The Gentle Seduction (7 page)
"Perhaps."
We continued.
She was a masterful therapist; I do not know when the trance ended, but when I looked at her and saw her as a human being, I was far back up the rode toward sanity. We crossed the sands to a limousine, to take us into town. I raised my eyebrows. "A limo?"
"Of course. What else would the heiress to the Grantship of Summerform travel in?"
"The heiress!" In horror, I grabbed her by the shoulders. "You're the next target! We have to find you a safe place!" I raised my arm. "Safire, send Glitter as fast as she'll fly." I started searching the skies for cruisers, and blizzards, and anything else the mind of an evil Master might conceive.
She slipped from my touch. "Of course I'm your next target, silly." She looked puzzled for a moment. "Why would you seek a place of safety for me? You know it's too late."
"What?!"
"The poison. I know I'm dying." She brushed her hand through my hair. "I was hoping you'd consider giving me the antidote. I love the people of Forma. I believe you do, too." She looked away for a moment. "Why then are you killing?"
"I'm not!" I tried to scream, but the air scorched my lungs. "It's a set up!"
She seemed puzzled. "I believe I know you now. You are here to help the people of Forma. You are a good man. If my death will help, I accept it. "
"Have you been poisoned?" I tried to get some sense out of this conversation. "I'll run every test 1 know. We'll find an antidote." I was talking nonsense, of course; there are billions of poisons in the universe that cannot be counteracted, poisons that strike the brain so that rvoii Transfer cannot help. Death was still my master.
She knew it, too. Her expression became even more peaceful. "Then you
aren't
the assassin."
"NO! NO!" I held my head in my hands.
She touched me. "You have to promise me something."
I looked at her. "What?"
"I know you will destroy the person who's behind this. But you must promise me that first, you'll get even by
saving Forma
. You have the tools, and the talent, and now again you have the sanity. Promise me that you'll
save Forma
before killing my killer."
At the time, numb as I was, it seemed a tiny thing. "I promise."
"Thank you." She jerked, a broken motion that was not her own. I held her close. "A three day poison," she mused, taking a shuddering breath. "Just long enough . . . the enemy . . . how did he know?"
An ambulance slid to a stop beside us, and two men leaped out to carry her away. I stared in amazed horror. "We've been on call," the medic explained as they pulled her from me and put her in the back. They left me alone.
Glitter came into sight; I boarded her.
On my first sip of Aldebarone wine I choked. Furious at my weakness, I forced the whole glassful down in one gulp and refilled it.
On my next sip I choked again. In helpless fury I hurled the glass against the wall. The glass didn't even give me the satisfaction of breaking. A robot scurried in to clean up; in minutes, all sign of my anger had disappeared into time's passage.
Karmel, the heiress to the Grantship of Summerform, had ruined my one path to ruination. I couldn't even escape into a drunken stupor any more. I was trapped with my memories.
With a deep breath I swore revenge, again. And again I remembered the promise I had made, to save Forma first.
I laughed, maliciously. It would be ridiculously easy to save Forma. The Playmaster had made a terrible mistake setting me up as the murderer, because he had also set me up as the invincible power behind the murders. The whole planet trembled at my touch, the touch of the assassin.
When I had announced from Glitter that I was departing, but that I would return the following day, all of Forma jumped to clear airspace; they knew I would only announce my plans if I could not be stopped.
They had seen me die on stage, under the eyes of their own cameras, in Springform. Yet I had lived to kill again in Summer. They thought I was an immortal god. They were fools.
Today, four more people would die.
But perhaps other people's lives, or at least some of the time of their lives, would be saved.
"Safire?"
"Yes, Gibs."
"Call the heads of state of Forma."
"All at once?"
"Oh, start with the Directress of Winterform."
One by one Safire and I went through the names, telling them to meet me in sixteen hours at Skycrest for a brief trip to the radiation belt.
