Direct Descent (4 page)

Pchak is completely hooked,
he thought
, but what happens when Adams finds out the Library hasn’t been destroyed?

He sat down at his desk, swiveled to face the control panel and activated a tiny screen linked to a spy cell on the sixty-ninth level. Pchak was in the viewing room, studying the Albireo language pre-examining that double-star system’s war history. Behind Coogan, a mechanical hum sounded, indicating someone was emerging from the elevator. Hastily, he blanked the spy screen, turned to his desk just as the door burst open. Toris Sil-Chan staggered into the room, his clothing torn, a dirty bandage over one shoulder.

The Mundial native lurched across the room, clutched the edge of Coogan’s desk. “Hide me!” he said. “Quick!”

Coogan jerked around to the panel, swung it open and motioned toward the hole that was exposed. Sil-Chan darted in and Coogan closed the panel, returned to his desk.

Again the telltale signaled. Two armed guards burst into the room, blasters in their hands. “Where is he?” demanded the first.

“Where’s who?” asked Coogan. He squared a stack of papers on his desk.

“The guy who jumped off that lifeboat,” said the guard.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Coogan, “but I can see that I’ll have to call General Pchak and tell him how you’ve burst into my office without preamble and—”

The guard lowered his blaster and retreated one step. “That won’t be necessary, sir,” he said. “We can see the man’s not here. He probably went to a lower level. Please excuse the interruption.” They backed out of the room.

Coogan waited until his spy relays in the corridor told him the men had gone, then opened the panel. Sil-Chan was crumpled on the floor. Coogan bent over him, shook him. “Toris! What’s wrong?”

Sil-Chan stirred, looked up at Coogan with eyes that were at first unrecognizing. “Uh … Vince—”

The director put an arm behind Sil-Chan, supported the man to a sitting position. “Take it easy now. Just tell me what happened.”

“Made a mess of assignment,” said Sil-Chan. “Yoo Clan got wind of what I was after. Had Adams send order … arrest. Lost ship. Got away in escape boat. Landed other side … planet. Pchak’s guards tried stop—” His head slumped forward.

Coogan put a hand to the man’s heart, felt its steady pumping. He eased Sil-Chan back to the floor, went out and summoned a hospital robot. Sil-Chan regained consciousness while the robot was lifting him. “Sorry to go out on you like that,” he said. “I—”

The message visor on the director’s desk chimed. Coogan pushed the response switch, scanned the words of a visual message, blanked the screen and turned back to Sil-Chan. “You’ll have to be treated here,” he said. “Couldn’t risk carrying you through the corridors right now.”

O O O

The spy beam hummed at the door. Coogan pushed Sil-Chan behind the panel, closed it. Pchak strode into the office, a blaster in his hand, two guards behind him. The general glanced at the hospital robot, looked at Coogan. “Where’s the man that robot was called to treat?”

The last guard into the office closed the door, drew his blaster.

“Talk or you’ll be cut down where you stand,” said Pchak.

The showdown,
thought Coogan. He said, “These hospital robots are a peculiar kind of creature, general. They don’t have the full prime directive against harming humans because sometimes they have to choose between saving one person and letting another one die. I can tell this robot that if I’m harmed it must give all of you an overdose of the most virulent poison it carries in its hypo arm. I informed the robot that this action will save my life. It naturally is loyal to the Library and will do exactly what I have just now told it to do.”

Pchak’s face tightened. He raised the blaster slightly.

“Unless you wish to die in agony, place your blasters on my desk,” said Coogan.

“I won’t,” said Pchak. “Now what’re you going to do?”

“Your blasters can kill me,” said Coogan, “but they won’t stop that robot until it has carried out my order.”

Pchak’s finger began to tighten on the trigger. “Then let’s give it the—”

The sharp
blat!
of an energy bolt filled the room. Pchak slumped. The guard behind him skirted the robot fearfully, put his blaster on Coogan’s desk. The weapon smelled faintly of ozone from the blast that had killed Pchak. “Call that thing off me now,” said the man, staring at the robot.

Coogan looked at the other guard. “You, too,” he said.

