COULD YOU EXPLAIN THIS DISCUSSION?
The reeg receptionist, and also Taubman, had lost the thread of the discourse.
‘Would you care to begin the laborious process of memorizing the formula?’ Willy K said to Eric. ‘It will take all the time you have left.’
All right,’ Eric said, and listened intently.
WAIT
Willy K ceased, rotated his supporting mechanism inquiringly.
THE DOCTOR HAS LEARNED SOMETHING MORE IMPORTANT THAN ANY CHEMICAL FORMULA
‘What is it?’ Eric asked her.’
IN YOUR UNIVERSE WE ARE YOUR ENEMY BUT HERE YOU HAVE SEEN TERRANS AND OURSELVES LIVE TOGETHER. YOU KNOW THAT WAR AGAINST US IS UNNECESSARY. AND WHAT IS MORE IMPORTANT, SO DOES YOUR LEADER.
That was so. No wonder Molinari had no heart for the war; it was not merely a suspicion on his part that this was the wrong war with the wrong enemy and the wrong ally; it was a fact which he had experienced for himself, perhaps many times. And all due to JJ-180.
But not only that. There was something more, something so ominous that he wondered why the inhibition barriers of his mind had permitted the thought to rise from his unconscious. JJ-180 had reached Lilistar – and in quantity. ‘Starmen had certainly been experimenting with it. So they, too, knew the alternate possibility, knew that Terra’s better hope lay in cooperation with the reegs. Had witnessed it for themselves.
In both branches of possibility Lilistar had lost the war. With or without Terra on her side. Or—
Was there a third alternative, one in which Lilistar and the reegs joined against Terra?
‘A pact between Lilistar and the reegs is unlikely,’ Willy K said. They have been antagonists for too many years. I feel that it is only your planet, on which we now stand, that hangs in the balance; Lilistar will be defeated by the reeg power in any eventuality.’
‘But that means,’ Eric said, ‘that the ‘Starmen have nothing to lose; if they know they can’t win—’ He could imagine Freneksy’s reaction to this information. The nihilism, the destructive violence of the ‘Starmen, would be inconceivable.
‘True,’ Willy K agreed. ‘So your Secretary is wise to walk softly. Now perhaps you can comprehend why his illness pattern must be so vast, why he must push himself actually over the brink, into repeated death, to serve his people. And why he would hesitate to provide you with the antidote to JJ-180; if ‘Star intelligence agents – and your wife may be one – learned that he possessed it, they might—’ Willy K was silent. ‘It is hard, as you yourself might observe, to predict the behavior of psychotics. But this much is clear: they would not ignore the situation.’
‘They’d find a way to get it away from him,’ Eric said.
‘You’ve missed the point. Their attitude would be punitive; they would know that Molinari possesses too much power, that by having unhindered use of JJ-180, without the possibility of addiction, of neural deterioration, he can’t be controlled by them. This is why, on a deep, psychosomatic basis, Molinari can defy Minister Freneksy. He is not entirely helpless.’
‘This is all over my head,’ Taubman said. ‘Excuse me.’ He walked off.
The reeg receptionist remained.
URGE YOUR SECRETARY TO CONTACT THE REEG AUTHORITY. WE WOULD ASSIST IN PROTECTING TERRA FROM STAR VENGEANCE, I AM SURE.
It was, Eric thought, a rather wistful message which the multi-armed creature had flashed at him with her translation box. The reegs might want to assist, but ‘Starmen were already on Terra, holding key positions. At the first hint that Terra was negotiating with the reegs the ‘Starmen would move in prearranged order; they would seize the planet overnight.
A tiny Terran-controlled state might function for a limited time in the Cheyenne vicinity, shelled and bombed day and night by the ‘Starmen. But then it, too, would capitulate. Its shield of Jupiter-obtained rexeroid compounds would not protect it forever – and Molinari knew that. Terra would become a conquered state, supplying war materiel and slave labor to Lilistar. And the war would go on.
And the irony was this: as a slave planet Terra would be able to contribute more to the war effort than she did now as a quasi-independent entity. And no one recognized this more than did the Mole. Hence his entire foreign policy; this explained everything that he did.
