Worlds of IF (July 1962)

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WORLDS OF JULY 1962 • 35c • K FICTION THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS by Alle n Kim Lang UNCLE SAM’S TIME MACHINE by Theodore Sturgeon AIDE MEM0IRE,A Retief Novelette by KEITH LAUMER

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DON’T CLIP THE COUPON- — if you want to keep your copy of Galaxy intact for permanent possession!* Why mutilate a good thing? But, by the same token ... if you're devotee enough to want to keep your copies in mint condition, you ought to subscribe. You really ought to. For one thing, you get your copies earlier. For another, you're sure you’ll get them! Sometimes newsstands run out -the mail never does. (And you can just put your name and address on a plain sheet of paper and mail it to us, at the address below. We'll know what you mean... provided you enclose your check!) In the past few years Galaxy has published the finest stories by the finest writers in the field - Bester, Heinlein, Pohl, Asimov, Sturgeon, Leiber and nearly everyone else. In the next few years it will go right on, with stories that are just as good ... or better. Don’t miss any issue of Galaxy. You can make sure you won’t. Just subcribe today. *(lf, on the other hand, your habit is to read them once and go on to something new - please - feel free to use the coupon! It’s for your convenience, not ours.) GALAXY Publishing Corp., 421 Hudson Street, New York 14, N. Y. (50c additional Enter my subscription for the New Giant 196-paae Galaxy , per 6 ‘'sues foreign postage) (U. S. Edition only) for: 6 Issues @ $2.50 12 Issues @ $4.50 24 Issues @ $8.50 Name City Address Zone State

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THERE are some things that cannot be generally told — things you ought to know. Great truths are dangerous to some — but factors for personal power and accomplishment in the hands of those who understand them. Behind the tales of the miracles and mysteries of the ancients, lie centuries of their secret probing into nature’s laws — their amazing discoveries of the hid- den processes of man's mind, and the mastery of life's problems. Once shroud- ed in mystery to avoid their destruc- tion by mass fear and ignorance, these facts remain a useful heritage for the thousands of men and women wh o pri- vately use them in their homes today. THIS FREE BOOK The Rosicrucians (not a religious Wfe Rosicrucians ( organization) an age-old brotherhood of learning, have preserved this secret wisdom in their archives for centu- ries. They now invite you to share the practical helpfulness of their teachings . Write today for a free copy of the book, "The Mastery of Life." Within its pages may lie a new life of oppor- tunity for you. Address: Scribe e.C.E, , SEND THIS COUPON ! Scribe E-C.E. I The ROSICRUCIANS (AMORC) i San Jose, California i J Please send me the free book yThe Mastery 1 i of Life, which explains how I may learn to J i use my faculties and powers of mind, , 1 i 1 Name I i J Address * = ! SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA, U.S.A,

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worlds of VoL 12, Number 3 JULY 1962 All Stories New and Complete science fiction Robert M. Guinn, Publisher Sam Ruvidich, Art Director Frederik Pohl, Managing Editor Theodore Sturgeon, Feature Editor COMPLETE SHORT NOVEL The Chemically Pure Warriors by Allen Kim Lang 32 NOVELETTES Aide Memoire by Keith Laumer 8 All That Earthly Remains by C . C. MacApp 106 SHORT STORIES From Gustible’s Planet by Cordwainer Smith 25 The Recruit by Bryce Walton 96 A Bad Town for Spacemen by Robert Scott 124 SPECIAL FEATURES From the Editor’s Notebook — Honest! 6 You and Nostradamus 31 Uncle Sam’s Time Machine by Theodore Sturgeon 89 Hue and Cry 127 COVER by Burns from 44 Aide Memoire 99 Next issue (September) on sale July 12th IF published bi-monthly by Digest Productions Corporation, Vol. 12, No. 3 Main Office: 421 Hudson Street, New York 14, New York 35c per copy. Subscriptions 12 Issues $3.00 in the United States, Canada, Mexico, South and Central America and U. S. possessions, elsewhere $4.00. Second-class postage paid at New York, New York, and at additional mailing offices. Copyright by Digest Productions Corporation, 1962. All rights including translations reserved. All material submitted must be accompanied by self-addressed stamped envelopes. The publisher assumes no responsibility for unsolicited material. All stories printed in this magazine are fic- tion, and any similarity between characters and actual persons is coinciden- tal. Printed in the U. S. A. by the Guinn Company, Inc., New York 14, N. Y.

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IF • Editorial FROM THE EDITOR’S NOTEBOOK - HONEST! SURELY From The Editor’s Notebook is the corniest of all titles for an editorial page ; yet we do have a notebook and we are an editor, and just this once we’ll let you peek. We wouldn’t begin to let you leaf through it. It isn’t that you might swipe our ideas, or that we jot down em- barrassing Secrets. It’s just that we’d hate to have to ex- plain to you why we bothered to record such-and-such a thought when we honestly don’t know ourselves. Some things, of course, are put down out of sheer self-defense — ideas which pop up unex- pectedly and demand to be pursued at a time when duty calls elsewhere. Writing them down can often drive them un- derground for the time being. And some, of course, are writ- ten there specifically because we want to share them with you. It’s good to dredge these out, for they often get per- BY THE EDITOR manently lost, awaiting a tie- in or a pile-on — some frame- work or lead-in to excuse their being immortalized on these pages. Well, the heck with a context. Take ’em as is. All the worlds love a lover. (Title?). . . Guy asks a robot, or ET, “How do you feel?” and gets a four-hour, lecture on esthesia... Why do bees hum? Because they don’t know the lyrics... A prize fight is in progress at the end of the world, watched only by a man alone in a fallout shel- ter. . . A completed engraving for a commemorative stamp exists in the philatelic vaults in Washington, made in spring 1914: “100 Years of Peace, 1814—1914.”... No one seems to have noticed the ex- traordinary skill and force exhibited in the way the shepherds’ part in the Nativity story is presented. The shep- herds (a) left their sheep (b) at night, in order to view the 6

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Manger. You could juice up on applied psychology for forty years and never find a more powerful way to impress the uneducated pastoral mind as to the genuine wonder of an event. The story would be told and retold, not because they comprehended the hap- pening, but because these guys had done the unheard-of thing of leaving their flocks. It’s analagous to having a sur- geon leave the table in the middle of a brain opera- tion. So there’s this pas- toral planet, see. And the crew dress up like natives... Be Grown up or be Blown up... In Russian ‘"if” and “when” translate to the same word. Hey, could this be the real gimmick behind the Ber- lin crisis and these incredible deadlines Khrushchev sets and then backs off? Suppose he’s all the time saying “if I sign a treaty with East Germany in six months” and constantly gets translated “when I sign...”? Time travel story: smart guy buys up Cape Ca- naveral before base, is estab- lished, sits back to cash in. His smarter buddy won’t touch it: he buys the land all around it. When time comes, gov’t moves in, pays (via emi- nent domain) for squashy un- improved relatively useless swamp country, and pays pea- nuts. But the other guy makes nine fortunes on motel real es- tate, bars and trailer parks. . . Chalcedony is pronounced kal sed onee . . . “Here, therefore, is the greatest distemper of learning: when men study words, not matters.” — Francis Bacon... Genesis, Ch. 5, tells of Enoch (which means Man) who praised the Lord; and seems to imply that only with him did Man begin. Which in turn would imply that those who went before — Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, were not human ! . . . Re Conscience* see 1 Corinth. 29. (Now here’s a heck of a note in the note- book ! First Corinthians has only 16 chapters, Second Cor- inthians 13 chapters: what price Conscience?)... Make a fortune: by a piece of really nice woodland, fit it up with isolated tent sites, then install running water behind bushes, AC outlets in tree-roots, gas grates in open stone fire- places— everything really cam- ouflaged and concealed. Can’t imagine what sort of people you’d get for clients but bet they’d pay for it... Some medic has given a name to Fear of the Bomb: Nucleomi- trophobia. . . Seems sometimes as if the very people who were avoiding science fiction be- cause it was specious and com- ic-strippy are now staying away from it because it’s ’way over their heads... “It will ever remain incomprehensible that our generation, so great in its achievements of discov- ery, could be so low spiritual- ly as to give up thinking.” — Albert Schweitzer, END FROM THE EDITOR S NOTEBOOK HONEST! 7

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IF« Novelette AIDE MEMOIRE BY KEITH LAUMER ACROSS the table from Re- tief, Ambassador Magnan rustled a stiff sheet of parch- ment and looked grave “This aide memoire,” he said, “was just handed to me by the Cultural Attache. It's the third on the subject this week. It refers to the matter of sponsorship of Youth groups — ” “Some youths,” Retief said. “Average age, seventy-five.” “The Fustians are a long- live d people,” Magnan snapped. “These matters are relative. At seventy-five, a male Fustian is at a trying age — ” “That’s right. He’ll try any- thing— in the hope it will maim somebody.” “Precisely the problem,” The Fustians looked like turtles but they could move fast when they chose! ILLUSTRATED BY BURNS Magnan said. “But the Youth Movement is the important news in today’s political sit- uation here on Fust. And sponsorship of Youth groups is a shrewd stroke on the part of the Terrestrial Embassy. At my suggestion, well nigh eve- ry member of the mission has leaped at the opportunity to score a few p — that is, ce- ment relations with this emer- gent power group — the lead- ers of the future. You, Retief, as Councillor, are the out- standing exception.” “I’m not convinced these hoodlums need my help in or- ganizing their rumbles,” Re- tief said. “Now, if you have a proposal for a pest control group—” “To the Fustians this is no 8

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jesting matter,” Magnan cut in. “This group—” he glanced at the paper — “known as the Sexual, Cultural, and Athletic Recreational Society, or SCARS for short, has been awaiting sponsorship for a matter of weeks now.” “Meaning they want some- one to buy them a clubhouse, uniforms, equipment and any- thing else they need to com- plete their sexual, cultural and athletic development,” Retief said. “If we don’t act promptly,” Magnan said, “the Groaci Embassy may well anticipate us. They’re very active here.” “That’s an idea,” said Re- tief. “Let ’em. After awhile they’ll go broke instead of us.” “Nonsense. The group re- quires a sponsor. I can’t actu- ally order you to step for- ward. However...” Magnan let the sentence hang in the air. Retief raised one eyebrow. “For a minute there,” he said, “I thought you were going to make a positive statement.” JJL^fAGNAN leaned back, lac- ^•*ing his fingers over his stomach. “I don’t think you’ll find a diplomat of my experi- ence doing anything so naive,” he said. “I like the adult Fustians,” said Retief. “Too bad they have to lug half a ton of horn around on their backs. I won- der if surgery would help.” “Great heavens, Retief,” AIDE MEMOIRE Magnan sputtered. “I'm amazed that even you would bring up a matter of such deli- cacy. A race’s unfortunate physical characteristics are hardly a fit matter for Terres- trial curiosity.” “Well, of course your ex- perience of the Fustian men- tality is greater than mine. I’ve only been here a month. But it’s been my experience, Mr. Ambassador, that few races are above improving on nature. Otherwise you, for ex- ample, would be tripping over your beard.” Magnan shuddered. “Please — never mention the idea to a Fustian.” Retief stood. “My own pro- gram for the day includes going over to the dockyards. There are some features of this new passenger liner the Fustians are putting together that I want to look into. With your permission, Mr. Ambas- sador. . . ?” Magnan snorted. “Your pre- occupation with the trivial disturbs me, Retief. More in- terest in substantive matters — such as working with Youth groups — would create a far better impression.” “Before getting too in- volved with these groups, it might ’be a good idea to find out a little more about them,” said Retief. “Who organizes them? There are three strong political parties here on Fust. What’s the alignment of this SCARS organization?” “You forget, these are 9

