Second Stage Lensmen

7: Wide-open N-way

Serenely the mighty Dauntless bored her way homeward through the ether, at the easy touring blast—for her—of some eighty parsecs an hour. The engineers inspected and checked their equipment, from instrument–needles to blast– nozzles; relining, repairing, replacing anything and everything which showed any signs of wear or strain because of what the big vessel had just gone through. Then they relaxed into their customary routine of killing time—the games of a dozen planets and the vying with each other in the telling of outrageously untruthful stories.

The officers on watch lolled at ease in their cushioned seats, making much ado of each tiny thing as it happened, even the changes of watch. The Valerians, as usual, remained invisible in their own special quarters. There the gravity was set at twenty seven hundred instead of at the Tellurian normal of nine hundred eighty, there the atmospheric pressure was forty pounds to the square inch, there the temperature was ninety six degrees Fahrenheit, and there vanBuskirk and his fighters lived and moved and had their drills of fantastic violence and stress. They were irked less than any of the others by monotony; being, as has been intimated previously, neither mental nor intellectual giants.

And Kinnison, mirror–polished gray boots stacked in all their majestic size upon a corner of his desk, leaned his chair precariously backward and thought in black concentration. It still didn't make any kind of sense. He had just enough clues—fragments of clues—to drive a man nuts. Menjo Bleeko was the man he wanted. On Lonabar. To find one was to find the other, but how in the steaming hells of Venus was he going to find either of them? It might seem funny not to be able to find a thing as big as a planet—but since nobody knew where it was, by fifty thousand parsecs, and since there were millions and skillions and whillions of planets in the galaxy, a random search was quite definitely out. Bleeko was a zwilnik, or tied in with zwilniks, of course; but he could read a million zwilnik minds without finding, except by merest chance, one having any contact with or knowledge of the Lonabarian.

The Patrol had already scoured—fruitlessly—Aldebaran II for any sign, however slight, pointing toward Lonabar. The planetographers had searched the files, the charts, the libraries thoroughly. No Lonabar. Of course, they had suggested—what a help!—they might know it under some other name. Personally, he didn't think so, since no jeweler throughout the far–flung bounds of Civilization had as yet been found who could recognize or identify any of the items he had described.

Whatever avenue or alley of thought Kinnison started along, he always ended up at the jewels and the girl. Illona, the squirrel–brained, romping, joyous little imp who by now owned in fee simple half of the ship and nine– tenths of the crew. Why in Palain's purple hells couldn't she have had a brain? How could anybody be dumb enough not to know the galactic coordinates of their own planet? Not even to know anything that could help locate it? But at that, she was probably about as smart as most—you couldn't expect any other woman in the galaxy to have a mind like Mac's…

For minutes, then, he abandoned his problem and reveled in visions of the mental and physical perfections of his fiancee. But this was getting him nowhere, fast. The girl or the jewels—which? They were the only real angles he had.

He sent out a call for her, and in a few minutes she came swirling in. How different she was from what she had been! Gone were the somberness, the dread, the terror which had oppressed her; gone were the class–conscious inhibitions against which she had been rebelling, however subconsciously, since childhood. Here she was free! The boys were free, everybody was free! She had expanded tremendously—unfolded. She was living as she had never dreamed it possible to live. Each new minute was an adventure in itself. Her black eyes, once so dull, sparkled with animation; radiated her sheer joy in living. Even her jet–black hair–seemed to have taken on a new luster and gloss, in its every, precisely– arranged wavelet.

"Hi, Lensman!" she burst out, before Kinnison could say a word or think a thought in greeting. "I'm so glad you sent for me, because there's something I've been wanting to ask you since yesterday. The boys are going to throw a blow–out, with all kinds of stunts, and they want me to do a dance. QX, do you think?"

"Sure. Why not?"

