, you wouldn’t have,” she continued. “And all of you know it. Please try to be realistic.”

“If you show up at Da Vinci Heights,” Howard Straw said, “We’ll kill you. In fact if you don’t leave we’ll kill you. And the next ship that tries to land will never touch ground. This is our world and we plan to retain it as long as we survive. Mr. Baines here can recite the details of your original imprisonment of us; it’s all contained in the manifesto which he and I—
with the help of the others in this room—prepared. Read the manifesto, Mr. Baines.”

“Twenty-five years ago,’” Gabriel Baines began, “‘a colony was established on this planet—’”

Dr. Rittersdorf sighed. “Our knowledge of the assorted patterns of your mental illnesses—”

“‘Sordid’?” Howard Straw burst in. “Did you say ‘sordid’?” His face was mottled with dire rage; he half-rose from his chair.

“I said
assorted
,” Dr. Rittersdorf said patiently. “Our knowledge informs us that the focus of your militant activity will be found in the Mans settlement—in other words, the manic group’s settlement. Four hours from now we will break camp and leave the hebephrenic settlement of Gandhitown; we will set down in Da Vinci Heights and if you engage us in combat we’ll bring in line-class Terran military forces.” She added, “Which are standing by approximately half an hour from here.”

Again there was a taut and prolonged silence in the room.

Annette Golding at last spoke up, but barely audibly. “Read our manifesto anyhow, Gabriel.”

Nodding, he resumed. But his voice shook.

Annette Golding began to cry, miserably, interrupting his reading. “You can see what’s in store for us; they’re going to turn us back into hospital patients again. It’s the end.”

Uncomfortably, Dr. Rittersdorf said, “We’re going to provide
therapy
for you. It’ll cause you to feel more—well, relaxed with one another. More yourselves. Life will take on a more pleasant, natural significance; as it is you’re all oppressed with such strain and fears…”

“Yes,” Jacob Simion muttered. “Fears that Terra
will break in here and round us up like a lot of animals again.”

Four hours, Gabriel Baines thought. Not long. His voice trembling, he resumed the reading of their joint manifesto.

It seemed to him an empty gesture. Because there is just exactly nothing, he realized, that is going to save us.

   After the meeting had ended—and Dr. Rittersdorf had departed—Gabriel Baines laid his plan before his colleagues.

“You’re what?” Howard Straw demanded with contemptuous derision, his face made into a parody of itself by his grimace. “You say you’re going to seduce her? My god, maybe she’s right; maybe we ought to be in a neuro-psychiatric hospital!” He sat back and wheezed bleakly to himself. His disgust was too great; he could make no further motions of abuse—he left that to the others in the room.

“You must think a lot of yourself,” Annette Golding said, finally.

“What I need,” Gabriel said, “is someone with enough telepathic ability to tell me if I’m right.” He turned to Jacob Simion. “Doesn’t that Heeb saint, that Ignatz Ledebur, have at least a little capacity for telepathy? He’s sort of a jack-of-all trades, Psi talentwise.”

“None that I know of,” Simion said. “But you might, you just might try Sarah Apostoles.” He winked at Gabriel, shaking his head in mirth.

“I’ll phone Gandhitown,” Gabriel Baines said, picking up the phone.

Simion said, “The phone-lines in Gandhitown are out again. For six days now. You’ll have to go there.”

“You’d have to go there anyhow” Dino Watters said, rousing himself at last from the slumber of his endless depression. He, alone, seemed somewhat taken by Baines’ scheme. “After all that’s where he is, in Gandhitown, where anything goes, everyone has children by everyone. By now she may be in the spirit of the thing.”

With a grunt of agreement Howard Straw said, “It’s luck for you, Gabe, that she’s among the Heebs; she ought to be more receptive to you because of that.”

“If this is the only way we can comport ourselves,” Miss Hibbler said stiffly, “I think we deserve to perish; I truly do.”

“The universe,” Omar Diamond pointed out, “possesses an infinitude of ways by which it fulfills itself. Even this must not out-of-hand be despised.” He nodded gravely.

Without another word, without even saying good-by to Annette, Gabriel Baines strode from the council chamber, down the wide stone stairs and out of the building, to the parking lot. There he boarded his turbine-driven auto and presently, at a meager seventy-five miles an hour, was on his way to Gandhitown. He would arrive before the four-hour deadline, he calculated, assuming that nothing had fallen onto the road, blocking it. Dr. Rittersdorf had returned to Gandhitown by rocket-driven launch; she was already there. He cursed at the archaic mode of transportation which he had to rely on, but there it was; this was their world and the reality for which they were fighting. As a satellite of the Terran culture once more they would regain modern means of transportation… but this in no way would make up for what they stood to lose. Better to travel at seventy-five miles an hour and be free. Ah, he thought. A slogan.