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merely teen-agers, so to speak/’ Magnan said. ‘‘Poli- tics mean nothing to them... yet.” “Then there are the Groaci. Why their passionate inter- est in a two-horse world like Fust? Normally they’re con- cerned with nothing but busi- ness. But what has Fust got that they could use?” “You may rule out the com- mercial aspect in this in- stance,” said Magnan. “Fust possesses a vigorous steel-age manufacturing economy. The Groaci are barely ahead of them.” “Barely,” said Retief. “Just over the line into crude atom- ics... like fission bombs.” Magnan shook his head, turned back to his papers. “What market exists for such devices on a world at peace? I suggest you address your at- tention to the less spectacular but more rewarding work of studying the social patterns of the local youth.” “I’ve studied them,” said Retief. “And before I meet any of the local youth social- ly I want to get myself a good blackjack.” II OETIEF left the sprawling ^ bungalow-t y p e building that housed the chancery of the Terrestrial Embassy, swung aboard a passing flat- car and leaned back against the wooden guard rail as the heavy vehicle trundled through the city toward the looming gantries of the ship- yards. It was a cool morning. A light breeze carried the fishy odor of Fusty dwellings across the broad cobbled ave- nue. A few mature Fustians lumbered heavily along in the shade of the low buildings, audibly wheezing under the burden of their immense cara- paces. Among them, shell-less youths trotted briskly on scaly stub legs. The driver of the flat-car, a labor-caste Fus- tian with his guild colors em- blazoned on his back, heaved at the tiller, swung the un- wieldy conveyance through the shipyard gates, creaked to a halt. “Thus I come to the ship- yard with frightful speed,” he said in Fustian. “Well I know the way of the naked-backs, who move always in haste.” Retief climbed down, hand- ed him a coin. “You should take up professional racing,” he said. “Daredevil.” He crossed the littered yard and tapped at the door of a rambling shed. Boards creaked inside. Then the door swung back. A gnarled ancient with tar- nished facial scales and a weathered carapace peered out at Retief. “Long-may-you-sleep,” said Retief. “I’d like to take a look around, if you don’t mind. I understand you’re laying the bedplate for your new liner today.” 10 by Keith Laumer

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“May-you-d r c a m-of-the- deeps,” the old fellow mum- bled. He waved a stumpy arm toward a group of shell-less Fustians standing by a mas- sive hoist. “The youths know more of bedplates than do I, but who but tend the place of papers.” “I know how you feel, old- timer,” said Retief. “That sounds like the story of my life. Among your papers do you have a set of plans for the vessel? I understand it’s to be a passenger liner.” The oldster nodded. He shuffled to a drawing file, rummaged, pulled out a sheaf of curled prints and spread them on the table. Retief stood silently, running a fin- ger over the uppermost draw- ing, tracing lines. . . “What does the naked-back here?” barked a deep voice be- hind Retief. He turned. A heavy-faced Fustian youth, wrapped in a mantle, stood at the open door. Beady yellow eyes set among fine scales bored into Retief. “I came to take a look at your new liner,” said Retief. “We need no prying for- eigners here,” the youth snapped. His eye fell on the drawings. He hissed in sudden anger. “Doddering hulk!” he snapped at the ancient. “May you toss in nightmares! Put by the plans!” “My mistake,” Retief said. “I didn't know this was a se- cret project.” AIDE MEMOIRE THE youth hesitated. “It is not a secret project,” he muttered. “Why should it be secret?” “You tell me.” The youth worked his jaws and rocked his head from side to side in the Fusty gesture of uncertainty. “There is nothing to conceal,” he said. “We merely construct a passenger liner.” “Then you don’t mind if I look over the drawings,” said Retief. “Who knows? Maybe some day I’ll want to reserve a suite for the trip out.” The youth turned and disap- peared. Retief grinned at the oldster. “Went for his big brother, I guess,” he said. “I have a feeling I won’t get to study these in peace here. Mind if I copy them?” “Willingly, light-f o o t e d one,” said the old Fustian. “And mine is the shame for the discourtesy of youth.” Retief took out a tiny cam- era, flipped a copying lens in place, leafed through the drawings, clicking the shutter. “A plague on these youths,” said the oldster, “who grow more virulent day by day.” “Why don’t you elders clamp down?” “Agile are they and we are slow of foot. And this unrest is new. Unknown in my youth was such insolence.” “The police — ” “Bah !” the ancient rumbled. “None have we worthy of the name, nor have we needed^ ought ere now.” 1 1

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"What's behind it?" "They have found leaders. The spiv, Slock, is one. And I fear they plot mischief." He pointed to the window. "They come, and a Soft One with them.” Retief pocketed the camera, glanced out the window. A pale-featured Groaci with an ornately decorated crest stood with the youths, who eyed the hut, then started toward it. "That's the military attache of the Groaci Embassy," Re- tief said. "I wonder what he and the boys are cooking up together?" "Naught that augurs well for the dignity of Fust," the oldster rumbled. "Flee, agile one, while I engage their at- tentions." "I was just leaving," Retief said. "Which way out?" "The rear door," the Fustian gestured with a stubby mem- ber. "Rest well, stranger on these shores." He moved to the entrance. "Same to you, pop," said Re- tief. "And thanks." He eased through the nar- row back entrance, waited un- til voices were raised at the front of the shed, then strolled off toward the gate. THE second dark of the third cycle was lightening when Retief left the Embassy technical library and crossed the corridor to his office. He flipped on a light. A note was tucked under a paperweight: "Retief — I shall expect your attendance at the IAS dinner at first dark of the fourth cycle. There will be a brief but, I hope, impressive Sponsorship ceremony for the SCARS group, with full press coverage, arrangements for which I have managed to com- plete in spite of your intran- sigence." Retief snorted and glanced at his watch. Less than three hours. Just time to creep home by flat-car, dress in cer- emonial uniform and creep back. Outside he flagged a lum- bering bus. He stationed him- self in a corner and watched the yellow sun, Beta, rise rap- idly above the low skyline. The nearby sea was at high tide now, under the pull of the major sun and the three moons, and the stiff breeze carried a mist of salt spray. Retief turned up his collar against the dampness. In half an hour he would be perspir- ing under the vertical rays of a third-noon sun, but the thought failed to keep the chill off. Two Youths clambered up on the platform, moving pur- posefully toward Retief. He moved off the rail, watching them, weight balanced. "That’s close enough, kids," he said. "Plenty of room on this scow. No need to crowd up." "There are certain films," the lead Fustian muttered. His voice was unusually deep for a Youth. Hq was wrapped in a 12 by Keith Laumer

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eavy cloak and moved awk- wardly. His adolescence was nearly at an end, Retief guessed. “I told you once,” said Re- tief. “Don’t crowd me.” The two stepped close, slit mouths snapping in anger. Retief put out a foot, hooked it behind the scaly leg of the overaged juvenile and threw his weight against the cloaked chest. The clumsy Fustian tottered, fell heavily. Retief was past him and off the flat- car before the other Youth had completed his vain lunge to- ward the spot Retief had occu- pied. The Terrestrial waved cheerfully at the pair, hopped aboard another vehicle, watched his would-be assail- ants lumber down from their car, tiny heads twisted to fol- low his retreating figure. So they wanted the film? Retief reflected, thumbing a cigar alight. They were a lit- tle late. He had already filed it in the Embassy vault, after running a copy for the refer- ence files. And a comparison of the drawings with those of the ob- solete Mark XXXV battle cruiser used two hundred years earlier by the Concordi- at Naval Arm showed them to be almost identical, gun em- placements and all. The term “obsolete” was a relative one. A ship which had been out- moded in the armories of the Galactic Powers could still be king of the walk in the Eastern Arm. AIDE MEMOIRE But how had these two known of the film? There had been no one present but him- self and the old-timer — and he was willing to bet the elderly Fustian hadn’t told them any- thing. At least not willingly. . . Retief frowned, dropped the cigar over the side, waited un- til the flat-car negotiated a mud-wallow, then swung down and headed for the ship- yard. THE door, hinges torn loose, had been propped loosely back in position. Re- tief looked around at the bat- tered interior of the shed. The old fellow had put up a struggle. There were deep drag-marks in the dust behind the build- ing. Retief followed them across the yard. They disap- peared under the steel door of a warehouse. Retief glanced around. Now, at the mid-hour of the fourth cycle, the workmen were heaped along the edge of the refreshment pond, deep in their siesta. He took a multi- bladed tool from a pocket, tried various fittings in the lock. It snicked open. He eased the door aside far enough to enter. Heaped bales loomed before him. Snapping on the tiny lamp in the handle of the com- bination tool, Retief looked over the pile. One stack seemed out of alignment. . . and the dust had been scraped 13

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from the floor before it. He pocketed the light, climbed up on the bales, looked over into a nest made by stacking the bundles around a clear spot. The aged Fustian lay in it, on his back, a heavy sack tied over his head. Retief dropped down inside the ring of bales, sawed at the tough twine and pulled the sack free “It’s me, old fellow,” Retief said. “The nosy stranger. Sor- ry I got you into this.” The oldster threshed his gnarled legs. He rocked slightly and fell back. “A curse on the cradle that rocked their infant slumbers,” he rumbled. “But place me back on my feet and I hunt down the youth, Slock, though he flee to the bottommost muck of the Sea of Torments.” “How am I going to get you out of here? Maybe I’d better get some help.” “Nay. The perfidious Youths abound here,” said the old Fustian. “It would be your life.” “I doubt if they’d go that far.” “Would they not?” The Fustian stretched his neck. “Cast your light here. But for the toughness of my hide. . . .” Retief put the beam of the light on the leathery neck. A great smear of thick purplish blood welled from a ragged cut. The oldster chuckled, a sound like a seal coughing. “Traitor, they called - me. For long they sawed at me — in vain. Then they trussed me and dumped me here. They tjiink to return with weapons to complete the task.” “Weapons? I thought it was illegal !” “Their evil genius, the Soft One,” said the Fustian. “He would provide fuel to the Devil himself.” “The Groaci again,” said Retief. “I wonder what their angle is.” “And I must confess. I told them of you, ere I knew their full intentions. Much can I tell you of their doings. But first, I pray, the block and tackle.” Retief found the hoist where the Fustian directed him, maneuvered it into posi- tion, hooked onto the edge of the carapace and hauled away. The immense Fustian rose slowly, teetered. . .then flopped on his chest. Slowly he got to his feet. “My name is Whonk, fleet one,” he said. “My cows are yours.” “Thanks. I’m Retief. I’d like to meet the girls some time. But right now, let’s get out of here.” Whonk leaned his bulk against the ponderous stacks of baled kelp, bulldozed them aside. “Slow am I to anger,” he said, “but implacable in my wrath. Slock, beware !” “Hold it,” said Retief sud- denly. He sniffed. “What’s that odor?” He flashed the light around, played it over a 14 by Keith Laumer

