It may seem illogical that titans would “free” a host even though they knew that the host was the sort who could be owned. But the advantages to them show up through analogy: the commissars will not willingly let any of their slave-citizens escape; nevertheless they send out thousands of fifth columnists into the territory of free men. Once outside, these agents can choose freedom and many do, but most of them don’t—as we all know too well. They prefer slavery.
In the renegades the slugs had a supply of “trustworthy” fifth columnists—”trustworthy” is not the right word but the English language has no word for this form of vileness. That Zone Green was being penetrated by renegades was certain—but it is hard to tell a fifth columnist from a custard head; it always has been. The ratio of damn fools to villains is high.
So I got ready to go. I took under light hypnosis a refresher in the languages I would need with emphasis on shibboleth phrases of the latest meanderings of the Party Line. I was provided with a personality and coached in a trade which would permit me to travel, repairman for irrigating pumps—and given much money. If it suited me, my trade would let me hint that a pump had been sabotaged. Coercion, intimidation, blackmail, and bribery are especially useful behind the Curtain; the people have lived under a terror so long that they have no defenses; their puppet strings are always at hand.
I was to be dropped, rather than let to crawl under the Curtain. If I failed to report back, other agents would follow. Probably other agents would anyhow—or already had gone. I was not told; what an agent does not know he cannot divulge, even under drugs.
The reporting equipment was a new model and a joy to have. Ultramicrowave stuff with the directional cavity no bigger than a teacup and the rest, power pack and all, hardly larger than a loaf of bread, with the whole thing so well shielded that it would not make a Geiger counter even nervous. Strictly horizon range—I was to aim it at whatever space station was above the horizon. It had to be aimed closely, which required me to seal into my mind the orbital tables of all three space stations and a navigational grid of the territory I was to operate in. The handicap was really its prime advantage; the highly directional quality of the sender meant that it would not be detected save by wild accident.
I had to drop through their screen but it would be under a blanket of anti-radar “window” to give their search technicians fits. They would know that something was being dropped, but they would not know what, nor where, nor when, for mine would not be the only blanket, nor the only night of such tactics.
Once I had made up my mind whether the USSR was or was not slug infested I was to dictate a report to whatever space station was in sight—the line-of-sight, that is; I can’t pick out a space station by eye and I doubt those who say they can. Report made, I was free to walk, ride, crawl, sneak and/or bribe my way out if I could.
The only trouble was that I never had a chance to use these preparations; the Pass Christian saucer landed.
The Pass Christian saucer was only the third to be seen after landing. Of the first two, the Grinnell saucer had been concealed by the slugs—or perhaps it took off again—and the Burlingame saucer was a radioactive memory. But the Pass Christian saucer was tracked and was seen on the ground almost at once.
It was tracked by Space Station Alpha—and recorded as an extremely large meteorite believed to have landed in or near the Gulf of Mexico. Which fact was not connected with the Pass Christian saucer until later but which, when it was, told us why we had failed to spot other landings by radar screen . . . the saucers came in too fast.
The saucers could be “seen” by radar—the primitive radar of sixty-odd years ago had picked them up many times, especially when cruising at atmospheric speeds while scouting this planet. But our modern radar had been “improved” to the point where saucers could not be seen; our instruments were too specialized. Electronic instruments follow an almost organic growth toward greater and greater selectivity. All our radar involves discriminator circuits and like gimmicks to enable each type to “see” what it is supposed to see and not bother with what it should ignore. Traffic block control sees atmospheric traffic only; the defense screen and fire control radars see what they are supposed to see—the fine screen “sees” a range from atmospheric speeds up to orbiting missiles at five miles a second; the coarse screen overlaps the fine screen, starting down at the lowest wingless-missile speed and carrying on up into the highest spaceship speeds relative to Earth and somewhat higher—about ten miles per second.