The Sirians and Omegarans were furious, I was sure; but they could only attack me if they attacked
together
, in mutual trust. I pointed out to the Sirian commander that the Omegaran commander looked the right age to need a mindshift; I made a reciprocal comment to the Omegaran. Fearful that I had made a deal with their enemy, each fumed in silence. Each held his fleet idle.
At the appointed time, I ferried the Forman leaders in Glitter up to the Safire. They were impressed, which was why I took them aloft: Safire is a
big
ship. She carries a cargo of 2000 clone bodies, with the facilities to manufacture more, plus two entire Transfer systems (in case one breaks down), enough room for a twenty man crew (though I live alone most of the time), and a composite arsenal of all the deadliest weapons devised by the most advanced planets in the reaches of Man.
I looked at my guests from the head of the conference table. There was the Grantsman of Summerform with his wife; they seemed more concerned with their own lives than with the death of their daughter Karmel. That concern explained why I had met with Karmel on the beach and had been touched by her with impunity: the Grantsman had been afraid to interfere. I could understand their concern; I could not appreciate it. Karmel had been far more worthy than her parents.
There was Hawk Keensight of Springform. I smiled at him; he sweated. I suspected he might know more about the Playmaster. In time he would tell me everything he knew. People talk a great deal when their lives are at stake.
There was President Bardon of Fallform. He was my only current suspect for Playmaster, though Safire had already told me he lacked the tungstalloy skull of one with many Transfers. Also, he was terrified that he would not receive Transfer, a puzzling level of fear for the one I sought. It mattered little; he too would speak to me when his time came to lie beneath my knife.
And there was the Directress of Winterform. Her hair was silver, and she needed Transfer soon, or it would be too late. Yet she did not flinch under my steady gaze. She was a truly regal lady.
"So far, I have killed only secondary leaders in your governments," I began. "But as you now see, the execution of those who don't measure up is the least of my tools. I am a mindshifter first, and an assassin second.
"I have bad news for you," I continued. "The Sirians and the Omegarans are powerless, here on the Frontier." I stood erect, hands behind my back. It had been long since I projected not merely presence, but power; yet I remembered. "Power on Forma lies with the Frontier mindshifter in whose jurisdiction you lie." I smiled. "My jurisdiction."
I explained to them the nature of the system. They believed. I explained to them what would have to happen, if any of them hoped for a second lifetime. They understood. I appointed a council of respected scientistsfrom each form, to mediate the use of the radiation belt. They accepted.
The war ended.
I returned the leaders to their respective peoples. The Directress of Winterform stayed long enough to have a private chat. She was a good person. I would arrange her Transfer.
I shuddered; I still didn't know if I could shift a mind. I didn't want to find out.
The Playmaster seemed somehow far from my mind; I basked for a moment in knowing that I had done a good thing, that with the end of the feud between the forms, thousands of people would live better lives.
I took Glitter back into the Rift, where I had met Sharyn. As I stepped into the burned-out clearing I could smell the trees and the plants, growing fast to heal the wound. The sun sat in its low throne, frozen between the mountain ridges, staring at the Eye of Forma. I walked through the quiet rustle of the leaves.
When I returned, I heard a woman's voice singing, from inside Glitter. It was not Safire's voice.
With a burst of speed I jumped through the hatch to surprise the intruder.
She turned from her inspection of my paintings. "Have you found the Master yet?"
"No." I studied her; she didn't appear to be armed. "Get out of my ship."
She laughed; it came from inside, through many layers, as had Keara's laughter.
"Do you still seek the Master?" she asked.
"Yes."
She shook her head lightly, with a knowledge of her own power that reminded me of Sharyn. "You must stop your search," she whispered. "You will not find what you seek." She stared at me, with the harsh gaze only Rainbow could bestow.
I stood speechless.
She moved forward, flowing like water, flowing like Karmel.
"They're dead!" I cried, images of the past cascading through my head.
"They're gone," she continued so softly.
