Federation World

Chapter 30

“YOUR target is unconscious,” Beth said. “I heard shooting. Are you all right?”

Martin grunted again as he climbed awkwardly to his feet. “Yes,” he said.

“My ears and the bio-sensors are calling you a liar,” she said worriedly. “What happened to…”

“I’m all right,” Martin said.

He could not incline the helmet far enough forward to see, but with his fingers he could feel the two long, deep trenches that the bullets had cut in the suit’s chest and shoulder section. He could not move his left arm or inhale without pain, and he thought he had been very lucky indeed to escape with what felt like a broken collarbone and a couple of cracked ribs. But he could not afford to waste his breath on a verbal self-diagnosis-he might need all of it if he was going to recover the last runaway.

A few minutes later as he was struggling to lift the Keidi one-handed into the vehicle, Beth said, “Get in the back with the others and lie flat. I’ll bring you in on remote. Your bio-sensor display worries me, and I don’t want you to pass out, not now. There is another problem…”

It had been a mistake to show the young Keidi everything that was happening outside their transport, she said, because the sight of Martin knocking over their friends with his weapon had made their immature minds jump to a wrong conclusion-that the evil off-worlder’s intention was to kill and ultimately eat all of them. She had tried to reason with them, and had played back the original words of reassurance spoken by their First, but they were too frightened to listen to anyone. She had been forced then to seal the entry ports to keep them from escaping again.

“.. Now they’re taking the interior of the transport apart,” she went on quickly. “The doctor has the others loaded onto vehicles and is waiting outside, but if I open up the ones inside will escape. Gas?” “Gas,” Martin agreed.

On the way back the vehicle lurched and bumped several times, rolling one of the Keidi against his damaged shoulder. He mentioned it to Beth, who said crossly that gravity repulsion vehicles were designed to maintain a fixed distance above the land or road surface, and that it was the ground that was lurching. A few minutes later he heard her telling the doctor that there wasn’t time to unload his casualties and that, with the exception of her life-mate, they should remain in their vehicles until they were off-loaded at the nearest safe induction center. The First, who was still on the transport’s frequency, did not agree.

“They must be brought here!” the Keidi leader said firmly. “Many of their parents are with me and it is wrong to separate them. I insist.”

“But the radiation level in your area is dangerously high,” Beth protested, “and they are young people. They are anesthetized, unable to move, and many of them are injured, and this will complicate and delay the transfer. Unprotected and in the open, they could take only a few minutes exposure without the probability of serious gene damage.”

The First did not reply for a moment, during which Martin was being lifted and pushed through the personnel entry port. When he reached his control console, he saw that Beth was already lifting their transport with one of the hypership’s tractors, The direct vision panels showed only the receding top of the cloud layer.

Around them the Keidi trainees were asleep amid the self-created wreckage of the furniture. The doctor glared at Martin disapprovingly, but could not say anything because of the mask pressed tightly against his speaking horn.

“Land your vessel as close as possible to the entrance of my building,” the First went on suddenly, “and open all entry points. Older members of my Family, those who are too old to worry about further offspring, must be transmitted back to the entrance. They will remove the other casualties from inside your vessel. My own medics will attend the injured, but the doctor may advise if there are special cases. During the transfer the doctor and your life-mate will not try to assist my people in any way and will remain out of sight at all times.

“It is for their own safety,” the First explained harshly. “The feelings of Keidi parents for their offspring are strong and not always logical, and the way the young trainees were rescued has given rise to intense anger and hostility toward both of them. Do you understand your instructions?”

“Do you understand,” Beth said angrily, “that your young Keidi, the ones you feel so strongly and illogically about, will still be at risk. We can take them to another center and send them to you later when…”

“Do as he says,” Martin broke in sharply. “We must think of our obligations.”

He had been thinking about little else since returning to the transport, and hoping that the pain he felt with every breath would not affect his clarity of thought. He had even more time to think as he watched the screen showing the small, limp, and strangely, no longer alien bodies of the trainees being off-loaded. The operation was so fast and well-organized that he doubted whether any of the children were placed at risk, although the same could not be said for the elderly adults who had volunteered, or been told, to make several return trips. Was it a display of bravery and selfless devotion to the children, or of blind obedience to their First Father?

The Keidi leader had influenced the conduct of this assignment from the time, a few minutes after entering planetary atmosphere, his people had fired on their lander. Because of their desire to obtain information and be helpful both to the doctor and the First in the medical emergency involving his granddaughter, they had become personally involved with him and had come off a very bad second best. They had regained the initiative, briefly, during the escape from Camp Eleven, but since then the First had quickly regained control of the situation by maneuvering them into a position where he was running things-the two off-worlders as well as the whole population of his soon to be contaminated and desperately endangered planet-exactly as he pleased.