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dry stain on the floor. He knelt, sniffed at the spot. “What kind of cargo was stacked here, Whonk? And where is it now?” Whonk considered. “There were drums,” he said. “Four of them, quite small, painted an evil green, the property of the Soft Ones, the Groaci. They lay here a day and a night. At full dark of the first period they came with steve- dores and loaded them aboard the barge Moss Rock ” “The VIP boat. Who’s scheduled to use it?” “I know not. But what mat- ters this? Let us discuss cargo movements after I have set- tled a score with certain Youths.” “We’d better follow this up first, Whonk. There’s only one substance I know of that’s transported in drums and smells like that blot on the floor. That’s titanite : the hot- test explosive this side of a uranium pile.” Ill BETA was setting as Retief, Whonk puffing at his heels, came up to the sentry box beside the gangway lead- ing to the plush interior of the official luxury space barge Moss Rock. “A sign of the times,” said Whonk, glancing inside the empty shelter. “A guard should stand here, but I see him not. Doubtless he crept away to sleep.” 1* “Let’s go aboard and take a look around.” They entered the ship. Soft lights glowed in utter silence. A rough box stood on the floor, rollers and pry-bars be- side it — a discordant note in the muted luxury of the set- ting. Whonk rummaged in it. “Curious,” he said. “What means this?” He held up a stained cloak of orange and green, a metal bracelet, pa- pers. “Orange and green,” mused Retief. “Whose colors are those?” “I know not.” Whonk glanced at the arm-band. “But this is lettered.” He passed the metal band to Retief. “SCARS,” Retief read. He looked at Whonk. “It seems to me I’ve heard the name be- fore,” he murmured. “Let’s get back to the Embassy — fast.” Back on the ramp Retief heard a sound. . .and turned in time to duck the charge of a hulking Fustian youth who thundered past him and fetched up against the broad chest of Whonk, who locked him in a warm embrace. “N ice catch, Whonk. Where’d he sneak out of?” “The lout hid there by the storage bin,” rumbled Whonk. The captive youth thumped fists and toes fruitlessly against the oldster’s carapace. “Hang onto him,” said Re- tief. “He looks like the biting kind.” “No fear. Clumsy I am, yet not without strength.” by Keith Laumer

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“Ask him where the titanite is tucked away.” “Speak, witless grub,” growled Whonk, “lest I tweak you in twain.” The youth gurgled. “Better let up before you make a mess of him,” said Re- tief. Whonk lifted the Youth clear of the floor, then flung him down with a thump that made the ground quiver. The younger Fustian glared up at the elder, mouth snapping. “This one was among those who trussed me and hid me away for the killing,” said Whonk. “In his repentance he will tell all to his elder.” “That’s the same young squirt that tried to strike up an acquaintance with me on the bus,” Retief said. “He gets around.” The youth scrambled to hands and knees, scuttled for freedom. Retief planted a foot on his dragging cloak; it ripped free. He stared at the bare back of the Fustian — “By the Great Egg!” Whonk exclaimed, tripping the refugee as he tried to rise. “This is no Youth! His cara- pace has been taken from him !” Retief looked at the scarred back. “I thought he looked a little old. But I thought — ” “This is not p o s s 1 b 1 e,” Whonk said wonderingly. “The great nerve trunks are deeply involved. Not even the cleverest surgeon could excise the carapace and leave the pa- tient living.” AIDE MEMOIRE “It looks like somebody did the trick. But let's take this boy with us and get out of here. His folks may come home.” “Too late,” said Whonk. Re- tief turned. Three youths came from be- hind the sheds. “Well,” Retief said. “It looks like the SCARS are out in force tonight. Where’s your pal?” he said to the advancing trio. “The sticky little bird with the eye-stalks? Back at his Embassy, leaving you suckers holding the bag, I’ll bet.” “Shelter behind me, Retief,” said Whonk. “Go get ’em, old-timer.” Re- tief stooped, picked up one of the pry-bars. “I’ll jump around and distract them.” Whonk let out a whistling roar and charged for the im- mature Fustians. They fanned out. . .and one tripped, sprawled on his face. Retief whirled the metal bar he had thrust between the Fustian’s legs, slammed it against the skull of another, who shook his head, turned on Retief... and bounced off the steel hull of the Moss Rock as Whonk took him in full charge. Retief used the bar on an- other head. His third blow laid the Fustian on the pavement, oozing purple. The other two club members departed hasti- ly, seriously dented but still mobile. Retief leaned on his club, breathing hard. “Tough heads 17

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these kids have got. I’m tempt- ed to chase those two lads down, but I’ve got another er- rand to run. I don’t know who the Groaci intended to blast, but I have a sneaking sus- picion somebody of impor- tance was scheduled for a boat ride in the next few hours. And three drums of titanite is enough to vaporize this tub and everyone aboard her.” “The plot is foiled,” said Whonk. “But what reason did they have?” “The Groaci are behind it. I have an idea the SCARS didn’t know about this gam- bit” “Which of these is the lead- er?” asked Whonk. He prod- ded a fallen Youth with a horny toe. “Arise, dreaming _ »» one. “Never mind him, Whonk. We’ll tie these two up and leave them here. I know where to find the boss.” A stolid crowd filled the low-ceilinged banquet hall. Retief scanned the ta- bles for the pale blobs of Ter- restrial faces, dwarfed by the giant armored bodies of the Fustians. Across the room Magnan fluttered a hand. Re- tief headed toward him. A low-pitched vibration filled the air: the rumble of subson- ic Fustian music. Retief Blid into his place be- side Magnan. “Sorry to be late, Mr. Ambassador.” “I’m honored that you chose to appear at all,” said Magnan coldly. He turned back to the Fustian on his left. “Ah, yes, Mr. Minister,” he said. “Charming, most charm- ing. So joyous.” The Fustian looked at him, beady-eyed. “It is the Lament of Hatching ” he said; “our National Dirge.” “Oh,” said Magnan. “How interesting. Such a pleasing balance of instruments — ” “It is a droon solo,” said the Fustian, eyeing the Terrestri- al Ambassador suspiciously. “Why don’t you just admit you can’t hear it,” Retief whispered loudly. “And if I may interrupt a moment — ” Magnan cleared his throat. “Now that our Mr. Retief has arrived, perhaps we could rush right along to the Sponsor- ship ceremonies.” “This group,” said Retief, leaning across Magnan, “the SCARS. How much do you know about them, Mr. Minis- ter?” “Nothing at all,” the huge Fustian elder rumbled. “For my taste, all Youths should be kept penned with the live- stock until they grow a cara- pace to tame their irresponsi- bility.” “We mustn’t lose sight of the importance of channeling youthful energies,” said Mag- nan. “Labor gangs,” said the minister. “In my youth we were indentured to the dredge-masters. I myseif drew a muck sledge.” “But in these modern 18 by Keith Leumer

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times, ” put in Magnan, “sure- ly it’s incumbent on us to make happy these golden hours.” The minister snorted. “Last week I had a golden hour. They set upon me and pelted me with overripe stench- fruit.” “But this was merely a manifestation of normal youthful frustrations,” cried Magnan. “Their essential ten- derness— ” “You’d not find a tender spot on that lout yonder,” the minister said, pointing with a fork at a newly arrived Youth, “if you drilled boreholes and blasted.” «WHY, that’s our guest of ▼Y honor,” said Magnan, “a fine young fellow! Slop I believe his name is,” “Slock,” said Retief. “Eight feet of armor-plated orneri- ness. And — ” Magnan rose and tapped on his glass. The Fustians winced at the, to them, supersonic vi- brations. They looked at each other muttering. Magnan tapped louder. The Minister drew in his head, eyes closed. Some of the Fustians rose, tot- tered for the doors; the noise level rose. Magnan redoubled his efforts. The glass broke with a clatter and green wine gushed on the tablecloth. “What in the name of the Great Egg!” the Minister mut- tered. He blinked, breathing deeply. “Oh, forgive me,” blurted AIDE MEMOIRE Magnan, dabbing at the wine. “Too bad the glass gave out,” said Retief. “In another minute you’d have cleared the hall. And then maybe I could have gotten a word in side- ways. There’s a matter you should know about — ” “Your attention, please,” Magnan said, rising. “I see that our fine young guest has arrived, and I hope that the remainder of his committee will be along in a moment. It is my pleasure to announce that our Mr. Retief has had the good fortune to win out in the keen bidding for the pleas- ure of sponsoring this lovely group.” Retief tugged at Magnan’s sleeve. “Don’t introduce me yet,” he said. “I want to ap- pear suddenly. More dramatic, you know.” “Well,” murmured Magnan, glancing down at Retief, “I’m gratified to see you entering into the spirit of the event at last.” He turned his attention back to the assembled guests. “If our honored guest will join me on the rostrum...?” he said. “The gentlemen of the press may want to catch a few shots of the presentation.” Magnan stepped up on the low platform at the center of the wide room, took his place beside the robed Fustian youth and beamed at the cameras. “How gratifying it is to take this opportunity to ex- press once more the great pleasure^we have in sponsor- 19

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ing SCARS,” he said, talking slowly for the benefit of the scribbling reporters. “We’d like to think that in our mod- est way we're to be a part of ill that the SCARS achieve during the years ahead.” Magnan paused as a huge Fustian elder heaved his bulk up the two low steps to the rostrum, approached the guest of honor. He watched as the newcomer paused behind Sl6ck, who did not see the new arrival. Retief pushed through the crowd, stepped up to face the Fustian youth. Slock stared at him, drew back. “You know me, Slock,” said Retief loudly. “An old fellow named Whonk told you about me, just before you tried to saw his head off, remember? It was when I came out to take a look at that battle cruis- efr you’re building/' ' - * IV WITH a bellow Slock reached for Retief— and choked off in mid-cry as the Fustian elder, Whonk, pin- ioned him from behind, lift- ing him clear of the floor. “Glad you reporters hap- pened along,” said Retief to the gaping newsmen. “Slock here had a deal with a sharp operator from the Groaci Em- bassy. The Groaci were to supply the necessary hardware and Slock, as foreman at the shipyards, was to see that everything was properly in- stalled. The next step, I as- sume, would have been a local take-over, followed by a little interplanetary war on Fla- menco or one of the other nearby worlds. . .for which the Groaci would be glad to sup- ply plenty of ammo.” Magnan found his tongue. “Are you mad, Retief?” he screeched. “This group was vouched for by the Ministry of Youth !” “The Ministry's overdue for a purge,” snapped Retief. He turned back to Slock. “I won- der if you were in on the lit- tle diversion that was planned for today. When the Moss Rock blew, a variety of clues were to be planted where they’d be easy to find... with SCARS written all over them. The Groaci would thus have neatly laid the whole affair squarely at the door of the Terrestrial Embassy. . .whose sponsorship of the SCARS had received plenty of pub- licity.” “The Moss Rock?” said * Magnan. “But that was — Re- tief! This is idiotic. Slock himself was scheduled to go on a cruise tomorrow!” Slock roared suddenly, twisting violently. Whonk teetered, his grip loosened... and Slock pulled free and was off the platform, butting his way through the milling old- sters on the dining room floor. Magnan watched, open- mouthed. “The Groaci were playing a double game, as usual,” Retief 20 by Keith Laumer

