“What are you playing at bastardacoj?” I shouted; “Humane torture to go with your humane murder?”
A moment later I got my answer. The level began to drop.
“I was right-torturers!” I bellowed. “Torture first-then murder. And you call yourself civilized. Why are you doing this?”
The last of the water gurgled down the drain and the door slowly opened. I aimed the pistol at it. I wouldn’t mind drowning if I could take the cretinous colonel or the sadistic sergeant with me.
Something dark appeared through the partly open door. The gun banged and the bullet thudded into it. A briefcase.
“Cease fire!” a male voice called out. “I am your lawyer.”
“He only has one bullet, you’re safe,” I heard the Colonel gay.
The briefcase came hesitantly into the room, carried by a grayhaired man who was wearing the traditional gold-flecked and diamond decorated black suit that adorned lawyers throughout the galaxy.
“I am your court-appointed lawyer, Pederasis Narcoses.”
“What good will you do me-if the trial will be after my execution?”
“None. But that is the law. I will have to interview you now to enable me to conduct your defense at the trial.”
“This is madness-I’ll be dead?”
“That is correct. But it is the law.” He turned to the Colonel. “I must be alone with my client. That is also the law.”
“You have ten minutes, no longer.”
“That will suffice. Admit my assistant in five minutes. He has the court papers and the will.”
The door thunked shut and Narcoses opened his briefcase and took out a plastic bottle filled with a greenish liquid. He removed the top and handed it to me.
“Drink this, all of it. I’ll hold the gun.”
I handed him the weapon, took the bottle, smelled it and coughed. “Horrible. Why should I drink it?”
“Because I told you to. It is of vital importance and you have no choice.”
Which was true-and what difference would it make anyway?
I gulped it down. The champagne had tasted a lot better.
“I will now explain,” he said, recapping the bottle and putting it back into his briefcase. “You have just drunk a thirty-day poison. This is a computer-generated complex of toxins that are neutral now-but which will kill you horribly in exactly thirty days if you are not given the antidote. Which is also computer-generated and impossible to duplicate.”
He jumped back quite smartly when I leaped at him. But the chain on my ankle would not quite reach. My fingers snapped ineffectually just in front of his throat.
“If you will cease clawing at the air I will explain,” Narcoses said with an air of weary sophistication. Had he done this kind of thing before I wondered? I folded my arms and stepped back.
“Much better. Although I am a lawyer licensed to practice on this planet, I am also a representative of the Galactic League.”
“Wonderful. The Paskonjakians want to drown me-you poison me. I thought this was a galaxy of peace?”
“You are wasting time. I am here to free you, under certain conditions. The League has need of a criminal. One who is both skilled and reliable. Which is an oxymoron. You have proved your criminalistic ability by your almost-successful theft. The poison guarantees your reliability. Do I assume that you will cooperate? At the minimum you have a life extension of thirty days.”
“Yes, sure, you’re on. Not that I have a choice.”
“You don’t.” He looked at the watch set into his little fingernail and stepped aside as the door opened. A chubby, bearded youth came in with a sheaf of papers.
“Excellent,” Narcoses said. “You have the will?” The young man nodded. The door was closed and sealed again.
“Five minutes,” Narcoses said.
The newcomer pulled down a zipper that sealed his onepiece suit. Took off the suit-and a lot of flesh with it. The suit was padded. He was not fat at all, but lean and muscular quite like me. When he peeled off the fake beard I realized that he looked exactly like me. I blinked rapidly as I stared at my own face.
“Only four minutes left diGriz. Put on the suit. I’ll fix the beard.”