“The time for your audience is up, Captain.” Stanck buzzed for one of his aides to come
and escort Fortier from the room. “If we meet another time,” was his parting shot, “you
had better come armed with more than sly innuendos. ”
will, Stanck, I will, Fortier thought with determination. For the next few days, Herman
Stanck became an obsession with Fortier. He pored over the man’s lengthy file in the
SOTE computers until he’d virtually memorized it. In fifteen years of service as Sector
Marshal, Stanek’s record was unblemished. A dedicated public servant, he had never
married, preferring to devote his entire life to the administration of Sector Four’s affairs.
There were many newsroll accounts of his public actions, and a long list of awards and
honors he’d received. His private life was kept strictly private, but there’d never been the
breath of a scandaland that in itself was some kind of a record for a man who’d served in
public life as long as Stanck.
To all appearances, the Sector Marshal was as loyal as anyone could wish. Accusing
him of treason would be like strangling orphans or drowning kittens; Fortier dared not
move against him until he had strong proof on his side. And yet, an undercover agent
lived by his instincts-and all of Fortier’s well-trained intuition told him Stanck’s hostility
masked some guilty secret. It was inconceivable to Fortier that a man could write such a
glowing report about someone and not remember it later, even after ten busy
years-particularly when that person had never existed in the first place.
There were no clues in Stanck’s professional record, so Fortier dug even more deeply
into the man’s personal file. Stanck was a solitary sort, and no one knew him really well.
There was nothing in these files, either, that would mark him as a traitor.
In desperation, Fortier turned to the financial report. Stanck lived modestly, well within his
means. He didn’t gamble or squander his salary, and had made some shrewd
investments that left him a reasonably wealthy man-but there was no indication of any
impropriety there, just sound business dealings. Fortier was about to abandon this
avenue of inquiry too when his eye noticed one small, obscure detail that almost escaped
notice because it was so hidden. Stanek’s assets revealed that he was, upon retirement,
owed a fortune in sick leave pay because it had accumulated without being used.
Fortier called up the pay records, and they told an amazing story. In the fifteen years
that Stanck had been Sector Marshal, he had not missed a day of work because of
illness. There were no records of any sort before Stanck took the job, merely the cryptic
entry that the man had been appointed especially by the Grand Duke.
These were anomalies that Fortier could sink his teeth into. For the second time in this
case, he’d run into someone with no past. He was even more intrigued by Stanek’s
phenomenal health. It would be incredible enough for a man in his early twenties-but for
someone in his middle years, it was downright unbelievable.
Fortier asked for the medical records on his subject, only to find that there weren’t any.
Stanck had never visited a doctor in all the years he’d been Sector Marshal. Under
normal circumstances, every public employee had to undergo a physical examination
before being hired, but a cryptic note on Stanek’s file said that this requirement had been
waived in his case by direct order of the Grand Duke.
An idea was forming in Fortier’s mind, one he didn’t like a bit. He knew all too well that
the conspiracy was capable of creating robot duplicates of people and substituting them
for the real ones; he himself had been impersonated by a robot during the few months
preceding the attack against Earth, and the experience had nearly been fatal. What if
Stanck were such a robot, infiltrated into the management of Sector Four? It would
explain why he’d never been ill and why he’d never gone to see a doctor. It would explain
the man’s solitary lifestyle, his precise and punctual work habits-and his hostility to
anyone like Fortier who tried to peer too closely into his background. If Stanck was
indeed a robot he would have to be handled very cautiously. The robots had superhuman
strength and were immune to stun weapons. Only a blaster would bring a robot down,
and it could cause untold destruction if not controlled quickly once its identity was
uncovered. The first step was to prove conclusively that Stanck was a robot. The local
SOTE office was most cooperative about providing Fortier with the long range sensor
equipment he asked for, and the naval officer set about the difficult task of getting
readings on Stanek’s body. The trouble was that Stanek rarely went out in public. He
was either in his office, in his car, or in his apartment-places where it was difficult for
Fortier’s equipment to get a clear reading uncluttered by surroundings.
After a week, Fortier’s patience paid off. Stanck was scheduled to give a speech at the
local sports stadium before a series of charity games. Fortier attended, and was able to
get close enough to train his instruments on the Sector Marshal. The readings confirmed
Fortier’s worst suspicions: Stanck was not a living human being, but a complex artificial
mechanism covered with plastiderm. All of Sector Four was being administered by a
robot agent of the deadly conspiracy.
Fortier weighed his next moves very carefully. He was out of his depth in this matter, and
he knew it. Tracking down treason was really SOTE’s business; Naval Intelligence was
responsible for rooting out pirates, smugglers, and other miscreants who used the
spaceways for illegal purposes. In all honesty, he should have turned the case over to
SOTE when he had discovered the Helmund connection, but his teeth were too solidly
into it to let go; he wanted to keep with this matter now to its conclusion. Consequently
he did not inform SOTE of his newly- found information. Instead, he went to the local
naval station and recruited some colleagues to capture the robot. They approached
Stanck one morning in his underground garage just as he was getting into his groundcar
to go to the office. As an important official, Stanck had a cluster of bodyguards around
him; Fortier had taken the precaution of bringing with him a squad of twenty Planetary
Patrolmen. As the two groups approached one another amid the concrete pillars of the
underground garage, tension developed instantly.
“Hold it, Stanck,” Fortier called. “You’re not going anywhere. ”
“You have no jurisdiction here, Captain,” the other said icily. “If your people don’t back
away instantly, I’ll have you court-martialed so fast your circuits will fuse.”
“I know you’re a robot,” Fortier continued despite the threat. “You’re part of a conspiracy
to overthrow the Stanley dynasty.”
“I’ve been accused of many things in my time, but that’s the most ridiculous charge I’ve
ever heard.” Stanck turned his back on the officer and started to enter his car.
Fortier gave a signal, and his group suddenly drew their weapons. This brought an
immediate reaction from the Sector Marshal’s bodyguards, and within seconds the air
was filled with the sounds of a stun-gun battle. The robot, however, did not wait to
observe the outcome. It slipped into the car and sped hastily away from the scene of the
battle before anyone could stop it.
Captain Fortier, too, hurried away, leaving the fighting to his comrades. He had not
intended to capture Stanck just yet; he was hoping to panic it into making some hasty
mistake. In a direct confrontation, the robot would have allowed him to destroy it rather
than tell him anything and, with its strength and immunity to stun-guns, there was almost
no way to capture it “alive.” His only hope was that the robot would lead him to yet a
bigger connection before he was forced to destroy it.
Fortier had a copier waiting hidden on the street a block away. The pilot saw him coming
and revved up the motor, so they were able to take off the instant Fortier jumped into the
passenger seat. Within seconds they were airborne and ready to follow the robot’s car
wherever it might lead them. Fortier cautioned the pilot not to get too close; they didn’t
want the robot to realize it was being tailed.
The Sector Marshal’s groundcar had an automatic priority device, damping the motors of
surrounding cars to let it pass by them unhindered. It sped out of Aachen in record time,
the robot trusting to its computer-fast reflexes to drive more recklessly than any human
would dare. Even in a copier Fortier had trouble keeping up, and he no longer had to
caution his pilot to hang back. They had to fly at top speed if they didn’t want to lose their
quarry.
Out in the open countryside, the robot drove even faster. The car was practically a blur