The other man came around behind the robot, put his weapon on the desk. Coogan picked up one of the weapons. It felt strange in his hand.

“You’re not going to turn that thing loose on us now, are you?” asked the second guard. He seemed unable to take his gaze from the robot.

Coogan glanced down at the scarab shape of the mechanical with its flat pad extensors and back hooks for carrying a stretcher. He wondered what the two men would do if he told them the thing Pchak had undoubtedly known—that the robot could take no overt action against a human, that his words had been a lie.

The first guard said, “Look, we’re on your side now. We’ll tell you everything. Just before he came down here, Pchak got word that Leader Adams was coming and—”

“Adams!” Coogan barked the word. He thought,
Adams coming! How to turn that to advantage?
He looked at the first guard. “You were with Pchak when he came the first day, weren’t you?”

“I was his personal guard,” said the man.

Coogan scooped the other blaster off his desk, backed away. “All right. When Adams lands, you get on that visor and tell him Pchak wishes to see him down here. With Adams a hostage, I can get the rest to lay down their arms.”

“But—” said the guard.

“One false move and I turn that robot loose on you,” said Coogan.

The guard’s throat worked visibly. He said, “We’ll do it. Only I don’t see how you can get the whole government to give up just because—”

“Then stop thinking,” said Coogan. “Just get Adams down here.” He backed against the control wall and waited.

O O O

“I don’t understand,” said Sil-Chan.

The Mundial native sat in a chair across the desk from Coogan. A fresh Library uniform bulged over Sil-Chan’s bandaged shoulder. “You pound it into us that we have to obey,” he said. “You tell us we can’t go against the Code. Then at the last minute you turn around and throw a blaster on the whole crew and toss them into the hospital’s violent ward.”

“I don’t think they can get out of there,” said Coogan.

“Not with all those guards around them,” said Sil-Chan. “But it’s still disobedience and that’s against the Code.” He held up a hand, palm toward Coogan. “Not that I’m objecting, you understand. It’s what I was advocating all along.”

“That’s where you’re mistaken,” said Coogan. “People were perfectly willing to ignore the Library and its silly broadcasts as long as that information was available. Then the broadcasts were stopped by government order.”

“But—” Sil-Chan shook his head.

“There’s another new government,” said Coogan. “Leader Adams was booted out because he told people they couldn’t have something. That’s bad policy for a politician. They stay in office by telling people they can
have
things.”

Sil-Chan said, “Well, where does—”

“Right, after you came stumbling in here,” said Coogan, “I received a general order from the new government which I was only too happy to obey. It said that Leader Adams was a fugitive and any person encountering him was empowered to arrest him and hold him for trial.” Coogan arose, strode around to Sil-Chan, who also got to his feet. “So you see,” said Coogan, “I did it all by obeying the government.”

The Mundial native glanced across Coogan’s desk, suddenly smiled and went around to the control wall. “And you got me with a tricky thing like this lever.” He put a hand on the lever with which Coogan had forced his submission.

Coogan’s foot caught Sil-Chan’s hand and kicked it away before the little man could depress the lever.

Sil-Chan backed away, shaking his bruised hand. “Ouch!” He looked up at Coogan. “What in the name of—”

The director worked a lever higher on the wall and the panel made a quarter turn. He darted behind the wall, began ripping wires from a series of lower connections. Presently, he stepped out. There were beads of perspiration on his forehead.

Sil-Chan stared at the lever he had touched. “Oh, no—” he said. “You didn’t
really
hook that to the grav unit!”

Coogan nodded mutely.

Eyes widening, Sil-Chan backed against the desk, sat on it. “Then you weren’t certain obedience would work, that—”

“No, I wasn’t,” growled Coogan.

Sil-Chan smiled. “Well, now, there’s a piece of information that ought to be worth something.” The smile widened to a grin. “What’s my silence worth?”

The director slowly straightened his shoulders. He wet his lips with his tongue. “I’ll tell you, Toris. Since you were to get this position anyway, I’ll tell you what it’s worth to me.” Coogan smiled, a slow, knowing smile that made Sil-Chan squint his eyes.

“You’re my successor,” said Coogan.