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said. “They intended to dis- pose of this fellow Slock, once he’d served their purpose.” “Well, don’t stand there,” yelped Magnan over the up- roar. “If Slock is the ring- leader of a delinquent gang. . . !” He moved to give chase. Retief grabbed his arm. “Don’t jump down there! You’d have as much chance of getting through as a jack- rabbit through a threshing contest.” Ten minutes later the crowd had thinned slightly. “We can get through now,” Whonk called. “This way/” He low- ered himself to the floor, bulled through to the exit. Flashbulbs popped. Retief and Magnan followed in Whonk’s wake. In the lounge Retief grabbed the phone, waited for the operator, gave a code let- ter. No reply. He tried anoth- er. “No good,” he said after a full minute had passed. “Won- der what’s loose?” He slammed the phone back in its niche. “Let’s grab a cab.” IN the street the blue sun, Alpha, peered like an arc light under a low cloud layer, casting flat shadows across the mud of the avenue. The three mounted a passing flat- car. Whonk squatted, resting the weight of his immense shell on the heavy plank floor- ing. “W o u 1 d that I too could AIDE MEMOIRE lose this burden, as has the false youth we bludgeoned aboard the Moss Rock ” he sighed. “Soon will I be forced into retirement. Then a mere keeper of a place of papers such as I will rate no more than a slab on the public strand, with once-daily feed- ings. And even for a man of high position, retirement is no pleasure. A slab in the Park of Monuments is little better. A dismal outlook for one’s next thousand years!” “You two carry on to the police station,” said Retief. “I want to play a hunch. But don’t take too long. I may be painfully right.” “What — ?” Magnan started. “As you wish, Retief,” said Whonk. The flat-car trundled past the gate to the shipyard and Retief jumped down, headed at a run for the VIP boat. The guard post still stood vacant. The two Youths whom he and Whonk had left trussed were gone. “That’s the trouble with a peaceful world,” Retief mut- tered. “No police protection.” He stepped down from the lighted entry and took up a position behind the sentry box. Alpha rose higher, shed- ding a glaring blue-white light without heat. Retief shivered. Maybe he’d guessed wrong. . . There was a sound in the near distance, like two ele- phants colliding. Retief looked toward the 21

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gate. His giant acquaintance, Whonk, had reappeared and was grappling with a hardly less massive opponent. A small figure became visible in the melee, scuttled for the gate. Headed off by the battling ti- tans, he turned and made for the opposite side of the ship- yard. Retief waited, jumped out and gathered in the flee- ing Groaci. “Well, Yith,” he said, “how’s tricks? You should pardon the expression.” “Release me, Retief !” the pale-featured alien lisped, his throat bladder pulsating in agitation. “The behemoths vie for the privilege of dismem- bering me out of hand !” “I know how they feel. I’ll see what I can do... for a price.” “I appeal to you,” Yith whispered hoarsely. “As a fellow diplomat, a fellow ali- en, a fellow soft-back — ” “Why don’t you appeal to Slock, as a fellow skunk?” said Retief. “Now keep quiet . . .and you may get out of this alive.” The heavier of the two struggling Fustians threw the other to the ground. There was another brief flurry, and then the smaller figure was on its back, helpless. “That’s Whonk, still on his feet,” said Retief. “I wonder who he’s caught — and why.” Whonk came toward the Moss Rock dragging the su- pine Fustian, who kicked vainly. Retief thrust Yith down well out of sight behind the sentry box. “Better sit tight, Yith. Don’t try to sneak off; I can outrun you. Stay here and I’ll see what I can do.” He stepped out and hailed Whonk. Puffing like a steam engine Whonk pulled up before him. “Sleep, Retief!” He panted. “You followed a hunch; I did the same. I saw something strange in this one when we passed him on the avenue. I watched, followed him here. Look! It is Slock, strapped into a dead carapace! Now many things become clear.” RETIEF whistled. “So the Youths aren’t all as young as they look. Somebody’s been holding out on the rest of you Fustians!” “The Soft One,” Whonk said. “You laid him by the heels, Retief. I saw. Produce him now.” “Hold on a minute, Whonk. It won’t do you any good Whonk winked broadly. “I must take my revenge !” he to—” roared. “I shall test the tex- ture of the Soft One! His pulped remains will be scoured up by the ramp-wash- ers and mailed home in bot- tles!” Retief whirled at a sound, caught up with the scuttling Yith fifty feet away, hauled him back to Whonk. “It’s up to you, Whonk,” he said. “I know how important ceremonial revenge is to you 22 by Keith Laumer

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Fustians. I will not interfere.” “Mercy!” Yith hissed, eye- stalks whipping in distress. “I claim diplomatic immunity!” “No diplomat am I,” rum- bled W h o n k. “Let me see ; suppose I start with one of those obscenely active eyes — ” He reached... “I have an idea,” said Retief brightly. “Do you suppose — just this once — you could forego the ceremonial revenge if Yith promised to arrange for a Groaci Surgical Mission to de-carapace you elders?” “But,” Whonk protested, “those eyes! What a pleasure to pluck them, one by one!” “Yess,” hissed Yith, “I swear it ! Our most expert sur- geons ...platoons of them, with the finest of equipment.” “I have dreamed of how it would be to sit on this one, to feel him squash beneath my bulk. . .” “Light as a whissle feather shall you dance,” Yith whis- pered. “Shell-less shall you spring in the joy of renewed youth — ” “Maybe just one eye,” said Whonk grudgingly. “That would leave him four.” “Be a sport,” said Retief. “Well.” “It's a deal then,” said Re- tief. “Yith, on your word as a diplomat, an alien, a soft-back and a skunk, you’ll set up the mission. Groaci surgical skill is an export that will net you more than armaments. It will be a whissle feather in your cap— if you bring it off. And AIDE MEMOIRE in return, Whonk won’t sit on you. And I won’t prefer charges of interference in the internal affairs of a free world.” Behind Whonk there was a movement. Slock, wriggling free of the borrowed cara- pace, struggled to his feet, .> in time for Whonk to seize him, lift him high and head for the entry to the Moss Rock . “H e y,” Retief called. “Where are you going?” “I would not deny this one his reward,” called Whonk. “He hoped to cruise in luxury. So be it.” “Hold on,* said Retief. “That tub is loaded with ti- tanite !” “Stand not in my way, Re- tief. For this one in truth owes me a vengeance.” Retief watched as the im- mense Fustian bore his giant burden up the ramp and dis- appeared within the ship. “I guess Whonk means busi- ness,” he said to Yith, who hung in his grasp, all five eyes goggling. “And he’s a little too big for me to stop.” Whonk reappeared, alone, climbed down. “What did you do with him?” said Retief. “Tell him you were going to — ” “We had best withdraw,” said Whonk, “The killing radius of the drive is fifty yards.” “You mean — ” “The controls are set for Groaci. Long-may-he-sleep.” 23

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(ITT was quite a bang/’ said -■-Retief. “But I guess you saw it, too.” “No, confound it,” Magnan said. “When I remonstrated with Hulk, or Whelk—” “Whonk.” “ — the ruffian thrust me into an alley bound in my own cloak. I’ll most certainly complain to the Minister.” “How about the surgical mission?” “A most generous offer,” said Magnan. “Frankly, I was astonished. I think perhaps we’ve judged the Groaci too harshly.” “I hear the Ministry of Youth has had a rough morn- ing of it,” said Retief. “And a lot of rumors are flying to the effect that Youth Groups are on the way out.” Magnan cleared his throat, shuffled papers. “I — ah — have explained to the press that last night’s — ah — ” “Fiasco.” “ — affair was necessary in order to place the culprits in an untenable position. Of course, as to the destruction of the VIP vessel and the pre- sumed death of, uh, Slop.” “The Fustians understand,” said Retief. “Whonk wasn’t k i d d i n g about ceremonial vengeance.” “The Groaci had been guilty of gross misuse of diplomatic privilege,” said Magnan. “I think that a note — or perhaps an Aide Memoire: less for- mal ...” “The Moss Rock was bound for Groaci,” said Retief. “She was already in her transit or- bit when she blew. The major fragments will arrive on schedule in a month or so. It should provide quite a meteor- ite display. I think that should be all the aide the Groaci’s memoires will need to keep their tentacles off Fust.” “But diplomatic usage — ” “Then, too, the less that’s put in writing, the less they can blame you for, if anything goes wrong.” “That’s true,” said Magnan, lips pursed. “Now you’re thinking constructively, Re- tief. We may make a diplomat of you yet.” He smiled ex- pansively. “Maybe. But I refuse to let it depress me.” Retief stood up. “I’m taking a few weeks off... if you have no objec- tion, Mr. Ambassador. My pal Whonk wants to show me an island down south where the fishing is good.” “But there are some ex- tremely important matters coming up,” said Magnan. “We’re planning to sponsor Senior Citizen Groups — ” “Count me out. All groups give me an itch.” “Why, what an astonishing remark, Retief! After all, we diplomats are ourselves a group.” “Uh-huh,” Retief said. Magnan sat quietly, mouth open, and watched as Retief stepped into the hall "and closed the door gently behind him. END 24 by Keith Laumer

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IF • Short Story The aliens relished human ways. Unfortunately, the humans relished them too! from gustible’s planet BY CORDWAINER SMITH SHORTLY after the celebra- tion of the four thousandth anniversary of the opening of space, Angary J. Gustible dis- covered Gustible’s planet. The discovery turned out to be a tragic mistake. Gustible’s planet was inhab- ited by highly intelligent life- forms. They had moderate telepathic powers. They im- mediately mind-read Angary J. Gustible’s entire mind and life history, and embarrassed him very deeply by making up an opera concerning his recent divorce. The climax of the opera por- trayed his wife throwing a teacup at him. This created an unfavorable impression concerning Earth culture, and Angary J. Gustible, who held FROM GUSTIBLE’S PLANET a reserve commission as a Sub- chief of the Instrumentality, was profoundly embarrassed to find that it was not the higher realities of Earth which he had conveyed to these people, but the unpleas- ant intimate facts. As negotiations proceeded, other embarrassments devel- oped. In physical appearance the inhabitants of Gustible’s plan- et, who called themselves Api- cians, resembled nothing more than oversize ducks, ducks four feet to four feet six in height. At their wing tips, they had developed juxta- posed thumbs. They were pad- dle-shaped and sufficed to feed the Apicians. Gustible’s planet matched 25

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Earth in several respects: in the dishonesty of the inhab- itants, in their enthusiasm for good food, in their instant ca- pacity to understand the hu- man mind. Before Gustible be- gan to get ready to go back to Earth, he discovered that the Apicians had copied his ship. There was no use hiding this fact. They had copied it in such detail that the dis- covery of Gustiblc’s planet meant the simultaneous dis- covery of Earth. . . By the Apicians. THE implications of this tragic development did not show up until the Api- cians followed him home. They had a pianoforming ship capable of traveling in non- space just as readily as his. The most important feature of Gustible’s planet was its singularly close match to the biochemistry of Earth. The Apicians were the first intelli- gent life-forms ever met by human beings who were at once capable of smelling and enjoying everything which human beings smelled and en- joyed, capable of following any human music with forth- right pleasure and capable of eating and drinking every- thing in sight. The very first Apicians on Earth were greeted by some- what alarmed ambassadors who discovered that an appe- tite for Munich beer, Camem- bert cheese, tortillas and en- chiladas, as well as the better grades of chow mein, far transcended any serious cul- tural, political or strategic in- terests which the new visitors might have. Arthur Djohn, a Lord of the Instrumentality who was act- ing for this particular matter, delegated an Instrumentality agent named Calvin Dredd as the chief diplomatic officer of Earth to handle the matter. Dredd approached one Schmeckst, who seemed to be the Apician leader. The inter- view was an unfortunate one. Dredd began by saying, “Your Exalted Highness, we are delighted to welcome you to Earth — ” Schmeckst said, “Are those edible ?” and proceeded to eat the plastic buttons from Cal- vin Dredd’s formal coat, even before Dredd could say though not edible they were attractive. Schmeckst said, “Don’t try to eat those, they are really not very good.” Dredd, looking at his coat sagging wide open, said, “May I offer you some food?’’ Schmeckst said, “Indeed, yes.’’ And while Schmeckst ate an Italian dinner, a Peking din- ner, a red-hot peppery Szechuanese dinner, a Japa- nese sukiyaki dinner, two British breakfasts, a smorgas- bord and four complete serv- ings of diplomatic-level Rus- sian zakouska, he listened to the propositions of the Instru- mentality of Earth. 26 by Cordwainer Smith

