Irked and disgruntled, their thoughts a whirl of information about the planet they were headed for, and their duties as members of “Garoujik Construction,” they climbed into their bunks.
The second hand of the clock swung to the vertical, and the lights went out completely.
The only glow in the room now came from the softly-lighted clock face, and moonlight shining on the “beach.”
That scene outside, with the water washing in long white streamers up the sand, should have been restful, even romantic.
With growls of exasperation, they turned their backs to it, pulled the covers around them, buried their heads in their pillows, and fell asleep.
Down the hall, the colonel was on his feet facing the screen above his desk, where the same strongly built man who had given him the assignment in the first place now looked out with a puzzled frown.
“Tomorrow morning? Sure. You can leave yesterday, as far as I’m concerned. As long as Intelligence has its memory simulation, the sooner you get out of here, the better. They’re sure to find something about the simulation that isn’t clear. They’ll want to question your men, and on top of this damned super E-G, the last thing I want is to referee a fight between you and I-branch.”
“Fine. There are just a few more details, and I can get started.”
“O.K., then. Good luck.”
The screen went blank.
The colonel gave a satisfied grunt, hung up his uniform shirt, sat down at the desk, got pad and pencil, and jotted down the few things that still had to be done. Then he sat back and looked at the list critically.
Unless he had overlooked something, he was in good shape to get out of here early tomorrow.
But he always did overlook something.
It would occur to him tomorrow, as they were ready to leave. Or, worse yet, after they had left, and then he would have to come back, and bully everyone in reach, or else they would catch on to the silly oversight he’d made, and he would look and feel like a complete boob.
He sat back, and imagined himself ready to leave. It was tomorrow, and the ship was ready, the cargo on board, the men climbing in, and now he told them to shut the hatch, and—
He sat up abruptly. How had he forgotten that?
He reached out to impatiently tap the dial near his desk.
* * *
Roberts, Hammell, Morrissey, and Bergen were awakened by a clanging, bonging noise so loud and rude as to bring them all out of their bunks in a nasty frame of mind.
The colonel’s voice, brisk and cheerful, reached them from a speaker they were too sleep-drugged to try to locate.
“Good morning, gentlemen! As you see, it’s a fine day outside. I’ve gotten you up half-an-hour early, so you’ll have time for a little fresh air before we start. Anyone who wants to crawl back in his bunk is free to do it. But, believe me, it’s nice outside. A horn will tell you when it’s time to get back. You’ll eat in your quarters, and we’ll be ready to start immediately afterward. You need bring only yourselves, the uniforms you received yesterday, and your hand-weapons belts. Meanwhile, have a good time.”
The four men looked around stuporously, made spasmodic motions toward getting back in their bunks, then turned to look at the sunlight flooding through the thick round window of the door. Bright blue sky showed overhead, and a gentle wash of the sea on the sand could be faintly heard. Roberts growled under his breath, and walked over. Outside, the sea was far calmer than the day before, and the sky was a deep blue, with just a small white cloud moving slowly past high above. He glanced at the disguised stranger who was Hammell. Hammell nodded exasperatedly, and Roberts pulled open the door.
Outside, the air was fresh and cool, the sun hot, and the bright sand sizzling underfoot. They sprinted down the beach to the cool dark sand washed by the surf, then waded out in the cold water. Half-freezing, they ducked underwater, swam furiously out from the beach, and now the water seemed pleasantly mild. After a while, Roberts methodically swam far out, to look back at a sweep of sandy shore that stretched, gently curving, out of sight in both directions. Far off to his left, he could see the hazy outline of a kind of tower, and what appeared to be a thin rail stretching out into the sea. What might that be?
There was a quiet splash, and Hammell surfaced beside him.
“Some illusion,” said Hammell, looking around.
“And yet,” said Roberts, “as you said yesterday, they obviously don’t have a beach, and half an ocean, inside the ship.”
“I know it.”
They considered the situation in silence, then Hammell said, “What do you think of this outfit, so far?”
“Well—They’re exasperating. And they aren’t infallible, as you can see from what we did to them yesterday. But they don’t fool around, either. I get the impression there’s a high ratio of brains to mass in this outfit.”
Hammell nodded. “And we’ve only begun to get a look at it. It’s like an iceberg. Seven-eighths underwater. Maybe more of it will come to the surface when we tangle with this Operation New Vote. Boy, there’s an impossibility if I ever saw one. You can’t hit them, and they’re unpersuadable. Where do you take a grip on a thing like that?”
“There’s one hopeful sign.”
“What’s that?”
“According to the information we got last night, five or six of these two dozen petty kings are sensible.”
“Yeah, but the vote has to give a big majority, or the R & R Center is no go.”
“Well, it’s an opening, anyway. But we don’t have to figure it out now. Come on, I’ll race you to shore—that is, if you know anything besides the dog paddle.”
Hammell, born on a planet named “Poseidon,” smiled faintly, sucked in a deep breath, and ducked underwater.
Roberts started a fast crawl toward the shore. As he’d been Hammell’s captain on the fast freighter Orion, he was familiar with Hammell’s record, and knew what he was taking on. Roberts went through the water in a streak of foam. But Hammell was waiting when Roberts reached the shore.
An instant later, there was the loud blare of a horn.
VIII
The trip to the planet began with a series of shocks that made successively weaker impacts until the four men nearly reached the stage where nothing would surprise them.
To begin with, well before their ship was to leave the dreadnought, Roberts, standing beside the big hatch as he adjusted his unfamiliar weapons belt, somehow dropped the belt. It didn’t fall to the deck outside. It floated. Roberts climbed down the handholds of the space-yacht-type ship, stepped out to pick up the belt, and the ship was gone. As he stood staring around stupidly, a voice from above irritably directed him to put out his hand. He touched the side of the ship, and immediately could see it again. When he climbed back in through the big hatch, he happened to notice the total thickness of the beveled edge of the hatchway. It was at the very least six times thicker than any space yacht Roberts had seen before.
Bemused by these preliminaries, the men started for the grav shaft up to the next level, and banged head-on into a thick highly-polished column that ran vertically up the axis of the ship. When they did go up the shaft, they discovered that it stopped short of the sixth level, which usually contained the control room, but now had no visible entrance at all. The fifth level consisted merely of a space seven feet high, three feet wide, by two feet deep, the walls of which were fitted with a screen showing the detailed illusion of the usual fifth level. The control room turned out to be on the fourth level, along with five different weapons lockers, and the control seat and the controls themselves were unlike anything Roberts had ever seen on a space yacht. They were a lot closer to what he’d found in his salvaged patrol ship. The sleeping quarters were on the third level, along with highly functional kitchen and washroom sections.
Hammell said ironically, “This space yacht is sure luxurious—like a barracks.”
Morrissey smiled. “And flimsy—like a fortress.”
Roberts said, “It doesn’t seem possible, but I know what this ship looks like.”
“What’s that?”
“A large Interstellar Patrol ship, in disguise as a space yacht.”
“It does, at that.”
Their speculations were ended abruptly by the appearance of an impressive-looking individual who radiated financial know-how and business acumen. When this tycoon opened his mouth, the colonel’s voice came out:
“If I remember correctly, Roberts, you are supposed to be the pilot of this ship. Suppose you jar yourself off the mark and get in there and do some piloting.”