We stood locked in tableau. "You have lived many lives," I accused her.
"Yes." She closed her eyes in pain. "Even on this one planet, I have worn many bodies." She opened her eyes. "In other lives I have been an actress. And a mindshifter. Lately, I have been a teacher."
I choked. "Why did you do this?"
"I didn't want to kill anyone, yet I had to make them understand how easily they
could
be killed. The Sirians had completely brainwashed them by the time we investigated." She smiled. "I had started working my way through the power structures, without a real plan, when
you
arrived. Then, you gave me your idea for assassinations. I only wish I had trusted you more, to let you know."
"Don't apologize." Another thought struck me. "Wendy?"
The woman looked away. "I told her to let you protect yourself. I told her you could survive in ways she'd never dreamed. She didn't believe me."
"You, too, are only a mortal god."
She seemed amused. "No. I am only a mortal woman." She looked at me again, almost afraid. "I have used you."
I thought about it. Today, for the first time in a lifetime, I had a clear mind. "You gave me purpose."
"I hurt you."
"You gave me hope."
"You should hate me."
"I must love you." I took her in my arms. We stood embraced for a long moment.
"Safire," I commanded, "dim the lights." The sharp edges of the room faded.
"Safire," the woman said, "gentle music." A waltz began to play.
I softened my hold on my lady. "What is your name?" I asked.
She laughed. "I have held a thousand names. Yet I am who I am. Name me." We began to dance.
Tomorrow, four more people would live.
Too Loving A Touch
Too many cash prizes, offered by skeptics investigating psychic powers, have gone unclaimed for the rational mind to take claims of extrasensory perception too seriously.
And yet I still remember an incident from my adolescence, when I desperately needed a young woman's phone number (well, it seemed desperate at the time: if I did not get her number in the next 48 hours, I knew my life would be ruined). I remember lying in bed, feverish with my horror that my last opportunity for happiness would pass me by. I remember how loud and fast my heartbeat grew, how dry my mouth became, how totally my reasoning power left me.
So I lay there unable to think or sleep. Then suddenly I was calm. My heart stopped racing, and I was happy. For no clear or compelling reason, I was quite sure that a particular friend of mine would call, and that he would have the magic number even though he had no more access to the person or the number than I.
Then the phone rang.
The psychologists of today have a boxful of explanations for such events. I myself prefer any one of a dozen of their explanations to the mystical alternative. Still, it is most important to remember the incidents in your life that violate your expectations. Psychologists have also proved that the surprising, disconcerting incidents are the ones we are most likely to forget. This is perhaps the ultimate tragedy—for these incidents are the only ones that point out the flaws in our views, that would enable us to fix and improve the models of the world we use to mold our expectations.
And let's face it—no matter how many times we prove that ESP does not exist, we will never be able to disprove it entirely. Just as the experiments in physics that endlessly seek a proton decay can only increase the number of billions of protons needed to detect one, so we can only restrict the probability of psychic events to increasingly smaller odds. We can never reach zero.
And for anyone who believes in psychic phenomenon, I have good news as well: I have every faith that, if someone were to prove the existence of ESP one day, the physicists and the psychologists would have plausible explanations for it the day after. Goodness, the people who brought us outrageously counterintuitive explanations of the universe like quantum chromodynamics and Heisenberg uncertainty should surely be able to explain a simple thing like telepathy!
Too Loving A Touch
Veddin's eyes closed as his warship skipped into normal space. His concentration focussed on his ship's sensors. Images poured through the shiplink embedded in his cerebellum. He had expected to find yet another Squishy ambush, but he floated safe and easy amidst his own robot fleet.
He opened his eyes, to see the beauty of normal space himself. The hard points of starlight and the brilliant sun of the Hydra system blazed with cheer.