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THESE did not impress him. Schmeckst was intel- ligent despite his gross and offensive eating habits. He pointed out: “We two worlds are equal in weapons. We can’t fight. Look,” said he to Calvin Dredd in a threaten- ing tone. Calvin Dredd braced him- self, as he had learned to do. Schmeckst also braced him. For an instant Dredd did not know what had happened. Then he realized that in put- ting his body into a rigid and controlled posture he had played along with the low grade but manipulable tele- pathic powers of the visitors. He was frozen rigid till Schmeckst laughed and re- leased him. Schmeckst said, “You see, we are well matched. I can freeze you. Nothing short of utter desperation could get you out of it. If you try to fight us, we’ll lick you. We are going to move in here and live with you. We have enough room on our planet. You can come and live with us too. We would like to hire a lot of those cooks of yours. You’ll simply have to divide space with us, and that’s all there is to it.” That really was all there was to it. Arthur Djohn re- ported back to the Lords of the Instrumentality that, for the time being, nothing could be done about the disgusting people from Gustible’s plan- et. They kept their greed with- in bounds — by their stand- ards. A mere seventy-two thousand of them swept the earth, hitting every wine shop, dining hall, snack bar, soda bar and pleasure center in the world. They ate pop- corn, alfalfa, raw fruit, live fish, birds on the wing, pre- pared foods, cooked and canned foods, food concen- trates and assorted medicines. Outside of an enormous ca- pacity to hold many times what the human body could tolerate in the way of food, they showed very much the same effects as persons. Thou- sands of them got various local diseases, sometimes called by such undignified names as the Yangtze rapids, Delhi belly, the Roman groan- in’ or the like. Other thou- sands became ill and had to relieve themselves in the fashion of ancient emperors. Still they came. Nobody liked them. Nobody disliked them enough to wish a disastrous war. Actual trade was minimal. They bought large quantities of foodstuffs, paying in rare metals. But their economy on their own planet produced very little which the world itself wanted. The cities of mankind had long since de- veloped to a point of comfort and corruption where a rela- tively mono-cultural being, such as the citizens of Gusti- ble’s planet, could not make much impression. The word FROM GUSTIBLE’S PLANET 27

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“Apician” came to have un- pleasant connotations of bad manners, greediness and prompt payment. Prompt payment was con- sidered rude in a credit so- ciety, but after all it was bet- ter than not being paid at all. THE tragedy of the relation- ship of the two groups came from the unfortunate picnic of the lady Ch’ao, who prided herself on having an- cient Chinesian blood. She de- cided that it would be pos- sible to satiate Schmeckst and the other Apicians to a point at which they would be able to listen to reason. She ar- ranged a feast which, for quality and quantity, had not been seen since previous his- toric times, long before the many interruptions of war, collapse and rebuilding of cul- ture. She searched the muse- ums of the world for recipes. The dinner was set forth on the telescreen of the entire world. It was held in a pavilion built in the old Chi- nesian style. A soaring dream of dry bamboo and paper walls, the festival building had a thatched roof in the true ancient fashion. Paper lan- terns with real candles illu- minated the scene. The fifty selected A p i c i a n guests gleamed like ancient idols. Their feathers shone in the light and they clicked their paddle-like thumbs readily as they spoke, telepathically and fluently, in any Earth lan- 28 guage which they .happened to pick out of the heads of their hearers. The tragedy was fire. Fire struck the pavilion, wrecked the dinner. The lady Ch’ao was rescued by Calvin Dredd. The Api- cians fled. All of them es- caped, all but one. Schmeckst himself. Schmeckst suffocated. He let out a telepathic scream which was echoed in the living voices of all the hu- man beings, other Apicians and animals within reach, so that the television viewers of the world caught a sudden cacophony of birds shrilling, dogs barking, cats yowling, otters screeching and one lone panda letting out a singularly high grunt. Then Schmeckst perished. The pity of it. . . The Earth leaders stood about, wondering how to solve the tragedy. On the other side of the world, the Lords of the Instrumentality watched the scene. What they saw was amaz- ing and horrible. Calvin Dredd, cold, disciplined agent that he was, approached the ruins of the pavilion. His face was twisted in an expression which they had difficulty in understanding. It was only af- ter he licked his lips for the fourth time, and they saw a ribbon of drool running down his chin, that they realized he had gone mad with appetite. The lady Ch’ao followed close by Cordwainer Smith

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behind, drawn by some re- morseless force. She was out of her mind. Her eyes gleamed. She stalked like a cat. In her left hand she held a bowl and chopsticks. The viewers all over the world watching the screen could not understand the scene. Two alarmed and dazed Apicians followed the hu- mans, wondering what was go- ing to happen. Calvin Dredd made a sud- den reach. He pulled out the body of Schmeckst. The fire had finished Schmeckst. Not a feather re- mained on him. And then the flash fire, because of the pe- culiar dryness of the bamboo and the paper and the thou- sands upon thousands of can- dles, had baked him. The television operator had an inspiration. He turned on the smell-control. Throughout the planet Earth, where people had gath- ered to watch this unexpected and singularly interesting tragedy, there swept a smell which mankind had forgotten. It was an essence of roast duck. Beyond all imagining, it was the most delicious smell that any human being had ever smelled. Millions upon millions of human mouths wa- tered. Throughout the world people looked away from their sets to see if there were any Apicians in the neighborhood. Just as the Lords of the In- strumentality ordered the dis- FROM GUSTIBLE’S PLANET gusting scene cut off, Calvin Dredd and the lady Ch’ao be- gan eating the roast Apician, Schmeckst. TUTITHIN twenty-four ^ hours most of the Api- cians on Earth had been served, some with cranberry sauce, others baked, some fried Southern style. The seri- ous leaders of Earth dreaded the consequences of such un- civilized conduct. Even as they wiped their lips and asked for one more duck sand- wich they felt that this be- havior was difficult beyond all imagination. The blocks that the Api- cians had been able to put on human action did not operate when they were applied to hu- man beings who, looking at an Apician, went deep into the recesses of their personality and were animated by a mad hunger which transcended all civilization. The Lords of the Instru- mentality managed to round up Schmeckst’s deputy and a few other Apicians and to send them back to their ship. The soldiers watching them licked their lips. The captain tried to see if he could con- trive an accident as he escort- ed his state visitors. Unfor- tunately, tripping Apicians did not break their necks, and the Apicians kept throwing violent mind-blocks at human beings in an attempt to save themselves. One of the Apicians was so 29

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undiplomatic as to ask for a chicken salad sandwich and almost lost a wing, raw and alive, to a soldier whose ap- petite had been re-stimulated by reference to food. The Apicians went back, the few survivors. They liked Earth well enough and Earth food was delicious, but it was a horrible place when they considered the cannibalistic human be- ings who lived there — so can- nibalistic that they ate ducks! The Lords of the Instru- mentality were relieved to note that when the Apicians left -they closed the space lane behind them. No one quite knows how they closed it, or what de- fenses they had. Mankind, salivating and ashamed, did not push the pursuit hotly. In- stead, people tried to make up chicken, duck, goose, Cornish hen, pigeon, sea-gull and other sandwiches to duplicate the incomparable taste of a gen- uine inhabitant of Gustible’s planet. None were quite authentic and people, in their right minds, were not uncivilized enough to invade another world solely for getting the inhabitants as tidbits. The Lords of the Instru- mentality were happy to re- port to one another and to the rest of the world at their next meeting that the Apicians had managed to close Gustible’s planet altogether, had had no further interest in dealing with Earth and appeared to 30 possess just enough of a tech- nological edge on human be- ings to stay concealed from the eyes and the appetites of men. Save for that the Apicians were almost forgotten. A con- fidential secretary of the Of- fice of Interstellar Trade was astonished when the frozen intelligences of a methane planet ordered forty thousand cases of Munich beer. He sus- pected them of being jobbers, not consumers. But on the in- structions of his superiors he kept the matter confidential and allowed the beer to be shipped. It undoubtedly went to Gustible’s planet, but they did not offer any of their own citizens in exchange. The matter was closed. The napkins were folded. Trade and diplomacy were at an end. END EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS NEW REPRINTS 1. MONSTER MEN Due in May. New illustrations. $2.75. 2. MOON MEN Due in May. New illustrations. $2.75. 3. A FIGHTING MAN OF MARS Due in May. $2.75. a. More titles in the works. 4. THREE NOVELS IN ONE PAPERBACK* Thuvia Maid of Mars; Chessmen of Mars; Master Mind of Mars. Ready now! $1.75. EXTRA SPECIAL COLLECTION 5. Complete run of ASTOUND- INGS, 1930 through 1961, 31 full years. Good to very good condition. ONE SET ONLYJ I Price $600.00. (Many other complete sets, special [collections, etc. Send your want list. All prices F.O.B. Brooklyn. (N.Y. I JAYS CORNER |6401 24th Ave. . . .Brooklyn 4. N.Y. by CorUwainer Smith

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IF • Feature YOU AND* NOSTRADAMUS ARE you intelligent? Gift- ed? Brilliant? Sure you are! At least, so says our Fea- ture Editor. In the last issue of IF, he challenged you to prove it. Just in case you missed his provocative article THE OTHER IF, here’s a di- gest of what he said. Since s-f readers as a whole seem to have a special affinity for extrapolation, prognosti- cation, prophecy, or whatever your word for pre-knowledge of the future is, he feels that among our readers there must be a high ability to deduce from current events certain things that will, or even must, happen in the near future. Since about 90 days pass be- tween IF’s closing deadline and the appearance of the magazine on the newsstands, this seems a perfect place to prove how good you are at writing now what will appear in the daily paper three months from now. He is not interested in wild guesses with a billion-to-one chance of amazing everyone : any fool can predict that a Bulgarian earth satellite will land in a Wisconsin pasture but it wouldn’t prove a thing if he turned out to be right. He would like to see reasoned forecasts in this general form: Such-and-such has been the case. So-and-so has now hap- pened. Therefore : Thus and thus will be news when this goes to press. There will of course be a small reward for the most accurate forecasts and ac- knowledgements for all. Send your entries before June 15th, 1962, to: IF Worlds of Science Fiction 421 Hudson St. New York 14, N. Y. 31

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They conquered the planet and they owned it outright. The trouble was — — they didn’t dare set foot on it! THE CHEMICALLY PURE BY ALLEN KIM LANG FROM the head of the pla- toon Lieutenant Lee Hart- ford signaled Sergeant Felix, busy policing up stragglers at the rear, that he was taking over. Hartford tongued the volume-setting of his bitcher to ‘‘Low" and softly sing- songed to his three dozen troopers: **Your girlfriend's just an hour away; there's a time to soldier and a time to play , Pick it HUP, HUP, HUP! ‘Toon, tain-HUT/ HUP, twop, threep, furp; 32

