The Potter of Firsk and Other Stories (52 page)

“Quite true, quite true,” said Abel Ruan. “But—as I pointed out to General Vec—the medium through which we must act, the brain of a bird, permits no precision to the messages.”

“The objection has been noted in higher places, and the suggestion made that intensive breeding and selection be tried to improve the type of brains involved.”

Abel Ruan grinned, drawing aside his lips. “Something of the sort has occurred to me; however it is a long-range program.”

“How long?” inquired Baze Roseau, eyes sharp and cold.

“Impossible to say. Several years, at least.”

Baze Roseau nodded, began to pace once more. “That, of course, is unavoidable. Well, we will advance along those lines, as rapidly as possible. You will be in charge of the entire program. No effort, no expense is too great. There will of course be a substantial increase in your salary. If you succeed in developing a workable system, you will receive a pension of ten thousand marks a year, elite status and the Order of Butin.”

“But,” Ruan put forward, “suppose the idea is unsound? Suppose I fail?”

Baze Roseau swelled his plump chest. “The Movement recognizes no such word…Let us not talk of unpleasantness…”

“Persuasive arguments,” was Abel Ruan’s comment. “On both hands. Well, we shall see; we shall see.”

On the afternoon of the same day, Edvard Schmidt, knocking at the door and entering, found Abel Ruan seated in a chair leaning back on two legs with his own feet on a desk, arms clasped behind his head.

Schmidt quietly took a seat, leaned forward, sat bewildered when Ruan held up a hand for silence, picked up his portable phonograph, carried it to the wall, turned it on rather loudly.

Grinning his bare-toothed smile, Ruan returned to his seat. “That’s where Roseau has installed his eavesdrop button. If he’s listening he will be treated to the Moltroy anthem played
con brio
, with encores till you leave.”

Schmidt shook his head. “I had no idea…”

“It pays to be suspicious,” said Ruan, “even when you are working your soul out for them.”

Schmidt leaned forward. “That’s what I came to see you about. Abel, you’ll succeed in this project!” And he eyed Ruan accusingly.

“Of course. That is my business, to make progress. They are paying me well, they offer me honors—”

“But heavens, man!” and Schmidt’s old eyes glittered. “Do you mean to help those beasts? Do you understand what you are doing?”

Abel Ruan shrugged. “The sooner war comes, the sooner it will be over.”

“But if you succeed—the slave state will be the model for the world.”

Abel Ruan lit a cigarette. “Who knows? Moltroy may not win the war. After all, scientists work for the World Federation, too.”

“But none of them are perfecting an instrument as decisive as the one you prepare…I ask you, Abel, do you intend to complete the project?”

Abel Ruan’s eyes glinted warily as he watched the older man. “That is my job.”

Schmidt pulled out a gun, levelled it, fired. Ruan ducked, toppled from his chair, reached under the desk, pulled at the old man’s legs. Schmidt fell, and the gun clattered to the floor out of his reach. Ruan picked it up, returned to his seat.

Schmidt rose stiffly. “Well, why don’t you call the guards?”

Ruan shook his head. “Edvard—you misjudge me. First and foremost, my guiding principle is—trust no one! Except now, perhaps you—for you have expressed your sentiments forcefully. I would like to point out that no man is indispensable; that if you shot me, there are a thousand who could fill my shoes with equal effect. That is one reason I’m pursuing these experiments. Here I control the situation. I am on top of it, I guide it. If I refused to cooperate—one of the other thousand would be in my shoes, and we would not be a whit the better off.”

Schmidt had been absorbing as much of this as possible. “Abel, you cleverly avoid stating anything specific. Do I understand that you—you have some sort of plan?”

“Opportunities suggest themselves to a thoughtful man,” said Ruan. “But not—” he held up the gun “—of this nature.”

Schmidt stood stiffly. “I did what my conscience told me…I’m not sure that I’m glad I failed, because you promise nothing definite—”

“The universe, down to the most negligible electron, is indefinite, my dear director,” was Ruan’s cheerful statement. “Absolute decision is out of my hands. And never forget my motto is—trust no one.”