***

PART II

Whenever Sooma Sil-Chan moved along these lower corridors of the Library Planet, he liked to think of his ancestors marching through these ancient spaces. Family history was a special favorite in his studies and he felt that he knew all of those people intimately, their crises, their victories—all preserved in the archival records these thousands of years. His thirty-times removed grandfather, Toris, had paced along this very corridor every day of that long-gone life.

Robot menials made way for him and Sooma knew that at least
parts
of some of these very robots had made way for that other Sil-Chan. The menials were manufactured to last. There was one of them down in his own office, Archival Chief Accountancy, that was known to have gone without need of repair for twenty-one human generations.

The fandoor of the Director’s office opened before him and Sooma Sil-Chan put on his best mask of efficiency. There had been no hint at why Director Patterson Tchung had summoned the Chief Accountant. It was probably some simple matter, but Tchung was notorious as a boring stickler for detail. The Director’s mouth apparently could ramble on for hours while everyone around him battled ennui.

Sil-Chan stepped into the Director’s presence, heard the fandoor seal.

Patterson Tchung sat behind his glistening desk like an ancient simian, his characteristic scowl reduced to a squinting of the brown eyes. Wisps of black hair trailed across Tchung’s mostly-bald pate and his thin lips were drawn into a tight line which Sil-Chan could not interpret. Disapproval?

Even before Sil-Chan took a seat across from him, Tchung began speaking:

“Terrible problem, Sooma. Terrible.”

Sil-Chan eased himself into the cushioned chair carefully. He had never heard that tone from Tchung before. Sil-Chan cast a quick look around the Director’s office, wondering if it contained evidence of this “Terrible problem.” The walls which were focus rhomboids for realized images had been silenced. They presented a uniform silver grey. The only touches of color in the office were behind the Director—a low table cluttered with curios, each one a story from some far-ranging collection ship of this “Pack Rat Planet.” There was a gold statuette from the Researchers of Naos, an arrow thorn from Jacun, a tiny mound of red Atikan whisper seeds in their ceremonial fiber cup of gleaming purple … even an Eridanus fire scroll with its flameletters.…

“Terrible,” Tchung repeated. “We will be destroyed within six months unless we solve it. After all of these thousands of years … this!”

Sil-Chan, familiar with Tchung’s hyperbole as well as with his ability to bore even the dullest of Library workers, wanted to smile, but there was something in Tchung’s manner, something undefinably odd.

Tchung leaned forward and studied his assistant. Sil-Chan was a large man with a square, rather handsome face, green eyes under brows so blonde as to be almost invisible. His hair, of the same pale ivory, was close cropped, a new fashion among the younger archivists.

Misgivings began to fill the Director’s mind.
Can this be the man upon whom our survival depends?
The nostrils of Tchung’s high-ridged nose flared briefly, his eyes opened wide. He took a deep breath and calmed himself. There could be no turning back.

“Sooma, my young friend, you may be our only hope,” Tchung said.

“What? I don’t …”

“Of course you don’t. But those government accountants who …”

“Those jackals I’ve been guiding through our files?”

“Those accountants,” Tchung corrected him.

“Have I done something wrong? I mean …”

“No!” Tchung passed a hand over his eyes. “I must obey and yet I cannot.”

Now, Sil-Chan saw at least the core of Tchung’s disturbance. Galactic Archives—this Library Planet—had existed for thousands of years by the absolute dictum that its workers must obey the government—no matter the government. The accountants from the current government had descended upon them a fortnight ago, sneering at the “Pack Rats,” demanding this record and that record. Something about that event had created a dilemma for Tchung.

“What’s the problem?” Sil-Chan asked.

“Those accountants came from a war monitor which is parked in orbit above us. Accountants do not need a war monitor.”

Sil-Chan stared at the Director in silence.
Was that it? Could that possibly constitute the essence of Tchung’s upset?
Sil-Chan thought of a giant war monitor circling over the park-like surface of this unique planet. Up there lay serenity and open vistas, forests and lakes and rivers—even a few low mountains. But down here, in fact all the way to the planet’s core, was a honeycombed hive of storage and recording activity. The Library collection ships went out and came back with their information and their curios. The random-selection system at the heart of the planet’s activity, chosen from all of that accumulated material and broadcast thousands of programs daily all across the known universe—a bit of this and a bit of that, sometimes interesting, but mostly boring … just as boring as old Tchung here.