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IF • Short Novel WARRIORS ILLUSTRATED BY MACK HUP, HUP; HUP, twop, threep, furp. Mondrian, pick up the cadence; you’re march- ing like a man with a paper pelvis. Swing ’em six to the front and three to the rear; When you sing to your Dad- dy, sing it loud and clear’’ Hartford turned up the vol- ume. **Three weeks in the woods, eating squeeze-tube beans; We’d be better off in the Fleet Marines . Sound off!9’ “ONE, TWO,” boomed the voice of the Terrible Third, sounding from the hitchers at the chests of thirty-six safety- suits. Dust slapped up from marching-boots. A flock of scarlet blabrigars settled on the road ahead, chattering and watching like small boys. (tSound hoff!” “THREE, FOUR!” The road led uphill toward Stink- erville; they were some three miles from First Regiment Barracks. Three miles from now these troopers could shed their safety-suits and helmets, 33

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shower off three weeks of sweat, drink a beer and leer at the short-skirted, taut-hal- tered girls of the Service Companies. “Who are we?" Hartford chanted. “COMPANY C,” the troop- ers blatted back. The blabrigars, fluttering up from the roadway, chanted too: “Who are we? Company See. Who, we? See, see. Com- pany See Are Wee See See.” These wild birds didn’t mem- orize human speech as well as their captive cousins; they garbled their mockeries imme- diately. The flock settled into the sunflowers beside the road; and were joined by a pair of wild camelopards, chewing sunflower-leaf cud as they peered at the marching Axenites. Hartford looked about, but there were no Stinkers — Kansans — in sight. These natives didn’t care to watch the occupying regiment stir up their homeland’s dust. “ What platoon ?” Hartford called, his voice magnified by the bitcher till the whole col- umn could hear him. “THIRD PLATOON,” the men bellowed back, singing against the percussion of their boots. “ ’Toon, click, click, click; ’toon, click, third pla- toon, click,” mocked the blab- rigars in ragged chorus, re- flecting both the words and the marching feet.” “ Best platoon ?” “THIRD PLATOON!” the men shouted. They’d turned 34 up their bitchers to a volume the blabrigars couldn’t match. Disgusted, the birds flapped their scarlet wings and flew off across the sunflower fields. “ ’Toon,” one rear-flier chanted, “ ’toon, ’toon, ’toon.” “ Worst platoon?” Hartford asked “FIRST PLATOON!” That was for the benefit of Lieu- tenant Piacentelli, command- ing the tail-end of the Regi- ment, the platoon marching on either side of the lumbering Decontamination Vehicle, their safety-suit filters clog- ging with the dust. “ Sound off!” Hartford shouted. “ONE, TWO!” THAT’LL rattle the win- dows in Stinkerville, Hart- ford thought. He pitched his descant louder and higher. “ Sound off!” “THREE, FOUR!” “ Run yer on down!” “ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR; ONE, TWO, THREEP— FURP!” The men of The Terrible Third were grinning through the face- plates of their helmets, rejoic- ing in their reputation as the loudest bunch in the Regi- ment, happy to help Hartford in waging his mock-feud with Lieutenant Piacentelli. They’d been classmates at the Axenite Academy; they’d been room- mates in the Barracks until Pia’s recent marriage to a Service Company officer. Hartford lowered his bitch- by Allen Kjim Lang

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er to a confidential tone. “Square up, men; march tall; look rough and dirty. Show the Stinker girls what they’re missing. HUP, HUP, HUP. Sling those rifles square. Mon- drian, you march like you’re wearing skis: HUP, twop, threep, furp!” Up and down the column came the com- mands of sergeants and pla- toon-commanders, g e 1 1 i n g their troopers in parade-trim for the march through Kan- sannamura: “Stinkerville.” Somewhere up front a compa- ny was singing the anthem of the Axenite troopers, “Oh, Pioneers!” The chorus of twelve dozen men, their hitch- ers full-up, filled the Kansan air and echoed from the walls ahead. Stinkerville, all white- washed, with flakes of mica glittering in the sunlight, sprawled across the road that led to the Barracks. The vil- lage wall, designed to keep wild camelopards from roam- ing the streets and to keep the tame beasts out of the sun- flower-fields, was some eight feet tall. Some Indigenous Hominid had heard the Regi- ment’s clatter and song, for the gates of Kansannamura were open, the brick streets were clear of Stinker com- merce. The village seemed de- serted. A few blabrigars perched on the tiled eaves of the rammed-earth houses, making echoic comments on the sounds of the troopers, singing fleering snatches of “Oh, Pioneers !” A camelopard stretched its ridiculous, three- horned head at the end of its fathom of neck to peer, big- brown-eyed, at the caravan of fishbowl-headed men. Up at the head of the column the Regiment’s flags were un- furled and the Regimental Band was skirling the An- them; men were counting ca- dence as their boots clicked over the scrubbed bricks of Stinkerville’s streets. BUT no Kansan, Stinker, Indigenous Hominid, Gook or Native watched. No cowboy youngsters stared at the gunned-and-holstered men from another planet. No eld- ers looked down their noses at the brash invaders. No mothers wiped their hands on their aprons as they thought of their sons, and the fleshly price they’d pay for freedom. No teenage girls, those pa- trons of parades, watched with lips half-open with apprehen- sion and audacious thoughts about the hundreds of gift- wrapped young man marching past. This planet could have as well been named Coventry as Kansas, Hartford thought. Out the far gate of Kansanna- mura marched Third Platoon, Company “C,” then First Pla- toon, flanking the Decontam- ination Vehicle. A villager came from the house nearest the gate and closed it. He did not look after the two columns of men winding up through the fields of sunflowers to the THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 35

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high plateau where they lived. The sight of the Barracks gave the men’s steps a new swing and spring. After three weeks of sleeping in safety- suits; of breathing, sweating, drinking, eating and excreting through germ-barrier valves and tubing, the prospect of stripping off the plastic bat- tle-dress was seductive. Inside that eight stories of window- less, doorless stone were gar- dens where the troopers could walk barefoot on the grass, pools whose water could splash their naked skin. In the Barracks were the three hun- dred Service Company wom- en who made the big stone box home to their three thousand men. The men of First Regiment massed on the parade-ground. While they stood At Ease, their plastic-sleeved rifles and packs growing heavier by the minute, their safety-suits staler, four of the five Service Companies marched out from the Syphon to join them. The women were suited in yellow plastic, giving rise to the gags about fool’s gold. The four golden companies took up po- sition at the center of the Regiment. Colonel Benjamin Nef, Commander-in-Chief, Kansas, CINCK, climbed to the re- viewing-stand in his command safety-suit of scarlet. Facing into the sun, the Colonel had the polarizing shield dropped over his eyes, and seemed to be wearing a black bandage. His lower jaw beetled to give him a truculent look generally ratified by his actions. His hair glinted through the hel- met like spun copper. Nef turned to his second-in-com- mand, a lieutenant-colonel in ordinary officer’s blues, and murmured instructions. The light colonel saluted, turned the controls of his bitcher to Full Loud, and addressed the troopers assembled : “Regi- ment. . .” Down the chain-of-com- mand came the ripple of warn- ing: “Battaaalion. . .” “Commmpaneee. . . ” “ ’Toooon. . .” “Tain-HUT!’’ Fifteen hun- dred pairs of boots smacked together. The Adjutant held up his clipboard and read pre- cisely: “Attention to orders: “One. Officer of the Guard, Lieutenant Lee Hartford. “Two. CINCK commends troopers involved in the just- completed three-week Field Exercise on not having had a single incident of compromise of sterility. Household, Main- tenance and Security troopers are complimented on having maintained the integrity of the Barracks with a much-re- duced force. “Three. All male and female troopers are again cautioned that fraternization with Indi- genous Hominids is an of- fense punishable by General Court-Martial, and that any unauthorized intercourse with the natives is prohibited.” 36 by Allen Kim Lang

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THERE was of course a murmur of automatic laughter at this last bit of of- ficial double-entendre. The idea of bedding-down a Stink- er wench was a favorite bit of pornographic fantasy. An air- tight safety-suit, though fit with valves as functional as the drop-seat in long-johns, was no garment for romance. To undress, to appear in out- door Kansas outside that head- to-foot sausage-casing, ap- pealed to none of the troop- ers. Healthy young men and women don’t entertain the thought of painful suicide. The reporting officer about- faced, saluted Colonel Nef, about-faced again. “Pres- ent. . “Preezent. . . ’’ “Preeezent . . .” “Preeeezent . . . ” “HAHMS!” Fifteen hun- dred Dardick-rifles, sheathed in plastic, slapped perpendicu- lar. The blue-clad officers, armed with pistols, touched their index fingers to their helmet-temples. The bands- men’s drums growled, the electronic horns sobbed against their miltes, and the flutes in lonely purity played the theme of “Oh, Pioneers!” For all his har-de-har-hard- ness, Hartford felt a sting in his eyes at this moment, as he did whenever the splendidly stage-managed ceremony of Retreat was performed. After the Anthem, much louder, the band played Retreat. The col- ors crept down the flagstaff, into the reverent arms of a pair of Service Policemen. “Oh-deph, HAHMS! By line-of-battalions, line-of-com- panies, line-of-platoons, line- of-squads, return to quarters and dismiss!’’ The light colonel made one last salute to CINCK, and the little ballet on the reviewing-stand was over. The troopers were now free to go in to their showers, their latrines, their suppers, and their women. “At ease,’’ Hartford told the Terrible Third. “Rest. Smoke if you’ve got ’em.” The men chuckled dutifully at the oldest joke in the serv- ice. An Axenite trooper, sealed in his germfree safety- suit and helmet, is by defini- tion a non-smoker outside his Barracks. It would be another hour they’d be outside, since the Third was next to the last of the fifty platoons to swim home through the Syphon. While the companies on the far left flank of the Regiment were ballooning-up and peel- ing-off in columns-of-squads to enter the Barracks, Hart- ford went back to talk with Piacentelli, C.O. of First Pla- toon. II ETTING inside the Bar- racks was a production. The safety-suits worn outside presumably bore on their out- er surfaces all the dust-borne bugs native to Kansas. To car- ry these bacteria into the Bar- THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 3T