"Clothes," she explained. "I told them I couldn't dance in a dress, and they said I wasn't supposed to, that acrobats didn't wear dresses when they performed on Tellus, that my regular clothes were just right. I said they were trying to string me and they swore they weren't—said to ask the Old Man…" she broke off, two knuckles jammed into her mouth, expressive eyes wide in sudden fright. "Oh, excuse me, sir," she gasped. "I didn't…"

"'Smatter? What bit you?" Kinnison asked, then got it. "Oh—the 'Old Man', huh? QX, angel–face, that's standard nomenclature in the Patrol. Not with you folks, though, I take it?"

"I'll say not," she breathed. She acted as though a catastrophe had been averted by the narrowest possible margin. "Why, if anybody got caught even thinking such a thing, the whole crew would go into the steamer that very minute. And if I would dare to say 'Hi' to Menjo Bleeko…!" she shuddered.

"Nice people," Kinnison commented.

"But are you sure that the…that I'm not getting any of the boys into trouble?" she pleaded. "For, after all, none of them ever dare call you that to your face, you know."

"You haven't been around enough yet," he assured her. "On duty, no; that's discipline—necessary for efficiency. And I haven't hung around the wardrooms much of late—been too busy. But at the party you'll be surprised at some of the things they call me—if you happen to hear them. You've been practicing— keeping in shape?"

"Uh–huh," she confessed. "In my room, with the spy–ray–block on."

"Good. No need to hide, though, and no need to wear dresses any time you're practicing—the boys were right on that. But what I called you in about is that I want you to help me. Will you?"

"Yes, sir. In anything I can—anything, sir," she answered, instantly.

"I want you to give me every scrap of information you possibly can about Lonabar; its customs and habits, its work and its play—everything, even its money and its jewelry." This last apparently an after–thought. "To do so, you'll have to let me into your mind of your own free will—you'll have to cooperate to the limit of your capability. QX?"

"That will be quite all right, Lensman," she agreed, shyly. "I know now that you aren't going to hurt me."

Illona did not like it at first, there was no question of that. And small wonder. It is an intensely disturbing thing to have your mind invaded, knowingly, by another; particularly when that other is the appallingly powerful mind of Gray Lensman Kimball Kinnison. There were lots of things she did not want exposed, and the very effort not to think of them brought them ever and ever more vividly to the fore. She squirmed mentally and physically: her mind was for minutes a practically illegible turmoil. But she soon steadied down and, as she got used to the new sensations, she went to work with a will. She could not increase the planetographical knowledge which Kinnison had already obtained from her, but she was a mine of information concerning Lonabars' fine gems. She knew all about every one of them, with the completely detailed knowledge one is all too apt to have of a thing long and intensely desired, but supposedly forever out of reach.

"Thanks, Illona." It was over; the Lensman knew as much as she did about everything which had any bearing upon his quest. "You've helped a lot—now you can flit."

"I'm glad to help, sir, really—any time. I'll see you at the party, then, if not before." Illona left the room in a far more subdued fashion than she had entered it. She had always been more than half afraid of Kinnison; just being near him did things to her which she did not quite like. And this last thing, this mind–searching interview, did not operate to quiet her fears. It gave her the screaming meamies, no less!

And Kinnison, alone in his room, started to call for a tight beam to Prime Base, then changed his mind and Lensed a thought—gingerly and diffidently enough—to Port Admiral Haynes.

"Certainly I'm free!" came instant response. "To you, I'm free twenty four hours of every day. Go ahead."

"I want to try something that I don't know whether can be done or not. A wideopen, Lens–to–Lens conference with all the Lensmen, especially all Unattached Lensmen, who can be reached. Can it be done?"

"Whew!" Haynes whistled. "I've been in such things up to a hundred or so…no reason why it wouldn't work. Most of the people you want know me, and those who don't can tune in through someone who does. If everybody tunes to me at the same time, we'll all be en rapport with each other."

"It's QX, then? The reason I…"

"Skip it, son. No use explaining twice—I'll get it when the others do. I'll take care of it. It'll take some little time…Would hour twenty, tomorrow, be soon enough?"

"That'll be fine. Thanks a lot, chief."