‘By the way,’ Willy K said, and there was a trace of amusement in his voice. ‘Your former employer, Virgil Ackerman, is still alive; he still governs Tijuana Fur & Dye. He is two hundred and thirty years old and retains twenty org-trans surgeons within call. I believe I have read that he has gone through four matched sets of kidneys, five livers, spleens, and undetermined numbers of hearts—’
‘I feel sick,’ Eric said, and rocked back and forth.
The drug is wearing off.’ Willy K floated toward a chair. ‘Miss Ceeg, assist him, please!’
‘I’m okay,’ Eric said thickly. His head ached and nausea staggered him. All the lines, the surfaces around him, had become astigmatic; under him the chair felt unreal and then, abruptly, he fell, lay on his side.
‘The transition is difficult,’ Willy K said. ‘Apparently we can’t help him, Miss Ceeg. Good luck to your Secretary, doctor. I can appreciate what a great service he performed for your people. Perhaps I will write a letter to the New York Times, conveying this knowledge.’
A prism of primal colors tapped at Eric like an illuminated wind; it was, he thought, the wind of life blowing over him, sweeping him where it desired without regard for his small wishes. And then the winds became black; they were no longer the winds of life but the opaque smoke of death.
He saw, projected as a pseudo environment around him, a travesty of his injured nervous system; the multitudes of conduits were visibly corrupted, had turned inky as the drug’s damage spread throughout him and established its grim self. A voiceless bird, some carrion eater of the storm, sat on his chest, croaking in the silence left behind as the winds receded from him. The bird remained and he felt its dunglike claws penetrate his lungs, his chest cavity, and then his abdominal cavity. Nothing within him remained untouched; it had all been disfigured and even the antidote had not stopped this. As long as he lived he would never regain the purity of the original organism.
This was the price exacted from him by the deciding forces.
Dragging himself to a crouched position, he saw that he inhabited an empty waiting room. No one had seen him and he was free to get up and go. He rose to his feet, steadied himself by means of a chrome and leather chair.
The magazines, in the nearby rack, were in English. And on their covers, laughing Terrans. Not reegs.
‘Did you want something?’ A male voice, lisping slightly. A Hazeltine employee wearing florid, fashionable robes.
‘No,’ Eric said. This was his own time; he recognized the trappings of 2055. Thanks just the same.’
A moment later he had made his way painfully outdoors in the direction of the sidewalk, down the path of redwood-rounds.
What he wanted was a cab, a place to sit down and rest. As he made his trip back to Cheyenne. He had gotten what he wanted; presumably he was no longer an addict and if he cared to he could also free his wife. And in addition he had viewed a world over which the shadow of Lilistar did not obtain.
‘Ferry you somewhere, sir?’ An autonomic cab drifted toward him.
‘Yes,’ he said, and walked toward it.
Suppose an entire planet took the drug, he thought as he boarded. A mass fugue away from our dismal, ever narrowing world of reality. Suppose Tijuana Fur & Dye gave the order to produce it in enormous quantity, distributed it, through the government’s help, to everyone. Would that be a moral solution? Are we entitled to that?
Anyhow it couldn’t be done. The ‘Starmen would move in first.
‘Where to sir?’ the cab’s circuit inquired.
He decided to use it for the entire trip; it would take only a few minutes longer. To Cheyenne.’
‘I can’t, sir. Not there.’ It sounded nervous. ‘Request another—’
‘Why not?’ He came awake instantly.
‘Because as is well known all Cheyenne belongs to them. To the enemy.’ It added, ‘And traffic into enemy areas is illegal, as you know.’
‘What enemy?’
‘The traitor Gino Molinari,’ the cab answered. ‘Who sought to betray the war effort; you know, sir. The former UN Secretary who conspired with reeg agents to—’
‘What is the date?’ Eric demanded.
‘June 15, 2056.’
He had – possibly through the action of the antidote – failed to make it to his own time; it was one year later and there was nothing he could do about it. And he had saved no more of the drug; the rest had been given to Kathy at the Airfield, and so he was stuck here in what obviously was ‘Star-dominated territory. Like most of Terra.