“No,” said Hammell, “They’d know we were faking.”
“And we can’t afford that,” said Roberts.
Morrissey said, “The wonder is that we ever got away from them at all. How did you work it?”
Roberts described what had happened, adding, “I’d think it was a pretty good bluff if we were far away by now. But since we aren’t, our safety depends on keeping them afraid to try anything, for fear the mighty Empire will blow them to bits.”
“Which,” Hammell growled, “means every move we make not only has to make sense for our purposes, but also has got to be convincing to the commerce raiders.”
“Correct,” said Roberts.
Morrissey, scowling, said, “This is going to complicate things.”
“When you consider the likely situation on this planet,” said Roberts, “it’s going to pile up complications to the point where it’s a question whether we can move at all. Just think of the factions here. There’s the planetary computer with its roboid devices and built-in directives. As a sort of semi-independent extension, there’s Kelty and his army of roboid police. There’s the technicians, and the machines and devices the technicians have made. Then there’s the Great Leader and his fanatics—plus the general bulk of the populace itself. On top of all this is the effect of the measures we took while we were here the last time. And, of course, the whole thing is bound to have developed since then, even though we won’t know how until we get the spy screen to work.”
Morrissey nodded moodily. “And since the trouble is on the other end, there isn’t much we can do.”
There was a moody silence.
Out in the clearing, it was getting dim, and Roberts absently tapped the switch to opaque the portholes, lest they be watched from outside. Then the silence stretched out again.
Finally Hammell said, “There ought to be some way to simplify this.”
Morrissey nodded. “Sure. What?”
Roberts was about to suggest, yet again, that they move into the patrol ship, where, at least, their skins would be safe. But just then—
BAM!
The ship jumped underfoot.
Roberts instantaneously dove for his battle armor.
There was a rapid series of jolts and heavy crashes. Something clattered on the deck, hissed, spun, and bounced, in a blur of escaping mist.
Roberts heaved open the backplate.
Hammell and Morrissey, caught in the mist, stumbled toward the grav-lift, and were lost in swirling grayness.
Roberts squirmed into the armor, his eyes shut, and holding his breath. But even though he was now inside, so was a certain amount of gas. He staggered to his feet, swung shut the backplate, groped for the emergency-breathing chin-lever, couldn’t find it, and suddenly, despite himself, his straining lungs sucked in a little breath of air that smelled sweetish and strange.
Roberts’ thoughts vanished like startled fish. There was a gap when he was aware of nothing at all, and then he was standing, stuporous and empty-minded, as there appeared through the fog, from the direction of the grav-lift, a heavily-armed figure wearing an armored suit with wide transparent faceplate, flexible air hose looped over the left shoulder, and speaking diaphragm in the side of the mouthpiece.
From somewhere down in the clearing, an amplified voice boomed out:
“YOU ARE UNDER ARREST! BY ORDER OF THE PLANETARY DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY, YOU MUST EVACUATE THESE SHIPS AND COME OUT DISARMED AND WITH YOUR HANDS CLASPED BEHIND YOUR HEADS! YOU HAVE FIFTEEN SECONDS TO COMPLY WITH THIS ORDER!”
A second armored figure loomed through the fog. The two figures bent, and carried Hammell and Morrissey below.
A third figure came in, peered around, stepped forward, looked straight toward Roberts, and froze.
Another armored figure, and another, came in the grav-shaft, peered through the fog toward Roberts, and suddenly stood motionless.
Roberts, aware of an urgent need to act, at the same time was unable to remember who or where he was. All he really knew was that he was standing still, breathing in air that smelled slightly less sweet at every breath. Then, dimly, he caught the tail end of a train of thought, struggled to hold it, sucked in a great breath of air, and in a blinding flash the situation was clear to him.
He fought off a host of other thoughts and kept his mind riveted on that one thought that clarified the whole situation:
I am Vaughan, Duke of Trasimere, Prince Contestant to the Throne. This planet is the Earldom-Designate of Paradise. Its every inhabitant is rightly subject to my command, save only Oggbad, the sorcerer.
