Noticing this, Roberts felt a sudden suspicion. But there was no time to check on that. He turned to Glinderen. “If you are given the opportunity to leave this planet, how long will it take you?”
“Several weeks, to get everything in order.”
“You may as well start now.”
Glinderen and his party obediently left the room.
“Now, gentlemen,” said Roberts, “there remains one problem. Glinderen has called for help from the outspace fleets. Of course, the Imperial battle fleets”—Roberts found himself believing this as he said it—”will defend the planet, but there is still the problem that our ships dare not come so close that Oggbad can use his powers upon them. This means that close defense must be handled by the city itself.” Roberts glanced at the redbearded technician. “We need multiple rapid-fire guns and missile launchers. Have you plans for them, and can you make them?”
The technician nodded. “We were working on those, as a defense against Oggbad, when Mr. Glinderen landed. With this maintenance headache off our necks, we can get back to it.”
“Good,” said Roberts. “The city must quickly be put in order, and its defenses made strong.”
His three principal human lieutenants expressed eagerness to get to work, and the planetary computer made no objection, so Roberts stood up, and everyone else at the table followed suit.
Just then, with the tricky meeting completed, with the major factions on the planet unified, and with Glinderen safely sidetracked, the outside door opened up and, one-by-one, there walked in to the quiet tap of a drum, six man-sized figures in silver armor.
Roberts watched speechlessly as they approached. The armored figures themselves he recognized as the type of roboid the patrol ship had put forth once before. Where they came from in the cramped ship was a good question. But even more pressing was the question why the patrol ship had chosen this instant, when everything seemed momentarily straightened out, to toss in a new complication.
The six silver-armored figures, meanwhile, crossed the room, directly toward Roberts. The first, with drawn sword, stopped to Roberts’ right. The second, stopped to his left. The third, with a golden tray, halted directly before Roberts, and kneeled. The other three, heavily-armed, halted and stood guard.
Roberts did the obvious, lifted up a large glittering jewel, took the sealed envelope lying underneath on a silver cushion, and spent a few precious seconds futilely turning the envelope. The battle armor, strong enough to toss gigantic creatures around like kittens, had nothing corresponding to fingernails.
Roberts exasperatedly tore off an end, worked the message out, and read past a set of figures, dates, and code words, to the sentence:
. . . ELECTORS CHOSE THIS DAY HIS ROYAL AND IMPERIAL HIGHNESS, VAUGHAN, DUKE OF TRASIMERE AND EARL OF AURIZONT, TO BE KING AND EMPEROR . . .
What good this did, Roberts didn’t know. But he was now stuck with it.
“The Electors have chosen,” he said, and handed the paper to Hammell and Morrissey, who at once dropped to one knee, heads bowed, to murmur, “Your Majesty—”
Cursing inwardly, Roberts considered the problem of Kelty, the technician, and the fanatical leader of the Outer City. He held the message out to them, and said, “For the immediate future, this changes nothing. Oggbad in his rage may still lash out. All preparations must go forward without delay. But”—his voice took on a harder tone—”the day of faction in the Empire is gone. Outsiders now interfere at their peril. ‘Tis customary to kneel, my lords and gentlemen, as a sign of fealty.” The three men, with varied expressions, dropped to one knee.
Roberts considered how to quickly bring the thing to an end.
“Rise,” he said, “we must be about our duties without delay. No one knows when Oggbad will attack, or what the outspace vermin will do next. Good evening, gentlemen.”
With the silver-armored figures serving as guards, Roberts, Hammell, and Morrissey left the hall.
Once inside the ship, they watched the armored figures disappear through an opening forward of the control console. Once the figures disappeared, the opening disappeared. The three men got out of their armor, and looked at each other.
Hammell said, “When there’s time—”
Morrissey nodded. “We’ll have to go over this ship. There’s more to it than I realized.”
Roberts locked the hatch, and said, “What that business about the Electors did to improve things I don’t know. But we’ve got Glinderen off our necks, and the chief factions on the planet are now united.”