Veddin's vision merged again with the images from the
DareDrop
's sensors. The scene telescoped. The sun brightened, then dimmed as the
DareDrop
's computer screened its rays. Soon Hydra floated just beyond Veddin's nose. It was a lustrous blue and white jewel, unlike anything in the FreeFed. His own home planet, Kaylanx, was perhaps more colorful with its violent swirls of red, green, and violet, but Kaylanx was not
warm
, as was Hydra.
He nudged his ship towards the planet. A small contingent of the main fleet followed. Senships scattered into early-warning array around the system.
This was foolish, Veddin realized—using standard military tactics just outside the one invincible planet in the galaxy. He almost ordered the senships back to the main fleet. But with a shrug he let them go. What else could he do with them, after all? For the first time, he understood why the Directorate had let him bring his fleet; now that FreeFed had been found by the larger human civilization, the Directorate had less use for the fleet than Veddin now had for the senships.
Something about Hydra disturbed Veddin. A troubled frown formed, then faded as he realized what was missing: There were neither moons nor battle-stations around the planet. His sensors backed off a bit and caught a single space station glinting in the sun. It was surrounded by gigantic freighters from the rest of human space. They were beautiful, and Veddin felt awed by the builders of these craft that dwarfed the
DareDrop
.
He also felt an unreasonable surge of joy, being here. It was different from anything he'd ever felt before, a joy that filled parts of his soul that until now had been empty.
Alerted by the sensation, almost alarmed, Veddin searched for an explanation. Meanwhile the joy grew stronger.
"Commander of the unidentified war fleet, this is maneuver control. Please identify yourself." The voice came not through any of the
DareDrop
's communications channels, but through his mind itself. It reminded him of his first contact with a Hydran Couple, as the savage Battle of Kaylanx Moons climaxed. That had been just before the Hydrans drove the Squishy fleet terror-stricken back into their own territory.
"This is Colonel Veddin Zhukpokrovsk, from the planet of Kaylanx, requesting permission to dock," Veddin thought for the controller.
The sternness of the controller's first thought dissolved. "Veddin Zhukpokrovsk! We've been worried about you!"
Veddin must have transmitted his bafflement, because the controller went on. "The Seekers told us to expect you several days ago. When you didn't show up on schedule, Tarn and Tara Westfall became concerned—and when Tarn gets concerned,
everybody
gets concerned!"
Veddin was still baffled. He had come here to Touch Autumn Westfall, but . . .
"Tarn is her father, you ninny. Tarn and Tara are the commissioners of Hydra."
"They're what!?"
"Didn't anybody tell you that you have a psi-resonant pair bond to the commissioners' daughter?" The controller chuckled. "Probably not. The Seekers wouldn't consider it a proper thing to mention."
Veddin was still dazed; the controller's thought pattern changed, and changed subjects as well. "Dear Colonel, why'd you bring a fleet with you? You certainly don't need it, and I suspect there's a rule against it somewhere."
Veddin was still trying to understand why the speaker's "voice" had changed. There were two chuckles this time, one in each "voice." "We're a Couple, silly," they said in unison.
Veddin shook his head; of course there were two of them, forming a single psi-resonance.
"Are you going to answer our question, or are you going to try to blast us out of space?" the controllers jested.
He tried to remember their question, and answered just as they were about to repeat it. "I brought my fleet in case I was ambushed."
Loud giggles threaded through his mind. Veddin felt aggravated anger. "Thank the Lords I did, too. I would've been killed if it hadn't been for my robots."
"What?!" The laughter stopped; Veddin thought he could sense a trace of horror mixed with their shock.
He waited till the shock wore off, then told them about the ambush that occurred shortly after he left Kaylanx. Disbelief colored the controllers' thoughts so much that Veddin finally linked them with the
DareDrop
, so they could see and feel the giant hole gouged in her side by an enemy missile. If the warhead hadn't been a dud . . . well, Veddin never would have known about it.
When he finished, the controllers were grim. "We'll have to tell the commissioners. I've never heard of an attack on humans from a species that knew about us."
