The Zap Gun

22

In the park in Festung Washington, D.C. the aged, feeble, shabbily dressed war veteran sat mumbling to himself and watching the children playing, and then he saw, making their way without haste down the wide gravel path, two second lieutenants from the Wes-bloc Air Arm Academy, youths of nineteen with clean, scrubbed, beardless but arrestingly, unusually intelligent faces.

"Nice day," the ancient hulk said to them, nodding.

They paused briefly. That was enough.

"I fought in the Big War," the old man cackled, with pride. "You never saw combat but I did; I was main-man for a front-line T.W.G. Ever seen a T.W.G. recoil 'cause of an overload, when the input-line circuit-breaker fails, and the induction field shorts? Fortunately I was off a distance so I survived. Field hospital. I mean a ship. Red Cross. I was laid up months."

"Gee," one of the shavetails said, out of deference.

"Was that in the Callisto revolt six years ago?" the other asked.

The ancient cobwebbed shape swayed with brittle mirth. "It was sixty-three years ago. I been running a fixit shop since. Until I got to bleeding internally and had to quit except for small work. Apt appliances. I'm a first-rate swibble man: I can fix a swibble that otherwise—" He wheezed, unable to breathe momentarily.

"But sixty-three years ago!" the first shavetail said. He calculated. "Heck, that was during World War Two; that was 1940." They then both stared at the old veteran.

The hunched, dim, stick-like figure croaked, "No, that was 2005. I remember because my medal says so." Shakily, he groped at his tattered great-cloak. It seemed to disintegrate as he poked at it, turning further into dust. He showed them a small metal star pinned to his faded shirt.

Bending, the two young commissioned officers read the metal surface with its raised figures and letters.

"Hey, Ben. It does say 2005."

"Yeah." Both officers stared.

"But that's next year."

"Let me tell you about how we beat 'em in the 'Big War,' " the old vet wheezed, tickled to have an audience. "It was a long war; sheoot, it seemed like it'd never end. But what can you do against T.G. warp? And that's what they found out. Were they surprised!" He giggled, wiped then at the saliva that had sputtered from his sunken lips. "We finally came up with it; of course we had all those failures." With disgust he hawked, spat onto the gravel. "Those weapons designers didn't know a thing. Stupid bastards."

"Who," Ben said, "was the enemy?"

It took a long time before the old veteran could grasp the nature of the question and when he did his disgust was so profound as to be overwhelming. He tottered to his feet, moved shufflingly away from the two young officers. "Them. The slavers from Sirius!"

After a pause the other second lieutenant seated himself on the other side of the old war veteran and then, thoughtfully, he said to Ben, "I think—" He made a gesture.

"Yeah," Ben said. To the old man he said, "Pop. Listen. We're going below."

"Below?" The old man cringed, confused and frightened.

"The kremlin" Ben said. "Subsurface. Where UN-W Natsec, the Board, is meeting. General Nitz. Do you know who General George Nitz is?"

Mumbling, the veteran pondered, tried to remember. "Well, he was way up there," he said finally. "What year is this?" Ben said. The old man eyed him gleefully. "You can't fool me. This is 2068. Or—" The momentarily bright eyes dimmed over, hesitantly. "No, it's 2067; you were trying to catch me. But you didn't, did you? Am I right? 2067?" He nudged the young second lieutenant.

To his fellow officer, Ben said, "I'll stay here with him. You get a mil-car, official. We don't want to lose him."

"Right." The officer rose, sprinted off in the direction of the kremlin's surface-installations. And the funny thing was he kept thinking over and over again, inanely, as if it had any bearing: What the hell was a swibble?