Hammell shoved his armor into the locker on its sling. “I had my doubts in there whether we were doing the right thing, but that business about Glinderen’s Chief of Psychology did it for me. If we don’t get anything done here but to deliver that guy to the wolves, we’ve accomplished something.”
Morrissey shoved his armor into his locker, and glanced at the spy screen. “The screen’s working. I don’t like to say anything, but I left the want-generator set for ‘desire to sleep’ and it’s now set for ‘desire to believe, to accept on faith.’ ”
“Stands to reason,” said Hammell dryly. “Where’s it focused?”
“On the Barons Council Hall.”
Roberts had already put his armor away and now stripped and jabbed a button in the wall. A cramped shower cubicle popped open. “The only thing that bothers me,” he said, “is the Space Force expedition headed for the planet. But there must be a way to straighten that out, too—if we can just work it out.”
The following weeks went by like a pleasant interlude between hurricanes. Glinderen was too busy getting ready to leave to make trouble. His Chief of Psychology, having made the mistake of walking alone past the wrong doorway, “volunteered” to become a citizen of Paradise, and was now cozily bedded down in the most murderous section of the city. Every authority in the city was working day and night to prepare against attack. Roberts, Hammell, and Morrissey devoted most of their time to the want-generator and spy screen. By now, they had a formidable total of partly-trained soldiers who could put up a fight in fixed defenses. The Citizens’ Defense Force, and the fanatics of the Outer City, promised far worse trouble for an invader. The roboid police, so long as they were on solid footing, had the advantages of speed, uncanny coordination, and an impressive lack of fear.
The city’s technicians, meanwhile, relieved of endless maintenance, put back in shape all the devices they had hidden on the arrival of Glinderen. These devices, combined with the rapid-fire guns the computer’s automatic factories were now turning out, promised that the city would be able to put up a tough fight.
However, one little problem remained to be solved.
The day following the departure of Glinderen and his administrators, Hammell remarked, “So far, so good. Now, what do we do when the Space Force shows up?”
Morrissey suggested, “There’s no love lost between the Space Force and the Planetary Development Administration. And Glinderen belongs to PDA. Can we make anything out of that?”
Roberts shook his head. “If we make PDA look silly, the Space Force will be secretly delighted. But it’s still their duty to physically back up Glinderen. We’ll be just as dead afterward, no matter how they chortle at his expense.”
“One thing I wonder about,” said Morrissey, “is why you told Glinderen the Space Force had a detachment in the asteroid belt?”
“Because Glinderen is almost sure to go straight to them. I’m eager to see what happens.”
“How will we see what happens?”
“When Maury and his boys had us in their gravitor beam, they sent up some fishnet pickups to listen in on any tight-beam messages passed between our ships. The symbiotic computer planted parasite circuits in the fishnet pickups. Those pickups are expensive. They’ve long since been pulled back in, and stored where Maury can see that no subordinate appropriates them. Many of the parasite circuits—which outwardly are little more than electrically-charged dust particles—have floated off into the atmosphere of Maury’s base, to stick to walls and viewports, and get carried out to other places on people’s clothing. Every time Maury checks his pickups, more parasite circuits float out. Each of these circuits will relay signals from other circuits. And on the way from the asteroid belt to the planet, here, the patrol ship sowed microrelays at intervals to pass along the signals. That’s how we’ll know what happens.”
Later that day, Glinderen’s ships arrived off the asteroid belt, and were stopped by the two-day wonder. Glinderen immediately reported the situation on Paradise. The two-day wonder got hold of Maury. Maury appeared, dressed as a general, speedily dug out all the information he wanted, and gave orders to let Glinderen proceed. Glinderen refused, and demanded action.
The two-day wonder now exhausted his stock of military poses trying to get Glinderen to move on. Glinderen angrily accused the two-day wonder of trying to evade his responsibilities, and threatened to report him to Sector Headquarters. The two-day wonder called Maury. Maury, determined not to saddle himself with a horde of administrators who were worthless for ransom, but sure to bring on a crusade if he killed them, promised immediate action, and sent some followers disguised as Space Force men, who methodically smashed the infuriated Glinderen’s transmitters, but otherwise left the ships undamaged.