Although Martin had never been quite sure of what constituted evil in a human being much less an extraterrestrial, he did not think that the First was a completely bad person. He was a brilliant politician, organizer, and tactician, an inspiring leader who had a great dream for the future of his people, and he had the ability combined with the ruthlessness to make that dream come true even after his death. But now, because of the coming of the off-worlders, the entire population would forget their earlier fear and distrust of him and would instead look on him as the greatest benefactor in their history, never considering that for the majority of them-those who were not of his inner Family-the dream would become a nightmare, a future of near slavery.

He was also, as were many of the people he had gathered around him, completely and utterly Undesirable.

More than anything else, Martin wished that his friend Skorta, the Master of Education, and the other Masters of Teldi were here to advise and support him. The Keidi people, the old and very young, the Undesirables and the potential Citizens alike, were not his property in the Teldin sense of the word, but the time had come to grasp his Master’s sword and assume ultimate responsibility.

The time had come, Martin thought sadly, to stop the First from doing even more damage, to end the playing of his planetary power game by removing him and his group of handpicked Undesirable followers from the board.

“I am troubled, off-worlder,” the doctor said suddenly.

Having made a decision which he would probably regret for the rest of his life, not because he thought it wrong but because others with influence over his future career would think so, Martin welcomed the interruption. By giving him something else to think about it decreased the temptation to change his mind.

“The First does not like me and no longer wants me in his Estate,” the Keidi went on. “This does not trouble me because the feeling is mutual. But I hear your life-mate telling the people in the centers that the doors of the matter transmitter rooms are now open, and that they should prepare themselves for transfer to the north and south continents. The people of my city will be confused and frightened by this and worried about what is to come. Will you be able to send me back to them?”

“Yes, Doctor,” Martin said, thinking that the subject had not changed after all. “But not until we know their new location. You may have to wait a few days.”

“I am obligated beyond the possibility of discharge,” the doctor said, “and I have come to realize that the whole of Keida is obligated to your life-mate and yourself. The First will doubtless try to misdirect the discharges toward himself, but my people will be told the truth.

“However,” he went on, “I have had sufficient experience as a healer to know when another person is troubled, even when he is a being of another and visually repugnant species, and I would like, if it is possible, to discharge a small part of my obligation to you. I think that you are troubled. Is there a burden other than your recent hurts that you would like to share with me?”

This is ridiculous, Martin thought wildly as he stared at the leathery, alien features and into the puckering, widely flared mouth of the other’s speaking horn. He had always had a clear idea of what a concerned and trusted psychiatrist or a father confessor should look like, but this was certainly not it.

He surprised himself by saying, “There is a burden, Doctor. I am about to do something very wrong for what I believe are the right reasons. That is what troubles me.”

For a moment the old Keidi was silent, then he said, “The First has the same belief and I do not think it troubles him. But you arc not the First. What is the wrong that you are about to do?”

The docking signal interrupted him at that point, followed by the voice of Beth. Either she had been too busy or was pretending not to have heard their conversation.

“Can you come to Control at once,” she said briskly, “or do you have to visit the medical module first?”

“Yes,” Martin said, “and no.”

The moment for confession had passed.

When they arrived Beth looked at his face, the bullet furrows in his suit, and at the slow, careful way he took his seat, but did not comment. Instead, she nodded toward the main screen and said, “The seismic activity is increasing all over the continent. Most of the centers are feeling it now and the refugees can’t get out and are close to panic… In an earthquake situation their natural instinct is to get outside before the building falls on them and to treat the radiation, which they can neither see nor feel, as the lesser danger. There will be serious casualties if they aren’t moved out quickly. The transmitter rooms are waiting for the destination instructions. So am I.”

Plainly she was still annoyed at him, and he should take a few minutes to apologize and explain.

“Sorry about the way I cut short your argument with the First,” he said, “but there wasn’t time for a debate. I thought that the radiation risk was acceptable, the First certainly thought so, and we both wanted the trainees with him because my idea was to separate…”

“It doesn’t matter,” she broke in angrily, “whether they receive a sublethal dose now,or slowly over the next five generations. I called up the Keida pre-Exodus data and the missile arsenal the First opened up contains virtually all of the fissionable material on the planet. That volcano was dormant and would have remained so for thousands of years if the subsurface detonation hadn’t.;. When it erupts it will make Kratatoa look like a hiccup. All that radioactive filth will be distributed by stratospheric winds all over Keida, and five generations is how long it will take for the radiation to fall to a safe level.