“But in the meantime,” remarked Schmidt glumly, “you perfect the weapon Moltroy will use to win the world.”

IV

General Zoltan Vec unsnapped the clip at his neck, removed the high-domed helmet.

“Well?” demanded Marshal Koltig, chief of staff of the Moltroy armed forces.

“Perfect,” said Zoltan Vec. “When I shut my eyes, I see the same scene the pilot sees. With my eyes open, I can transmit orders which need no acknowledgment, because I feel the impact in the pilot’s mind.”

“Excellent.” Marshal Koltig turned to Abel Ruan, who stood quietly in the background. “How many of these have you prepared?”

“About four hundred and fifty, sir,” replied Abel Ruan after a moment’s hesitation. He appeared thin, tired, his color had become pasty.

Marshal Koltig pondered. “Four hundred and fifty…Hm. We are ordering two hundred flight-groups into action. That means four hundred helmets—one for each flight captain and one for his intermedium here at headquarters. That leaves fifty spares…Is it not possible to obtain another fifty?”

Abel Ruan shook his head. “Not for several months, sir. These brains are exceedingly delicate things, and for every brain large and complex enough to serve, we must discard ten thousand faulty ones.”

The Marshal reflected further. “Well, we will make do. If necessary we can double up in non-critical areas, or use radio.” He turned back to Zoltan Vec. “General, you will conduct exhaustive tests and report to me.” Zoltan Vec bowed his head.

Abel Ruan cleared his throat. “I have some ideas for an improved model of the helmet. If I work hard, I possibly can complete a few in time for—an emergency. Perhaps enough for the top officers, or at least you and General Vec.”

The Marshal gestured cordially. “By all means. Spare no expense; you have done handsomely so far, Abel Ruan, and will be well rewarded.”

The scientist bowed, withdrew.

The morning of I Day. On a hundred fields bombers sat like great drone bees, gorged not with pollen but with nucleonic explosives, poison-foams and mists, violent bacterial cultures, propaganda leaflets prepared by renegade Federates. Fighter-jets and rockets ranged in long glinting rows, fueled, dangerous, willing.

Within the barracks, pilots sat smoking, talking or silent, as their temperaments prompted, while in the command centers flight captains donned their new high-domed helmets. And at the staff headquarters deeper within Moltroy, two hundred intermediums donned helmets each containing a brain habituated to the brain in a corresponding flight captain’s helmet.

The intermediums took their numbered seats, these ranged around a dais and a great screen. Here would form a schematized picture of the battle, with different colors indicating the advances, retreats, with lights emphasizing emergency points. The whole play of this chart would be synthesized from the steady reports of the two hundred flight captains, relayed through the intermediums, and watching the chart, the staff, including General Vec and Marshal Koltig, would direct the strategy of the battle.

Marshal Koltig sat drinking coffee in a study nearby, brooding over intelligence reports—a large, brown, mustached man, full of bluff energy. “They know we’ve mobilized,” he told General Vec. “We’ve kept it secret longer than I dared hope…They’re calling up reserves.”

Vec poured himself coffee. “I’ll be interested to see the performance of the Mark IV Blatchats against their new Gladius Rams. I believe we’ve the better fire-power.”

Koltig looked up. “That’s right, the Blatchats are your special pets.

“…Better emphasize once again to the intermediums that there must be no individual actions, no dog-fighting. We are a vast overwhelming mass of precise machinery; that’s important. No heroics. Drive home the fact that we will win through our unprecedented firmness and coordination. We cannot allow this advantage to be nullified by individual grandstanding.”

Vec stood up. “I’ll make it clear.” He paused. “Let me see—Abel Ruan was to have special helmets for us. Has he arrived?”

“I believe he’s in Suite C. You’d better send an orderly to check. Time’s getting short. Twenty-two minutes now.”

Zoltan Vec delivered his warning speech to the sighing body of intermediums, returned to the study. The orderly he had sent to Abel Ruan saluted.

“Abel Ruan requests that you come to Suite C for your helmet, sir.”

“Very well,” said Vec. “Tell the technicians to give the screen a final check.”

“Yes, sir.”

