The Eskimo Invasion (44 page)

 

 

Mao III laughed as if he liked to hear his own voice. "Times have changed
since my grandfather was Chairman. He had no Dream Persons to perplex him.
Surely you CIA assassins do not really believe that American Eskimos
or even a sentient strain of American Dream Persons could arouse our
Dream Persons."

 

 

This was a statement rather than a question. Like other leaders,
Mao III swept into a monologue. "It is not psychologically possible
for Dream Persons to take the aggressive initiative necessary for
revolution. Your Eskimos cannot arouse our Dream Persons because there
is nothing to arouse. If your heavily armed corpses are not Eskimos,
if they are American Dream Persons, the joke is even stranger. This is
like sending the blind to teach the blind how to see."

 

 

Dr. West felt physically ill, suspecting the black aircraft had been
purposely crashed by the Harvard Circle. The planeload of Esks might be
simply to remind the Chinese that the CIA's Esk expert was filed away
somewhere in a Peking prison. Had those Harvard sons of bitches in effect
murdered twelve Esks as another little move in the attempt to place an
American face to face with Mao III? His distance to Mao III was about
fifteen feet. What did the Harvard Circle expect him to do, explode --
or strangle Mao III with his bare hands?

 

 

" -- Marxist-Maoists are anti-Malthusian," Mao III was saying, "because
we have faith in mankind's ability to find new food supplies, new living
space beneath the sea, new planets. There cannot be too many Chinese
when there is so much work to be done. For the present, there cannot
be too many Dream Persons. It is strange that the CIA would send you
to China. From the beginning you have had a closed mind concerning the
Esks. Dr. West, what rational message could you possibly bring?"

 

 

Dr. West stood there swaying. He did not know. If the Harvard Circle had
given him a message for Mao III, it was lost or buried too deep in his skull.
He stood face to face with Mao III and no message had been cued.

 

 

" -- Marxist-Maoist position regarding the origin of the Dream Person,"
Mao III was orating, "is that the renewed thermonuclear testing by Russia
in the Arctic during the 1970s caused the mutation. No other nation
would have both the vicious deviationist disregard for human life and
the technological clumsiness to explode weapons so unexpectedly filthy
with radioactive cesium."

 

 

This cued the one track in Dr. West's mind. "The mutation theory has no
basis in fa- "

 

 

"The lichens, the little plants on Arctic rocks were contaminated with
radioactive cesium." Mao III's voice swept on emotionally, drowning
Dr. West's voice. "The lichens were like rice to the herds of caribou,
and radioactive cesium concentrated in certain organs of these extinct
beasts who were eaten by the Eskimos, who are an Oriental people. Don't
tell me there was no mutation!"

 

 

Mao III gasped for breath, evidently emotionally involved with his
interpretation of the Esks. "The most important mutation in the world took
place on the Boothia Peninsula in the Canadian Northwest Territories. An
Oriental child was born.

 

 

"Even though there were not Three Wise Men in attendance, even though
no angels sang," Mao III laughed breathlessly, "the metabolism of this
child was at least three times as efficient and he matured in one-sixth
as many years as other children. Whenever this precocious Eskimo mated,
from each conception to the time of birth was only a month."

 

 

Near Mao III's right hand gleamed a glass of water. He looked at it
longingly. "The rapid multiplication of these Dream Persons has proved
vital to the rightful growth of the Chinese Federation of Nations. My
original decision to rescue the Eskimos from imperialist genocide has
been proven correct."

 

 

Mao III's right hand jerked and he stared at Dr. West. " -- I recall from
the United Nations discussions of seventeen years ago, your own theory of
the origin of that first Dream Person was more unlikely and -- sinister."

 

 

"I was the first -- I was encamped on the Boothia Peninsula within twenty
years after the event took place." Dr. West spoke quickly. "I tried to
interview the Eskimos who -- "

 

 

"There is no need for you to defend your theory," Mao III interrupted.
"You have attempted to justify your mass murder on many occasions.
I, for one, would be equally disturbed if I believed your theory."