“During that time,” Beth went on, “the race will probably not die out, but there will be a high incidence of cancers, sterility, mutant births, and drastically reduced resistance to disease and wound infection. They may never be able to rise again, and if that wasn’t bad enough, they’ll have the descendants of the First’s bull-boys riding on their backs if they even try. They don’t deserve any of this, especially not the First’s plan for them.

“You should disperse his organization to centers all over Keida,” she ended vehemently, “not allow him to keep it intact. Break your promise to him, dammit. In these circumstances no sane, ethical being would think any the less of you.”

“No,” Martin said quietly. “I have special plans for the First and his organization. They will no longer be able to affect, or infect, the other Keidi.”

It was the doctor who spoke first.

“You disappoint me, off-worlder,” he said. “Is this the great wrong whose doing so troubled you?”

“Yes,” Martin said, still looking at Beth. “I want you to prepare the transmitters for the immediate transfer…”

“I’ve already done that,” she said impatiently.

“I mean,” he said quietly, “the orbital transmitters.”

It was obvious from her deathly pallor and the sudden fear in her eyes that she had already guessed what was in his mind but, for the benefit of the recorders, he went on to tell her exactly what he wanted done so that there would be no possibility of misunderstanding.

The doctor, sensing that something was wrong, moved his horn uncertainly from one to the other but did not speak.

“You’re mad,” she said angrily, “if you’re not joking. You’re breaking every rule in the book. Worse, you’re breaking rules that are so basic that they didn’t even think it necessary to write them! Opening all the induction centers to Undesirables was bad enough, but this!. I don’t think there is a precedent, or a punishment, for what you’re doing. Demotion and loss of non-Citizen status, psychological reconstruction, maybe even reclassification as Undesirables. I just can’t imagine what they will do to us.”

“To me,” Martin corrected.

“To us,” she said firmly. “I have no better answer to the problem. Maybe the hypership will refuse to transmit an illegal instruction tike this, I hope.”

“Try,” Martin said.

Beth swung around, played a brief, silent composition on her console and said, “Federation hypership One Seven Zero Zero Six requesting immediate reactivation of circum-Keida matter transmission network, all units.”

The intership communication screen lit at once with the reply.

She looked at Martin, giving him a last chance to change his mind, then said firmly, ‘The emergency evacuation of remaining Keida planetary population, currently awaiting transfer from equatorial continent induction centers, to the Federation World. Authority, non-Citizen Contact Specialist MJC/221/5501, Level Three and non-Citizen Ship Handler ECM/221/4977, Level One.”

The reply did not seem to surprise her. She changed her approach and said carefully, “Information requested. Am I correct in thinking that a high level of computer mentation is necessary to coordinate the (ie.: materialization, transmission over interstellar distances, and reassembly without distortion of the individual atomic particles which comprise a planetary population, food and draught animals, selected artifacts, and vegetation? All data on the present emergency will be transmitted. Is the level of mentation sufficiently high to evaluate and check present planetary geophysical data, current and predicted long-term radiation effects on the population concerned, and the nonmaterial factors involved, specifically the political, ethical, and emotional considerations peculiar to intelligence bearing organic life forms?”

The reply appeared in supposedly unemotional white characters on a black screen, but Martin could imagine icicles forming under each and every letter. Beth had told him on several occasions that the more highly evolved the computer, the more susceptible it became to the human or other-species influences such as flattery, criticism, or a professional challenge.

For a very few seconds the hypership spoke in its highly compressed language and the mattran coordination computer listened, and Martin held his breath.

Beth looked briefly at the master screen, where the sensors were reporting increasing levels of seismic activity and of mental distress among the Keidi inside their quaking centers. The most optimistic forecast for the eruption was only a few hours away, but it could happen at any time. With a visible effort she curbed her impatience and spoke as one highly intelligent, responsible, but utterly emotionless computer to another.

She said, “The data supplied was intended simply to inform you of the complexity of the problem. A solution was not requested since many of the factors involved, the sometimes illogical and emotion-based thinking associated with the nonmaterial aspects of their lives, place it beyond your level of competence. The problem can be fully appreciated, and a solution provided, only by another organically constructed computer or computers of Supervisor or Planner level empowered to modify or temporarily rescind the regulations being contravened. This is an emergency situation with insufficient time to seek the advice or permission of organic superiors. The solution must therefore be provided immediately by subordinates assuming full responsibility and temporary authority. Activate the orbital transmitters forthwith.”

The reply did not appear for nearly three seconds, which was a very long time for such a high-level computer to consider its response.

“A nice, considerate computer,” Beth said softly. “It’s offering to let us off the hook, giving us time for second thoughts. Maybe we should…” Martin shook his head.

“Your original instruction,” Beth said, in a human and very frightened voice, “is confirmed.”