The Couple vanished from his mind. The unexplained joy he had felt earlier returned, even stronger now than before.
Another Couple Touched his mind. "Veddin?"
"That's me," Veddin acknowledged, still contemplating the joy.
The new Couple saw his contemplation and shared his joy. "You're getting closer to your touched-one. Autumn feels the same thing." An image of a young woman appeared in his mind, sent by Tarn and Tara Westfall—for the Westfalls were the Couple who now contacted him. Another mind touched his, and he could see through Autumn's eyes a pair of delicate woman's hands, and he could look out the cockpit of a hoverplane at the oceans below. He knew that Autumn could see the
DareDrop
's control room in much the same manner, through the link her parents provided.
"I am coming," was the message Autumn and Veddin exchanged before the contact dissolved.
"It will be better, of course, when you touch one another," the Westfalls explained to him. "For now, however, you'd better concentrate on docking. Or can your ship enter the atmosphere?"
"I can land anywhere," Veddin replied.
"Excellent. I'll put you in touch with spaceport control."
"Isn't there some kind of Customs inspection?"
"Ah, yes. Customs. Are you carrying anything dangerous—firearms, drugs, or potentially diseased foods, animals, or plants?"
"Nothing except a few gigaton-equivalents in weaponry."
"Are there safety devices to prevent misfiring?"
"Yes."
"Are you planning to use these weapons against us?"
"No."
"That's what the folks at the space station thought. Customs inspection ended."
"What?"
"Customs is much easier when you can just see what's in a person's mind. One thing, though." The thought was wryly amused.
"What's that?"
"Leave your war robots in orbit. There's really no need to land them."
"Sure." Veddin blushed an apology, but the Westfalls were already gone.
The landing was unlike any other. In the FreeFed, all ship-to-shore communication was handled via the ship's communication channels. Here, there were all the normal communication and detection electroptics, but in addition there was a mental link with the ground controller. Veddin found himself acting as a passive relay between the ship and the port.
At least he wasn't alone in being upset by the arrangement; the port controller had never dealt with a pilot who was in direct mental communication with his ship, either. "All in all, I'm glad it's over," the controller admitted to Veddin as the ship touched down. "It takes a bit to adjust to that kind of arrangement." His thoughts turned sympathetic. "I fear that for you, though, the adjusting is just about to begin."
Veddin grimaced. The Seekers, when they first told him that he was half of a Couple, warned him that Hydra was different from Kaylanx. "Less sex, more laughter," was their capsule description. It had been funny, at the time: the Seekers had been so
grave
, while discussing sex and laughter, of all things! Here, their warning took on new meaning. Veddin had had trouble just finding a traffic controller who didn't giggle incessantly. The Seekers' warning had been true, despite its irony.
And there would be other problems, Veddin realized as he looked outside at the damaged hovacar coming to meet him. Veddin knew it was damaged, because there was just an open cockpit where the sealed capsule should have been. With an effort, Veddin accepted that the hovacar was not damaged at all. Lords of Tarantell! The people on board wore no spacesuits, nor even breathing masks! They were
outside
, on the surface of a planet, without any protection whatever! It made Veddin very queasy indeed. He tried to think of the phenomenon in a different way: Here was a planet where, instead of sealing small cities, they'd simply sealed the whole planet from outside disturbances.
He still felt queasy. Well, the people were wearing more clothing than people normally wore around Kaylanx; perhaps Veddin could think of the full-length pants, shirts, and boots as a sort of very light spacesuit. A
very
light spacesuit.
He pulled on the clothes the Seekers had given him on Kaylanx. They were a bit small—even the Seekers had been unprepared for a 230-centimeter-tall ex- wrestler—but Veddin was thankful for them. He would have felt terribly exposed, standing outside on a planet with only a pair of shorts, sandals, and a utility harness.