That was straightforward.
Once Roberts knew who he was, everything simplified itself wonderfully.
Alertly, he studied the armored figures edging toward him. The expressions of fear and awe visible through their faceplates suggested that they were not ill-intentioned. What had happened, then?
In a kindly voice, with the natural overturns of power and authority that followed from a knowledge of who he was, Roberts said quietly: “Kneel to your liege lord.”
The armored figures, wide-eyed, dropped to one knee.
This told Roberts that the men were not from off the planet, but from the city, and were acquainted with what had happened on his last visit, when the sorcerer Oggbad had escaped into the wilderness, and the leaders and population of the city, after a little unseemly wavering, had rallied to the true cause. Their allegiance once pledged, and his power to reward and punish once established, they would not readily turn against him.
* * *
With a tinge of regret and a hint of sternness in his voice, Roberts said quietly, “What brings you here?”
Nobody dared to speak, and now Roberts said, “I must have an answer. Rise. Was it Oggbad?”
They stumbled to their feet. But still no one could bring himself to speak.
Roberts now noticed that the armored suits bore the words, “Citizens’ Defense Force.” One of the armored suits bore the chevrons of a sergeant.
Roberts’ voice became sharper. “Before this evil can be destroyed, I must know its source. Let whoever is of highest rank among you answer my questions. Did Oggbad send you here?”
The sergeant looked around, but there was no one else to do it. He said, “No, your . . . your highness. A man landed in a . . . ah . . . official Planetary Development Authority ship, and announced that we’d been tricked, and he was taking over the planet. He had an army of . . . ‘administrators’ . . . with him. They’re all over the Inner City. He gives the orders. We didn’t know you were here.”
“This fellow is an outspacer?”
“He . . . ah—?”
“He does not belong to the Empire?”
“No.”
“Then he is an outspacer and has no right here. Did this fellow come with you?”
“Yes, he—”
“Is he in this ship?”
“He’s outside, at the loudspeaker. There he goes now.”
The amplified voice boomed out:
” . . . AT ONCE, OR WE WILL DESTROY BOTH OF THESE SHIPS AND . . .”
Roberts nodded. “Go below, and warn your companions that I shall be down to settle this shortly.”
The men went out.
Roberts, breathing air that the suit had now cleared almost entirely of the fumes, was having more and more trouble fighting off a throng of distracting thoughts that conflicted with his new-found clarity of mind. He took a few moments to shove these thoughts out of his consciousness. There would be time enough for all that later. The main thing now was to take care of this officious usurper.
With this purpose clearly in mind, Roberts checked sword and gun, and stepped into the grav-shaft.
A throng of armored men moved back respectfully as Roberts walked to the cargo door to look down into the clearing.
Below, some eighty to a hundred heavily armed men nervously ringed the patrol ship. Closer to the patrol ship, redly-glowing fragments lay like driftwood marking high water at a beach. The larger turrets of the ship aimed straight ahead, as if disdaining such petty opponents, but the smaller turrets made little adjustments that served as warnings to come no closer.
Floodlights, mounted on dish-shaped grav-skimmers, lit the scene, which was given an inferno aspect by a thin mist blowing across the clearing from a ring of generators around the edge. Through the upper reaches of this mist, hosts of bats with glistening teeth dove at the clearing, but then with desperate twists and turns flitted away again.
Between the patrol ship and the space yacht stood a little cluster of figures beside a loudspeaker aimed at the patrol ship. One of these armored men spoke into a microphone, and his words boomed out:
” . . . AND I REPEAT—YOU WILL SURRENDER AT ONCE OR BE DECLARED OUTLAWS, SUBJECT TO ATTACK ON SIGHT, FORFEITURE OF ALL PROPERTY AND ASSETS, AND DENIAL OF RIGHT OF ENTRY AT ALL CIVILIZED . . .”