 

 

Mao III's right hand made a tentative movement toward the glass of water.
"At the present time it is to the advantage of the Chinese Federation
of Nations to breed several billion more Dream Persons at the very least."

 

 

"And drown the world!"

 

 

"Are you worried about the disappearance of hairy, Anglo-Saxon man?
Because the Dream Person's traits invariably are dominant?" Mao III laughed.
"Perhaps the world would be a happier and more peaceful place if all peoples
were absorbed by the Dream Persons?"

 

 

Mao III's eyes narrowed. "Perhaps you are a member of an extremist group
in the United States. In angry disagreement with your own Government,
you are plotting the violent elimination of Esks everywhere. Are you sure
there is not already a political splinter group in the United States
which has decided that I am a Dream Person, that even your President
hides an Esk in his ancestry. It cannot be true. Dream Persons are
remarkably unqualified for the violent leadership that is necessary in
the world today."

 

 

Awkwardly, Mao III's paralyzed right hand attempted to reach the glass.
"The Chinese people and all the peace-loving peoples of the world --
know that the vicious racist American propaganda campaign claiming
Chinese maltreatment of the Esks is a hypocritical attempt to pressure
the Chinese Federation of Nations into unilaterally limiting our greatest
source of agricultural growth, our Dream Persons!"

 

 

Dr. West watched the shivering hand. Instinctively, because he was a
fellow human being, his eyes wanted Mao III's hand to be able to reach,
to grasp the glass of water.

 

 

"Ah!" Mao III proudly clutched the glass in his hand. Shuddering, he raised
it to his lips and drank deeply.

 

 

When he had finished, an attendant stepped from the shadows to take the
glass. "No, no," Mao III coughed. "This time, this time I will not drop
it -- "

 

 

Dr. West's eyes concentrated on the cautiously moving hand on its long
journey with the empty glass down toward the table. The glass clunked
on the table.

 

 

"Ah! You see I am making great improvement. Until tonight I always broke
the glass. I am informed you originally were a medical doctor who attempted
to save lives rather than destroy them? If so, you will understand the
importance in my condition of such a sudden improvement. It was as if
a voice in my head was telling my hand to move downward. Amazingly, my
hand obeyed. No doubt new nerve wires have been growing as my doctors
promised, growing past the dead spot in my brain, and tonight contact
is made! Look at this. I am going to raise my arm. Soon, you will see,
soon I will stand before the people again. I will astound the world with
my words. This is the greatest moment in the history of the world!"

 

 

While Dr. West's eyes watched, Mao III tried to stand up.

 

 

"I am standing!"

 

 

Fall, you bigmouthed little tyrant! Dr. West thought.

 

 

Mao III pitched forward, upsetting the table and glass. Attendants sprang
from the shadows to assist Mao III. An attendant's hand closed on Dr. West's
elbow to lead him from the room.

 

 

Tell them to leave me alone! Dr. West thought.

 

 

"Leave him alone," Mao III gasped.

 

 

Tell them to bring me a chair!

 

 

"Bring him a chair." Mao III collapsed on his couch.

 

 

Dr. West sat down. His heavy legs were twitching, and he was reminded
of Galvani's early experiments with electricity and a frog's legs. His
legs tingled. His face felt numb with shock.

 

 

Those incredible Harvard sons of bitches! Heavy legs, electric eels,
biopower, parapsychology, this was why they had connived to maneuver
an American into close proximity with the Chairman of the Chinese
Federation of Nations, the ruler of four-fifths of the population of
the world. Within how many feet of Mao III did he have to remain?

 

 

Dr. West was afraid he was a poor choice for this kind of power. Had the
Harvard Circle selected him because Mao III once said he wanted to meet
Dr. West eye to eye? Selected him because they thought he could control
a paralyzed dictator?

 

 

He remembered when he was a med student at Harvard, startling Tom Randolph,
who tried to laugh it off. "That's only a parlor trick."