At last he stepped out of the airlock. As Veddin came down the ship ramp, he recognized one of the three Couples waiting for him: Tarn and Tara Westfall. Each Couple stood hand in hand, fingers lightly interlaced. Meanwhile, the song of joy in Veddin's soul—Autumn's song, he realized—grew stronger.
Veddin stumbled as the world ended.
At least, it seemed like the world ended. Autumn's song just . . . stopped. For a moment Veddin was too stunned by his own loss to notice events around him.
One of the Couples screamed. Another Couple dropped to the ground, and the third Couple grabbed each other desperately.
A supply truck nearing his ship veered, coughed across the white armalloy skirt of the spaceport and crashed into a derrick. Thick smoke billowed around it.
Veddin regained partial awareness. The lost song was still his most immediate reality. When he saw the truck burning he gasped, "Autumn!" She must be in the wreckage.
Now fully aware, he ran for the truck. It was hopeless, he thought; Autumn must have died, or he would still feel
something
. Nevertheless he ran, and pulled at the crushed door. It came off easily in his hands.
There was another Couple in the truck. They seemed unhurt, yet they clawed at each other and wept, oblivious to the danger around them. "Autumn!" Veddin cried, peering through the smoke. She wasn't there. New fire belched from the truck's belly. He turned back to the hysterical Couple. "Get out!" Veddin screamed. "You'll be killed!"
They didn't respond. There wasn't time to coax. Veddin grabbed the man and hurled him from the wreckage. He took the woman's arm and dragged her away from the flames. The truck exploded. The Couple was still too close to the flames, but they seemed vaguely aware now, and they struggled away from the disaster.
Veddin wiped his brow. Where was Autumn? His eyes bulged as he saw a hoverplane slide over the horizon, canting to one side. Autumn's hoverplane! Still breathing hard, he ran for his ship.
His shiplink hadn't been affected by whatever calamity had struck the Couples; the
DareDrop
responded calmly to his commands. "Lock onto that plane," his urgent thought rang out. Through his ship's sensors, he watched the craft come down at a crazy angle toward the port. "Tractors on—hold the plane off the ground" —but as he gave the order his ship's computer told him the plane was too far away, and the angle was wrong. Veddin cursed; he'd have to launch to catch her.
But Autumn's parents were right next to his ship; they'd be crisped if the
DareDrop
took off now. He turned away from the airlock. One half of his mind watched the plane through his ship's eyes, one half sorted out the pathetic humans there by the landing struts. Pair by pair he dragged them onto their hovacar.
He coaxed Tarn Westfall into pressing the accelerator. As the hovacar rocked away, Veddin rushed back to his ship.
Only the fact that the hoverplane started high in the sky had spared it from crashing; its rate of descent had increased dramatically. The plane was slowing down now, but it wasn't slowing down fast enough.
Veddin fell into his chair as the boosters blazed. He still shook with exertion, but he had to get into the air
now
.
The
DareDrop
lurched into position. As the tractors locked on, the plane actually fought against their guidance; but despite the plane's most furious counterthrusts Veddin landed it with a feather touch. He landed close by and jumped out.
Autumn leaped lightly from the plane. She looked awfully young in person. But, Lords of Tarantell, she was beautiful! Her deep blue one-piece jumpsuit held flickering threads of silver that outlined her long, supple body; the ocean wind whipped through her strawberry blonde hair, to set it shimmering in the sunlight. Her golden eyes blazed with angry fire.
Veddin paused as he realized she was angry.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" she yelled at him. She had a thick accent, a more distorted form of Standard than even the language of Kaylanx. She stamped her foot. "I have to get to the space port. I don't have time for idiots."
"I'm sorry," Veddin muttered, blushing. With a start, he realized how unjust her attack on him was. "Wait a minute. Your plane was about to crash. I just saved your life."
She stared at him. "Man, what planet're you from? Haven't you ever ridden a plane before? That's the way they always fly. Computer controlled. Multiple redundancy. Nothing can go wrong." She muttered something under her breath.