The next day dragged, even for the always–busy Kinnison. He prowled about, aimlessly. He saw the spectacular Aldebaranian several times, noticing something which tied in very nicely with a fact he had half–seen in the girl's own mind before he could dodge it—that whenever she made a twosome with any man, the man was Henry Henderson.

"Blasted, Hen?" he asked, casually, when he came upon the pilot in a corner of a ward–room, staring fixedly at nothing.

"Out of the ether," Henderson admitted. "However, I haven't been making any passes. No use telling you that, though."

There wasn't. Unattached Lensmen, as well as being persons of supreme authority, are supremely able mind–readers. Verbum sap.

"I know you haven't" Then, answering the unasked question: "No, I haven't been reading your mind. Nor anybody else's, except Illona's. I've read hers, up and down and crosswise."

"Oh…so you know, then…say, Kim, can I talk to you for a minute? Really talk, I mean?"

"Sure. On the Lens?"

"That'd be better."

"Here you are. About Illona, the beautiful Aldebaranian zwilnik, I suppose."

"Don't, Kim." Henderson actually flinched, physically. "She isn't a zwilnik, really—she can't be—I'd bet my last millo on that?"

"Are you telling me or asking me?"

"I don't know." Henderson hesitated. "I've been wanting to ask you…you've got a lot of stuff we haven't, you know…whether she…I mean if I…Oh, hell! Kim, is there any reason why I shouldn't…well, er…get married?"

"Millions of reasons why you should, Hen. Everybody ought to."

"Damnation, Kim! That isn't what I meant, and you know it!"

"Think straight, then."

"QX. Sir, would Unattached Lensman Kimball Kinnison approve of my marriage to Illona Potter, if I've got jets enough to swing it?"

Mighty clever, the Lensman thought. Since the men of the Patrol were notoriously averse to going sloppy about it, he had wondered just how the pilot was going to phrase his question. He had done it very neatly, by tossing the buck right back at him. But he wouldn't go sloppy, either. This "untarnished– meteors–upon–the–collars–of–our–heroes" stuff was QX for swivel–tongued spellbinders, but not for anybody else. So:

"As far as I know—and I bashfully admit that I know it all—the answer is yes."

"Great!" Henderson came to life with a snap. "Now, if…but I don't suppose you'd…" the thought died away.

'Til say I wouldn't. Unethical no end. I might cheat just a little bit, though. She probably won't do much worse than beat your brains out with a two– inch spanner if you ask her. And only about half of the twenty one hundred or so other guys aboard this heap are laying awake nights trying to figure out ways of beating your time."

"Huh? Those apes? Watch my jets!" Henderson strode away, doubts all resolved; and Kinnison, seeing that hour twenty was very near, went to his own room.

It is difficult for any ordinary mind to conceive of its being in complete accord with any other, however closely akin. Consider, then, how utterly impossible it is to envision that merging of a hundred thousand, or five hundred thousand, or a million—nobody ever did know how many Lensmen tuned in that day—minds so utterly different that no one human being can live long enough even to see each of the races there represented! Probably less than half of them were even approximately human. Many were not mammals, many were not warm–blooded. Not all, by far, were even oxygenbreathers—oxygen, to many of those races, was sheerest poison. Nevertheless, they had much in common. All were intelligent; most of them very highly so; and all were imbued with the principles of freedom and equality for which Galactic Civilization stood and upon which it was fundamentally based.

That meeting was staggering, even to Kinnison's mind. It was appalling— yet it was ultimately thrilling, too. It was one of the greatest, one of the most terrific thrills of the Lensman's long life.

"Thanks, fellows, for coming in," he began simply. "I will make my message very short. As Haynes may have told you, I am Kinnison of Tellus. It will help greatly in locating the head of the Boskonian culture if I can find a certain planet, known to me only by the name of Lonabar. Its people are human beings to the last decimal; its rarest jewels are these," and he spread in the collective mind a perfect, exactly detailed and pictured description of the gems. "Does any one of you know of such a planet? Has any one of you ever seen a stone like any of these?"