“That does not strike me as necessarily a terrible problem,” Sil-Chan said.

“There is more. Believe me, there is more.”

Tchung wondered how he could unfold the problem for the younger man and still keep Sil-Chan obedient to the code. It was such a complex problem.…

Sil-Chan sighed. Better men than he had despaired of ever bringing Tchung directly to the point. The man was a committed wanderer. And if the presence of a war monitor was all that …

For his part, Tchung’s thoughts were on the government accountants in their cell-like rooms of this hive planet—the eager men pouring over Archival records, bent on paring down the budget until this ancient institution died. And those men were on the trail of the things they needed.

“I am forced to remind you of our Code,” Tchung said. “Obedience to government. That one rule has kept us alive through crisis after crisis and through more than five thousand governments.”

“The Code, yes. I saw that you …”

“We are here to preserve the present for the future—any present for any future. Wherever the curiosity of our collectors takes them, that is what we preserve.”

“All right! What has happened?”

“Although this crisis may very well be our last one, Sooma, you are to do nothing, think nothing, say nothing that may be construed even remotely as disobedience to the government.”

“Agreed! Agreed!”

“Patience, my young friend. Patience.”

Again, Tchung covered his eyes with a hand.
This is the tool upon which I depend. This childless … bachelor … so intent upon his career that he has no time for home and mate … no thoughts at all for the long endurance which is the survival of us all. This youth … this callow … He’s not yet fifty and he …

“Are you ill, sir?” Sil-Chan asked.

Tchung lowered his hand, opened his eyes. “No. You were correct, of course, to call those accountants jackals. They will feast themselves on anything. They mean to destroy us.”

“Just because a war monitor …”

“They mean to destroy us. I assure you of this.”

“What makes you think that?”

Director Tchung stared over Sil-Chan’s head at an empty space above the fandoor.
So impatient! When I was his age I was already married and with two children. How can Records name Sil-Chan as my most logical successor? A man requires familial stability for this position.

“There is no doubt whatsoever about my assessment of our peril,” Tchung said.

The wordy old fool!

Sil-Chan hitched himself forward in his chair. “But how …”

“One of our random broadcasts reviewed an ancient play of the Trosair period. It was a humorous review, in fact very amusing—a farce. It poked fun at an imaginary government called The Myrmidion Enclave.”

Sil-Chan felt his mouth go dry. “Myrmidion …”

“Indeed—a cosmic jest. Coincidence? Tell that to our government. Tell that to Supreme Imperator Hobart of Myrmid. Tell it to the Myrmid Enclave.”

“It has to be a coincidence,” Sil-Chan said. “We’ll show them how the random selection system works. No one interferes with that. We’ll …”

“The accountants come directly from Hobart of Myrmid. Our own Records section, the Central Computer—all agree that the accountants have orders to destroy us.”

“Then we’ll fight!”

“We will not fight!” Tchung sank back into his chair, breathing heavily. “At least, we will not offer them violence.”

“Then let’s send out collection ships to enlist help for …”

“The accountants have already requisitioned every gram of fuel wire on the planet. Our ships are grounded.”

“They can’t do that! We …”

“They are the government,” Tchung reminded him. “And we obey the government.”

Sil-Chan stared at the curios behind the Director.
No more collection ships going out? No more additions to the Archives?

“I suppose our great age is against us,” Tchung said. “We’ve existed so long, it was inevitable that one day we would have to cope with … with coincidence.”

“Perhaps if we seceded from …”

“Hah!” Tchung glowered at his subordinate. “And us a hollow ball of storage space full of records and artifacts! We’re completely dependent upon Galactic subsidy. We’ve nothing to draw upon to support ourselves or to fuel our collection ships. We’ve only one commodity—the stored knowledge and information. We’re mankind’s memory. It has suddenly been rediscovered that certain memories can be dangerous.”