Vec found Marshal Koltig in Suite C, adjusting a domed helmet to his head, while Abel Ruan connected a clip to the nerve-graft on his neck.

“It would be better not to use the helmet until the battle is under way,” said Ruan, in the tone of a doctor advising about the use of a salve. “The brain is particularly energetic, but it also must work harder than any of the others, so it is as well not to use it until there is a need.”

“I see,” said Marshal Koltig. “I just throw the switch, correct?”

“Right—the switch stimulates the brain, awakens it from what amounts to sleep. To select one whom you wish to communicate with, merely think of the color corresponding to the name.” He produced a printed sheet. “Here is the list. General Vec, as you see, is light blue. You, Marshal, are maroon. So to make contact with General Vec, merely picture the color. The brain will do the rest.”

“Marvellous, marvellous,” exclaimed Marshal Koltig. “In the name of our leader, the great Butin, you shall be richly rewarded!”

Abel Ruan shook his long narrow head, and the glasses on his nose glinted. “No, I want no reward—merely the satisfaction of contributing to a great historical event.”

“Oh, you scientists!” the Marshal chaffed. “Impractical visionaries!”

Abel Ruan smiled his wide long-toothed grin, turned to General Vec. “Here, General, is your helmet. You heard my instructions to the Marshal? Not to use the helmet until necessary?”

General Vec nodded, donned the helmet gingerly. Never had he quite accustomed himself to the use of this subsidiary brain. Grimly he clipped the lead to the nerve-graft on his neck.

“Now,” said Abel Ruan, “you’re all in order.”

Marshal Koltig glanced at his wrist-watch. “We must hurry. The bombers took off nine minutes ago; in half an hour we will be over Federate territory.”

An orderly entered. “Contact has been made, sir. Over Blorland, by Fighter Squadron 819.”

“Results?” snapped Marshal Koltig.

“Unreported, sir.”

“819,” muttered Koltig. “That will be Flight 14.” He dialed ‘14’ on a communicator, was put through to the intermedium serving the squadron in question.

“14.”

“What’s going on?”

“F-S 819 encountered 12 Gladius Rams at 90,000 feet, sir. They are trying to break our formation, but have not succeeded and we have downed three—now four—without loss.”

“Good,” said Koltig. “Carry on.”

A number of other contacts were made and reported, skirmishes, scout brushes.

“Looks like they’re waiting for us somewhere over Ladomir,” said Koltig, arising. “Well, Vec, perhaps we’d better take our places.”

They passed through the door into the murmurous room, took their places on the dais. The screen above them now glowed, showing the Blorland–Ladomir boundaries, with a rim of the North Ocean in one corner. A flat black triangle slowly crossing the chart was the body of the Moltroy bombers, the great ships of strategic position. Once any number of these thunderous vessels had penetrated the enemy’s defenses, he must surrender, or see his nation vanish in molten clods and hot gas. A fainter gray shadow indicated the supporting fighters, and already along the periphery spots of color indicated contact with the defending planes of the World Federation.

Far down, sweeping along the Glimmet coast came a blue shadow—vague because its composition was yet unknown—the World Federation offensive force. And at the bottom of the screen a chart noted the current casualties, so far nine Moltroy Blatchats, opposed to fifteen Federate Gladius Rams.

Koltig glanced out at the two hundred intermediums; each sat pale, intent in his seat, eyes half-closed, the thoughts from the flight captains far out over Ladomir winging home to the brains in the helmets and so to the human brain.

Vec said, “Here it comes—here comes their median sweep.” A red line glared across the screen—the battle-front.

Koltig jumped to his desk, gestured to the screen operator. The map suddenly expanded, until the area of battle filled the whole screen, and the black triangle of bombers dissolved into its separate elements.

Vec said, “They’re breaking through at 98, sir.”

Koltig shouted, “Rocket-squadrons 12, 13, 14 to 98!” His voice boomed across the hall, the intermedium working with the flight moved, sent the order, the flight captain swerved his squadron, and a minute later the breach was healed. The casualty chart at the bottom clicked over furiously, but faster, much faster on the Federate side.