A pause—a heart–breakingly long pause. Then a faint, soft, diffident thought appeared; appeared as though seeping slowly from a single cell of that incredibly linked, million–fold–composite Lensman's BRAIN.

"I waited to be sure that no one else would speak, as my information is very meager, and unsatisfactory, and old," the thought apologized.

Kinnison started, but managed to conceal his surprise from the linkage. That thought, so diamond–clear, so utterly precise, must have come from a Second– Stage Lensman—and since it was neither Worsel nor Tregonsee, there must be another one he had never heard of!

"Whatever its nature, any information at all is very welcome," Kinnison replied, without perceptible pause. "Who is speaking, please?"

"Nadreck of Palain VII, Unattached. Many cycles ago I secured, and still have in my possession, a crystal—or rather, a fragment of a super–cooled liquid— like one of the red gems you showed us; the one having practically all its transmittance in a very narrow band centering at point seven zero zero."

"But you do not know what planet it came from—is that it?"

"Not exactly," the soft thought went on. "I saw it upon its native planet, but unfortunately I do not now know just what or where that planet was. We were exploring at the time, and had visited many planets. Not being interested in any world having an atmosphere of oxygen, we paused but briefly, nor did we map it. I was interested in the fusion because of its peculiar filtering effect. A scientific curiosity merely."

"Could you find that planet again?"

"By checking back upon the planets we did map, and by retracing our route, I should be able to—yes, I am certain that I can do so."

"And when Nadreck of Palain VII admits to being certain of anything," another thought appeared, "nothing in the macrocosmic universe is more certain."

"I thank you, Twenty Four of Six, for the expression of confidence."

"And I thank both of you particularly, as well as all of you collectively," Kinnison broadcast. Intelligences by the millions broke away from the linkage. As soon as the two were alone:

"You're Second Stage, aren't you?"

"Yes. I felt a need. I was too feeble. A certain project was impossible, since it was so dangerous as to involve a distinct possibility of personal harm. Therefore Mentor gave me advanced treatment, to render me somewhat less feeble than I theretofore was."

"I see."

Kinnison didn't see, at all, since this was his first contact with a Palainian mind. Who ever heard of a Lensman refusing a job because of personal risk? Lensmen always went in…no matter how scared he was, of course he went in… that was the Code…human Lensmen, that is…There were a lot of things he didn't know, and other races could be—must be—different. He was astounded that there could be that much difference; but after all, since the guy was an L2, he certainly had enough of what it took to more than make up for any lacks. How did he know how short of jets he himself looked, in the minds of other Second Stage Lensmen? These thoughts flashed through his mind, behind his impervious shield, and after only the appropriate slight pause his thought went smoothly on:

"I had known of only Worsel of Velantia and Tregonsee of Rigel Four, besides myself. I don't need to tell you how terrifically glad I am that there are four of us instead of three. But at the moment the planet Lonabar is, I believe, more important to my job than anything else in existence. You will map it for me, and send the data to me at Prime Base?"

"I will map the planet and will myself bring the data to you at Prime Base. Do you want some of the gems, also?"

"I don't think so." Kinnison thought swiftly. "No, better not. They'll be harder to get now, and it might tip our hand too much. I'll get them myself, later. Will you inform me, through Haynes, when to expect you?"

"I will so inform you. I will proceed at once, with speed." "Thanks a million, Nadreck—clear ether!" The ship sped on, and as it sped Kinnison continued to think. He attended the "blowout". Ordinarily he would have been right in the thick of it; but this time, young though he was and enthusiastic, he simply could not tune in. Nothing fitted, and until he could see a picture that made some kind of sense he could not let go. He listened to the music with half an ear, he watched the stunts with only half an eye.