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racks, to be inspired and in- gested by Axenites — humans who’d never before had a bac- terium inside their bodies — would wipe out the Regiment. Axenites are chemically pure people. They have no immuni- ological experience. Their gamma-globulin is low, their intestinal walls are thin. They may be killed by a light salt- ing of staphyllococci, a soup- con of strep, or just a pinch of B. subtilis, a buglet as in- nocuous to “normal” humans as the dust-motes it inhabits. The Syphon was the only entrance to the Barracks. It opened as the “Wet Gut,” a ramp leading downward into liquid disinfectant which fi- nally filled a tunnel, which ran the length of the Bar- racks. Each trooper, as he walked down into the disin- fectant, grabbed the hand- holds at either side to pull himself along. Half-swimming through a turbulent portion that tugged at his suit with cavitations designed to loose the gummiest particle of bug- dirt, he came to a quieter sec- tion where he wormed along in silence, watching the man ahead of him, his stay in the antiseptic gauged to make the outside of his safety-suit as germfree as the inside. The Wet Gut ended in an upslope. The troopers walked out, dripping, into a hallway returning in the direction from which they’d just swum. This upper arm of the Syphon was a hallway so brilliantly lighted that the trooper had to drop his polarizing shields over his eyes. The air here in the Hot Gut was spiced with ozone from the ultra-violet sources. As each man strode down the Hot Gut at a set pace, his suit was bathed in u-v light from lamps in the ceiling, floor and walls. Just as he was washed sufficiently in the Wet Gut to kill the sturdiest-shelled spore of anthrax, the most insistently cysted protozooan, in the Hot Gut he was laved in actinic radiation powerful enough to afford a one hundred per cent safety factor against h i s bringing viable bug-dirt into the Barracks. At the very end of the Syphon, so that his safety-suit wouldn’t stink of disinfectant or crack from ozone-rot, the trooper was blasted from all sides by a needle-shower of sterile wa- ter. Then he was home. The platoon to the left of the Terrible Third had bal- looned and was column-of- squadding toward the en- trance to the Syphon. “At ease, men,” Hartford said. “Increase suit-pressure one pound. Open and check re- serve air-tanks. Close off fil- ters.” The men blimped a bit. Their suits sausaged out around their arms and legs. Should some trooper have a pinhole in his safety-suit, the positive pressure within would keep the deadly anti- septic solution from seeping in. “Okay, men. First squad 38 by Allen Kim Lang

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off to the sheep-dip. Check the man ahead of you for bub- bles. This is Save-Your-Bud- dy Week,,, Hartford said. FAT-LEGGED and stiff, the men of Third Platoon wad- dled through the doorway and down the ramp into the bug- juice. One by one they went under, tugging themselves along through the turbulent area, past that; then turning over in three planes so that the man behind them could spot bubbles coming from any part of their safety-suit. A leak, of course, meant Decon- tamination. Decontamination meant an all-over shave, a load of antibiotics and quarantine. But it was better that one man should suffer this from time to time than that the Barracks should be sullied with a sin- gle bit of germ-laden dust. The pale-green murk of the Wet Gut and the desert brightness of the Hot Gut were the gates of home, and welcome. Hartford saw the Terrible Third off to their quarters, then got together with Pia- centelli to go up to Officers’ Country. It was good to un- clam helmets and breathe the inside air, smelling faintly green from having swept across the gardens on Level Eight. Hartford shucked off his blue suit and draped it over a refreshing unit. The device buzzed into action, washing, drying and recharg- ing the safety-suit with fresh filters and reserve air and wa- ter. The moment the refresher had grunted an okay to his safety-suit, Hartford carried it, clean and sweet as the day it had left the Goodyear plant on Titan, to hang it up in his locker, ready for his next foray onto bug-dirt. Piacentelli was already un- der a shower. “Come on, jay- bird,” he shouted. “Last one out buys the beers.” “No contest,” Hartford said, setting the shower-dial. “I'm gonna stay under water for three weeks.” He revolved blissfully beneath cold and angry needles. Piacentelli, snowed in with suds and steam, yelled through the blasting water. “How’d you rate O.G. the night we get in?” he asked. “I thought you were Nasty Nef’s fairhaired boy.” Hartford turned off his shower. “I got nothing better to do,” he said. He stood on the drier for a minute. “I don’t mind being Officer of the Guard, so long as I can eat supper off a plate instead of through a tube.” He stepped into his shorts, pulled on sneakers and tugged on a tee-shirt that had stenciled over its shoulders the two half-inch gold stripes of his rank. Pia dressed in a similar uni- form. “It isn’t the Messhall I miss,” he said. “It’s this. No number of ingenious engines, valves and relief-tubes can still my nostalgia for the sim- THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 39

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pie dignity of our Barracks latrines/’ JUNIOR Officers’ Mess was set in what looked like a park, except that the bushes were tomato-plants and the trees grew apples. The tables were mostly full. "All the subalterns getting in a quick sundowner,” P i a remarked, finding a two-place table yet untaken. A Service Company K.P. in the brief skirt-and- halter Class B’s the women wore informally in the Bar- racks came to take their or- der. "Big cold beer for me, honey,” Pia said. "The other gentleman is tonight’s O.G., so he’ll have a black, black cof- fee.” Hartford stared after the girl. "You’re right, Pia,” he said. "No matter how comfy Goodyear makes those safety- suits, home is best.” "You bachelors are a threat to the Table of Organization,” Piacentelli said. "You’d breed us right out of house and home if you had a chance.” "Damned right,” Hartford said. "You could find a girl,” Piacentelli said. "They all itch to get mar- ried.” Hartford explained. “They come out to these germy planets like they used to go to Purdue. The man- woman ratio is in their favor. And biology. Pia, I’ve seen bears you wouldn’t glim twice on Titan turn into love-god- desses after six months here. I’ll meet some Service Com- pany corporal, say. She’ll look to me like the prettiest li’l thing since Adam’s costecto- my, and I’ll call in at the Or- derly Room to have us as- signed Family Quarters. Back at Home Base, she’ll turn out to be something you scare kids quiet with. She’ll talk all the time, leave lipstick on drinking-glasses, or play bridge and talk about it. First thing you know, I’ll be volun- teering for another five years duty on bug-dirt, just for a chance to leave her behind.” "So pick up a local germ,” Piacentelli suggested. "If they can’t decontaminate you, they’ll send you to Earth. Lots of women on Earth.” "I’d do it,” Hartford said, "but I’m still more scared of microbes than lustful for a woman. Here’s Dimples with our chow.” "Dimples?” Piacentelli asked as the girl came up with their tray. "Watch her when she walks away,” Hartford suggested. "You must keep a carton of goat-glands under your bunk, Lee,” Piacentelli said. "Mar- riage isn’t all bad. I've done pretty well with Paula.” Hartford nodded. Paula Piacentelli, a lieutenant in the Service Companies, was a pretty decent sort. "Where is she now?” he asked. "She’ll be on the Status Board tonight,” Piacentelli said. "You'll be in the Board Room with her. Lee, I've got 40 by Allen Kim Lang

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a favor to ask you. As O.G„ you'll be in charge tonight.” "Paula will be in charge,” Hartford said, ‘Til be sleep- ing.” "If I go outside, though, it will need your okay as well as Paula’s,” Piacentelli said. "Who’s going outside with you?” "That’s the sticky bit,” Pia- centelli said. "I’d like to go outside alone.” “WANT t0 run *n t^le ra*n in your little bare skin?” Hartford asked. "Mix it up with a Stinker maiden? Paula wouldn’t like that. Be- sides, you might get yourself jack-rolled by some Indi- genous Hominid who doesn’t like Axenites running his planet.” "I want to work on my Kansan- Standard Dictionary,” Piacentelli said. "Bug-dirt,” Hartford said. "Don’t tell lies.” "All right, then,” Piacen- telli said. "I’ve got an idea that might lead to the most important discovery ever made on Kansas. Paula sug- gested it. I want to prove it.” "Tell Nasty Nef about your idea,” Hartford said, signal- ling the waitress for a second cup of stay-awake. "Give CINCK something clever to report when the supply ship lands, and you’ll have your silver stripes before I will. Wouldn’t Paula love that, though? Captain Piacentelli. I’d have to salute first.” "Nasty Nef wouldn’t consid- er our idea,” Piacentelli said. "He wouldn’t be happy to know that I’ve been studying the Kansan language, even. A common humanity between us Axenites and the Indigenous Hominids is a notion not wel- come to the world of Colonel Nef. Brother Nef, I might say.” Hartford leaned against the table to press a fist against Piacentelli’s propped elbow. "Don’t say that, Pia,” he whis- pered. “I’m not political; I’m not interested ; I don’t care whether the Brotherhood even exists.” "Yes, Virginia; there is a Brotherhood,” Piacentelli said. "And our Nasty Nef is a Brother.” "He’s a number of things,” Hartford said. "He’s our CO; he’s CINCK; he’s an SOB. But he’s our boss, and ‘Broth- erhood’ is a dangerous word.” He sipped his coffee. "Tell you what, Pia. If you want to go out and talk Gook with the Gooks, I’ll fix it for you to draw picket duty tonight. The man who’s got picket has been married only a month, and spent three weeks of that in a safety-suit out in the woods. I’m sure he’ll relinquish to you the pleasure of a night’s romp as picket officer.” "Can you do it?” "An O.G. can do anything, during those hours when his superior officers are asleep,” Hartford said. "You’re a buddy,” Piacen- THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 41

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telli said. 4T11 give you free tutoring in Kansan for the rest of our tour.” “Do mo arigato gazaimashi - ta” Hartford said. “Thanks to your mumbling the stuff in our room, I already talk like a Stinker.” He stood up. “I’m going down to the Board Room. Pick your companion for picket, and come on down when you’ve dressed.” Hart- ford bowed, Kansas-style. “ Shitsurei itashimasu ga ...” he said politely, and left to assume his duties as O.G. Ill AS one of the seventy-six male lieutenants of the Regiment, Hartford pulled O.G. about once every eleven weeks. His Terrible Third drew duty with him as Guard Platoon. All of them could ex- pect to sleep through the night undisturbed, unless Nasty Nef held a dry-run, fall- ing them out for a Simulated Problem. Nef was tired to- night, though; the Guard could sleep. Only the two men on picket and the handful of Service Company personnel on duty at the Status Board need stay awake tonight. Awake or sleeping, the se- curity of First Regiment would rest this night in the hands of Lee Hartford. It was he who bore the final re- sponsibility for allowing no living thing to enter the Bar- racks except in a well- scrubbed safety-suit; for as- suring that the air his sleep- ing comrades breathed was sterile and dustless; that the Syphon's poisonous bug-juice was of the proper pH and germicidity; and for checking that the whereabouts of every Axenite on Kansas was re- flected on the Status Board. That these duties were com- plex was attested by the as- signment of a Service Com- pany officer to the Board, a woman who would watch the Board’s bands of lights and meters every moment. Hart- ford could sleep; he was the Responsible Male. Mrs. Paula Piacentelli, 1/Lt. S.C. (Gnoto- biotics Spec.), had to remain awake : she was the Knowl- edgeable Woman. Hartford found Paula al- ready at her work in the Board Room. Only a bit over five feet tall, Piacentelli’s wife was concentrated woman of the most splendid sort. When Hartford had told her that Pia was taking the picket, she frowned. “I hope he doesn’t plan anything fool- ish.” “Me? Foolish?” Piacentelli demanded from the elevator. He walked up, clammed shut in his blue safety-suit, ready to hit bug-dirt. Under one arm he carried a package sheathed in opaque plastic. Behind him, in the gray safety-suit of an enlisted trooper, was a man Hartford recognized as Cor- poral Bond, machine-gunner from Pia’s platoon. “Lieuten- ant Gabriel Piacentelli report- 42 by Allen Kim Lang