 

 

But perhaps he did have a certain empathy and power of suggestion.
Sometimes it had extended its corona to startle imaginative persons such
as undergrad Tom Randolph. And Tom had grown. Professor Tom Randolph's
experiments at Duke University in which one soldier attempted to control
another hadn't satisfied the Defense Department. But Dr. West remembered
Tom Randolph's excuse. "A human's bio-power to broadcast his thoughts
through his neuron-electrical system is simply too weak."

 

 

But a man with biological booster batteries as powerful as electric eels'
installed in his swollen legs, Dr. West thought, such a man close enough --
Tell them to bring me a glass of water.

 

 

"Bring him a glass of water," Mao III murmured hollowly from his couch.

 

 

Because there were no peculiar reactions from the attendants in the room,
Dr. West concluded that he had been neatly conditioned to focus his control
at only one man, Mao III.

 

 

Tell them to prepare a couch for me. Tell them you believe I have a
healing power. When I am near you, your paralysis is cured.

 

 

When the water was brought, Dr. West was afraid to drink. It might be
poisoned. He knew he would have to suppress such fears. Now every move
would be into the unknown.

 

 

When the couch was brought, Dr. West was afraid to sleep. What was going
on in Mao III's head? The man had not spoken or moved since --

 

 

"I move. I speak," Mao III said. "What do you wish to speak about?"

 

 

Sleep until I awaken you. Dr. West lay there staring up at the triumphantly
grinning faces of the Harvard Circle.

 

 

Dr. George Bruning, boy wonder, geophysicist, astronaut, political climber,
and buddy of the President.

 

 

Dr. Sam Wynoski, chemopsychiatrist.

 

 

Dr. Fred Gatson, bacteriologist and ladder climber.

 

 

Dr. Einar Johansen, neurosurgeon and electric eel fancier.

 

 

Dr. Tom Randolph, parapsychologist.

 

 

You CIA Sons of bitches, Dr. West thought so gently that Mao III did not
awaken, you've succeeded in planting your man in Peking.

 

 

But am I your man? You may have implanted general guidelines in my skull
such as "love America." But you could never prepare me for all the quick
and unexpected decisions a new dictator must make. I have a feeling I am
free now -- to do what I want.

 

 

Within a few days we'll find out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

9. UNDERGROUND DYNASTY

 

 

Deep within the assassin-proof vault, a traditional dragon symbolizing good
fortune flaunted his gold-painted tail above the most important telescreen.

 

 

Across this surveillance screen moved Chiu Hsing (Saving Star) electric
fuel cell powered sedans rolling off an assembly line in distant Shanghai.
Click, televised from even further south, in Canton well-fed students
in traditional dacron robes sprang erect to face an antique blackboard
of chemical formulas.

 

 

Click, televised erect, as if disdaining underground silos and contemptuous
of strategic dispersal, protruding enormously above the pink-walled courtyard
of Peking's ancient Winter Palace, threatening nose cone symbolizing --

 

 

"Now show what's really important," Dr. West challenged. "We both know what
feeds all this -- "

 

 

Tapeworm, you force me too much pain, the protesting thought flickered
faintly within Dr. West's brain.

 

 

Beside Dr. West, the thin fingers on the control console remained
obstinately motionless. Dr. West could feel the other man's resistance
like sparks within his own skull. Authoritatively, Dr. West withdrew his
support. Beside him, the opposing face sagged while paralysis again spread
from the stroke-damaged brain. Dr. West returned his mental support,
and those narrowing eyes widened.

 

 

The two men were alone in the Command Vault beneath Peking, but they were
not alone.

 

 

"Now!" Dr. West commanded aloud, and beside him the unparalyzed fingers
moved more obediently across the numbered push buttons on the control
console.

 

 

Click, on the surveillance screen, shimmering across a thousand miles,
appeared the contorted mountains of Szechwan Province, laboriously
terraced. Up new tiers of glittering mountain rice paddies, swarming
shapes with hoes clambered into graying rain.

 

 

Closer