He forgot his problem for a while when, at the end, Illona Potter danced. For Lonabarian acrobatic dancing is not like the Tellurian art of the same name. Or rather, it is like it, except more so—much more so. An earthly expert would be scarcely a novice on Lonabar, and Illona was a Lonabarian expert. She had been training, intensively, all her life, and even in Lonabar's chill social and psychological environment she had loved her work. Now, reveling as she was in the first realization of liberty of thought and of person, and inspired by the heart–felt applause of the space–hounds so closely packed into the hall, she put on something more than an exhibition of coldly impersonal skill and limberness. And the feelings, both of performer and of spectators, were intensified by the fact that, of all the repertoire of the Dauntless1 superb orchestra, Illona liked best to dance to the stirring strains of "Our Patrol". "Our Patrol", which any man who has ever worn the space–black–and–silver will say is the greatest, grandest, most glorious, most terrific piece of music that ever was or ever will be written, played, or sung! Small wonder, then, that the dancer really "gave"; or that the mighty cruiser's walls almost bulged under the applause of Illona's "boys" at the end of her first number.

They kept her at it until the captain stopped it, to keep the girl from killing herself. "She's worn down to a nub," he declared, and she was. She was trembling. She was panting, her almost–lacquered–down hair stood out in wild disorder. Her eyes were starry with tears—happy tears. Then the ranking officers made short speeches of appreciation and the spectators carried the actors—actual carrying, in Illona's case, upon an improvised throne—off for refreshments.

Back in his quarters, Kinnison tackled his problem again. He could work out something on Lonabar now, but what about Lyrane? It tied in, too—there was an angle there, somewhere. To get it, though, somebody would have to get close to—really friendly with—the Lyranians. Just looking on from the outside wouldn't do. Somebody they could trust and would confide in—and they were so damnably, so fanatically noncooperative! A man couldn't get a millo's worth of real information—he could read any one mind by force, but he'd never get the right one. Neither could Worsel or Tregonsee or any other non–human Lensman; the Lyranians just simply didn't have the galactic viewpoint. No, what he wanted was a human woman Lensman, and there weren't any…

At the thought he gasped; the pit of his stomach felt cold. Mac! She was more than half Lensman already—she was the only un–Lensed human being who had ever been able to read his thoughts…But he didn't have the gall, the sheer, brazen crust, to shove a load like that onto her…or did he? Didn't the job come first? Wouldn't she be big enough to see it that way? Sure she would! As to what Haynes and the rest of the Lensmen would think…let them think! In this, he had to make his own decisions …

He couldn't. He sat there for an hour; teeth locked until his jaws ached, fists clenched.

"I can't make that decision alone," he breathed, finally. "Not jets enough by half," and he shot a thought to distant Arisia and Mentor the Sage.

"This intrusion is necessary," he thought coldly, precisely. "It seems to me to be wise to do this thing which has never before been done. I have no data, however, upon which to base a decision and the matter is grave. I ask, therefore—is it wise?"

"You do not ask as to repercussions—consequences, either to yourself or to the woman?"

"I ask what I asked."

"Ah, Kinnison of Tellus, you truly grow. You at last learn to think. It is wise," and the telepathic link snapped.

Kinnison slumped down in relief. He had not known what to expect. He would not have been surprised if the Arisian had pinned his ears back; he certainly did not expect either the compliment or the clear–cut answer. He knew that Mentor would give him no help whatever in any problem which he could possibly solve alone; he was just beginning to realize that the Arisian would aid him in matters which were absolutely, intrinsically, beyond his reach.

Recovering, he flashed a call to Surgeon–Marshal Lacy.

"Lacy? Kinnison. I would like to have Sector Chief Nurse Clarrissa MacDougall detached at once. Please have her report to me here aboard the Dauntless, en route, at the earliest possible moment of rendezvous."

"Huh? What? You can't…you wouldn't…" the old Lensman gurgled.

"No, I wouldn't. The whole Corps will know it soon enough, so I might as well tell you now. I'm going to make a" Lensman out of her."

Lacy exploded then, but Kinnison had expected that.

"Seal it!" he counseled, sharply. "I'm not doing it entirely on my own— Mentor of Arisia made the final decision. Prefer charges against me if you like, but in the meantime please do as I request." And that was that.