“What can we …”

“Not we,
you.”
Tchung pointed a finger at him. “You can anticipate that snooping accountant staff. You must justify every expenditure, every credit that we …”

“Sir? Nothing I do can justify us if they don’t want to accept our arguments.”

Tchung drew in a deep breath, exhaled slowly. “Yes, of course. But the government accountants are inquiring into the Dornbaker Account. I want …”

“Dornbaker Account?” Sil-Chan stared in puzzlement at the Director.

“Yes, the Dornbaker Account. I summoned you because the discrepancies are enormous. I want you to …”

“I’ve never heard of a Dornbaker Account.”

Tchung stared at him. “But you’re the Chief Accountant!”

“I know, sir, but …”

“Wait.” Tchung reached into the message chute behind his desk, retrieved a thick sheaf of inter-Library micros and fed them into the player above the chute. “I asked for the actual material when it … I mean, I didn’t want this playing over any of our internal circuits.”

“If it’s sensitive, I can understand the secrecy, sir. But that’s quite a package. All of that in one account?”

“It’s a condensation, Sooma. A condensation.”

“But why … I mean, if I’m to shepherd these accountants around and … Sir, I’ve never heard of this Dornbaker Account. I swear it. What is it?”

Tchung nodded. “I suspected that. You understand that I do not mistrust your competency. But I was naturally worried about the activities of these … as you say, jackals. I thought I would look into the larger expenses, find what …”

“That’s the very thing I’ve been doing, sir. I have my people poring over everything.”

“Not quite everything. You see, I requested the records on all large expenses of long standing that have not been reviewed or readjusted for several centuries.”

Tchung cleared his throat.

“So?”

“I … uh … turned over the preliminary examination to an assistant. He was distracted for a few days over the costs in the sub-micro refiling system. We all know
that’s
top priority if we ever hope to effect any big savings in … Oh, dear. I’m explaining this badly.”

“What did your assistant find?”

“The Dornbaker Account. For three days we have been receiving nothing but material on this Dornbaker Account.”

“One account?”

“That’s why I was so sure that my Chief Accountant would know what …”

Sil-Chan pressed backward into his chair. “Impossible! There’s no account in our records that big.”

“I’m afraid there’s at least one such account. Material on it is still pouring out. The last running tab showed eighteen billion stellars spent on the Dornbaker Account in the first seven months of this fiscal year.”

Sil-Chan opened his mouth, closed it without a word. Then: “I shall resign immediately, of course. I cannot …”

“Oh, don’t be a fool! Not a complete fool, at least.”

“Sir, I don’t understand how you got these records and we in Accountancy have never heard of them.”

“It was the way I phrased my request. How do you summon the records each year?”

“Accounts for readjustment, of course.”

“I asked for
all
large expenses.”

Sil-Chan crimsoned.

“Don’t blame yourself, my boy,” Tchung said. “I know the procedure. How could you suspect such a …”

“Even so, our cross-checks and random accounting procedures … anything that big has to be justified in the budgets!”

“It was marked DA. Does that suggest anything to you?”

“Deteriorated Accumulation—the fuel budget! Deteriorated fuel. I see! It was …”

“… Thrown in with fuel costs. They were large, but we expect them to be large and …”

“Doesn’t the Central Computer explain this Dornbaker Account?”

Tchung referred to the micro projection on his desk, flipped switches and read from the projection. “It refers to Dornbaker access, Dornbaker counterbalance—that’s one million six hundred and eight thousand stellars annually just for robot upkeep—and there’s Dornbaker re-routing and …” Tchung mopped his forehead. “It takes forty-two minutes just to list the subsections of this account. I won’t go on with it.”

Sil-Chan swallowed in a dry throat. “Forty-two minutes just to … Did you say
counterbalance?”

“Yes.”

“There’s obviously some stupid error here, sir. How could …”

“No error. When I saw counterbalance, I began to suspect that … well … You must understand, Sooma, that some matters are reserved for the Director. There’s a question of legality here. It seems that we don’t have the legal right to readjust this account.”

“But all that money, sir. How long since that account has even been studied for possible …”