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ing with one man. Sir and Ma’am,” he said, saluting his wife and Hartford. “At ease, Weenie-head,” Hartford said. “With you and Bond on picket amidst the sunflowers, I won't sleep a wink all night.” He turned to the corporal. “Did you sure- enough volunteer for this duty?” he asked. “Yes, sir!” Bond said. “I voluntarily assumed the duty of absorbing a fifth of Lt. Piacentelli’s Class-VI Scotch. The Lieutenant was kind enough to reciprocate by of- fering me this tour.” “He gave you Scotch?” Hartford turned to Piacen- telli. “Gabe, for a jug of Scotch I’d have gone on pick- et with you myself. What’s that you're taking outside with you? Lunch?” “A microscope,” Piacentelli said. “I’m doing a little re- search for Paula.” His wife nodded. A gnotobiotics tech- nician, responsible for main- taining the bacteriological se- curity of the Barracks, she had business with micro- scopes. “Want to give me the word on this romp of yours?” Hart- ford asked. “Standard picket, Lee,” Pia- centelli said. “I’ll learn a little Kansan, take care of Paula’s project and tell you all about it when we get back.” 4<T ET’S see your weapons.” Hartford inspected Bond’s Dardick-rifle and Pia- centelli’s Dardick-pistol. Both weapons were loaded, clean and wrapped up for their trip through the Wet Gut in plas- tic sleeves. The trucks and heavy weapons stayed outside on bug-dirt. The lighter weap- ons and all ammunition came back inside the Barracks with the troopers who carried them. The weapons were detail- stripped on each re-entry, ir- radiated with u-v and fit with fresh sleeves. As had been dis- covered with the first axenic animals, in the 1930’s, keeping a mammal germ-free is a for- midable task. When that mam- mal is a human being and a soldier the job is double- tough. “Check out a jeep,” Hart- ford said. “Report each half- hour. Don’t shoot any Stink- ers... sorry, I mean Indi- genous Hominids. Try not to hit a camelopard with the jeep ; we’re low on replace- ment parts. In fact, be careful. Okay, Pia?” “Done and done. Exalted One.” Hartford dropped his voice. “I’d feel easier in my mind if I knew what’s so important as to require your desertion of our mutual womb tonight, Pia.” “Language study, you might say,” Piacentelli replied. “Ha! So desa ka?” Hartford replied. “That’s so much bug- dirt, and vou know it.” “Ha!” Piacentelli said. “See you at dawn. Take care of my wife, baddy.” THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 43

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“Aren't you going to kiss her good night?" Hartford asked. Pia grinned through his clammed-shut helmet and clomped to the elevator with Bond. They were en route to the Hot Gut and the Wet Gut, the twisting hallway from the sterile First Regiment Bar- racks to the living night of Kansas. Hartford turned. Paula Piacentelli wore the short skirt, knee-hose and short-sleeved blouse of Pio- neer green that was the Class B uniform for females inside the Barracks. She looked, Hartford thought, remarkably delectable; and he again con- gratulated his friend on .his luck in getting her. He re- turned his attention to the Status Board, which Paula was conning. Two red lights flickered on above the ground- floor diagram of the Bar- racks, indicating that the two men of the picket had entered the Hot Gut. A moment later these lights blinked off, and two lighted over the diagram of the Wet Gut. Piacentelli and Bond were swimming now, towing their weapons in ballooning plastic sleeves. Sterile, on their way out into a filthy world, these two men were the outpost that would protect through the night their hundreds of brothers and sisters sleeping safe in utero. Freud, thou shouldst have lived this hour! Hartford mused. PIACENTELLI turned the ignition key of the jeep he'd chosen. With the starting cough of the engine, one of the rank of TV screens over the Status Board lighted. The camera eye was looking out the rear-view mirror of the jeep, and picked up Pia’s hel- meted head and the shoulder of his companion. “We're off to see the Wizard, the Won- derful Wizard of Oz!" Pia- centelli sang. His wife spoke into the mi- crophone before her. “Don’t do anything foolish, Lieuten- ant," she said. “And remem- ber, all transmissions are re- corded and are audited, at ran- dom, by the Base Command- er." “Transmission received, re- ceiver contrite," Piacentelli reported back. “Okay, Paula- Darling. From now on till Bond and I swim home, we’ll be as military as GI soap." He flicked the TV monitor around to look out the wind- shield and started the jeep down the road toward Stink- erville. The duty of the picket was to chug around outside at random, hitting all the cross- roads, settlements and high spots of the countryside near the Barracks; to interview late-riding Indigenous Hom- inids and inquire their busi- ness being out; to conduct such searches of Stinker homes and hideaways as might s£em useful to the occupying Axenites; and to remain at all times in contact with the offi- by Allen Kim Lang

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cers on duty at the Status Board. As the picket got under- way, Hartford went down to the Terrible Third's area to check quickly through the two-man apartments. Knock on the door; "As you were, Troopers.” A brisk inspection of two safety-suits, gaping be- side their owners’ bunks like firemen’s boot-sheathed pants. The men were quiet. Guard- duty meant that any socializ- ing with Service Company troopers was impossible for a night, and militated against any intake of alcoholic bever- age. It was a bore, especially after three dry and womanless weeks in the field. Hartford visited his Platoon Sergeant last: “Sergeant Felix, could you have our bunch standing on bug-dirt ten minutes after I blew the whistle? Very well, then. Good night, Felix/’ Having demonstrated to his troopers that he was suffering the same strictures as they, Hartford went back to the O.G. cubicle in the Board Room. He checked his own safety-suit, his plastic-pack- aged Dardick-pistol, said good night to Paula Piacentelli and lay down to begin his first night’s sleep outside a safety- suit in three weeks. But sleep didn’t come easi- iy- There was the murmur from the Board Room; Piacentelli’s half-hourly reports. “Nothing to report, Paula. I’m at Road Junction (41-17). No I.H. ac- tivity. No excitement at all.” “Continue random patrol, Lieutenant.” “Yes, Dear. I’m going to run down to Kansannamura (42- 19) for my next call-in.” “Carry on, Lieutenant.” Pia was in the best possible hands with Paula on duty, Hartford mused. The Status Board was really a woman's job. The girls of the Service Companies were the house- keepers of the Barracks, the guardians of the Regimental lares and penates. Paula, for example, had as her primary duty gnotobiotic control : the maintenance of the whole germ-free system of the Bar- rachks, from the Hot-&-Wet Guts to safety-suit inspection and the upkeep of the Decon- tamination Vehicles. Behind the women on Board-duty, however, was always at least one male, combat-trained Of- ficer of the Guard, ready (once awakened and briefed by the female help) to take armed men into the field. But meanwhile, Hartford wanted to sleep. HALF an hour passed, and at its end Pia made his report : “Picket reporting. Paula. I'm going into the vil- lage. Corporal Bond will re- main with the jeep, and will keep the transmitter open till I get back. Okay?” “Be careful, Lieutenant,” Paula Piacentelli said, com- bining affection with military formality. THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 45

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Hartford, deciding that sleep was impossible, got up and cold-showered. Dressing in fresh Class B’s, he walked out to join Paula at the Status Board. The TV screen showed Bond, the sheathed Dardick- rifle slung over his shoulder, pacing back and forth in front of the jeep, glancing from time to time toward the walls of Kansannamura, white in the light of the skyful of stars. He was nervous, evidently aware of the fact that Kansas was largely unexplored, her potential for midnight may- hem untested. Bond spoke across his shoulder. “The lieu- tenant has been gone for a quarter hour, Ma’am,” he said. “Do you want me to go in and ask him to come out?” “Wait another quarter-hour, Corporal,” Paula said. She ex- plained to Hartford, “What he’s got to do may take a lit- tle time.” They watched the screen. Bond climbed back into the jeep, where he sat with his rifle between his knees, sweeping his attention around him, at the village, at the road behind, at the sun- flower-fields, where the blos- soms were bleached white and the leaves enameled black by starlight. With Paula’s agreement, Hartford pressed the micro- phone-switch to talk with Bond. “Have you tried to tap Piacentelli on his suit-receiv- er, Corporal?” “Yes, sir,” Bond said. “First thing. No answer.” 46 “Turn your bitcher full up, then,” Hartford said. “Tell Lieutenant Piacentelli that the O.G. wants him out on the road within five minutes.” “Done and done, sir.” Bond tongued the bitcher’s controls to Full Volume and repeated the message. Echoes bounced back from the walls of Stink- erville and lost themselves in the tangle of sunflowers. No one answered. The village seemed as much asleep as it had been before Bond’s bellow. The Kansans were never hasty to volunteer response to Axenites; they knew that troopers meant trouble. “Piacentelli is busy at some- thing,” Hartford said, as much to reassure himself as Pia’s wife. “I think I’ll go out and have a look.” He spoke to Bond: “Get out of the jeep, but stay close to it. Report any haps immediately. Watch for lights, listen for small- arms fire.” “Done and done, sir.” Hartford phoned Felix, his platoon sergeant. “Report to the Board Room to sub for me,” he said. “Wake the Pla- toon Guide and tell him to stand ready to fall the Guard out, but not to wake anyone else yet. This is probably a nothing, Felix; Lt. Piacentelli just went for a walk in Stink- erville.” THE Command Light, top in the tier of all the hierar- chy of red-yellow-green-white by Allen Kim Lang

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Status-Board indicators, flashed alive. “A nothing?’" Nasty Nef’s voice demanded. “What sort of talk is that, Lieutenant? If I’ve been properly interpret- ing the past five minutes’ transmissions, we’ve got an Axenite officer stranded in the middle of a Stinker vil- lage. This, Mister, is not a nothing. Call out the Guard. Prepare to join me in a Stink- erville shakedown. Those Gooks got to learn they can’t play fast-and-easy with Axen- ite troopers.” “Done and done, sir!” Hart- ford snapped. He toggled the phone to get Felix back. “Fe- lix, fall the boys out beside the Syphon. We’ve got the Old Man hitting bug-dirt with us, so look sharp.” “The colonel’s going out with us?” Felix asked. “Yes. There must be more to this situation than meets the company-grade eye,” Hartford said. “Diaper-up our darlings and stand by in the Hot Gut, Felix.” “Done and done !” Twenty seconds later a fig- ure in Santa Claus red came clashing into the room. Hart- ford, half into his blue safety- suit, came to a clumsy atten- tion. The newcomer, his hel- met clammed shut all ready for contamination, bellowed, “Get with it, Mister!” “Yes, sir.” Hartford fit him- self into the suit, a sort of cockpit, a congeries of valves, gauges, counters and vetters. In a moment he’d sealed him- self in the sterile suit, checked his air-filters and air reserve. “The Guard is assembled in the Hot Gut, sir, ready to take the field.” “Dam’ well better be,” Nef said. “Lead off, Mister.” He turned to Paula Piacentelli. “Send a Decontamination Ve- hicle after us, Lieutenant. No telling what those Stinker devils have cooked up with Piacentelli.” Back to Hart- ford: “You’re in command of the Guard, I’ll observe and of- fer suggestions.” “Tain-HUT!” Platoon Ser- geant Felix saluted the scar- let-clad colonel and the blue- clad lieutenant as they stepped from the elevator into the electric atmosphere of the Hot Gut. The Guard snapped to, their plastic-packaged Dar- dick-rifles at order arms. “Take ’em out, Felix/’ Hart- ford said. “Two personnel car- riers, a .50-caliber m.g.-mount- ed jeep fore and aft. You and the colonel take the rear jeep; I’ll lead. Have the men unbag their weapons the instant we’re outside. Any ques- tions?” “No, sir.” “Move out,” Hartford said. IV THE squads peeled off and double-timed down the Hot Gut. Man by man they dipped into the Wet Gut for their swim outside. They’d been drilled for speed in exit- THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 47

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ing. If the Regiment were needed outside, the Syphon could become a literal bottle- neck. As the last squad splashed into the antiseptic solution, Hartford turned to Colonel Nef. “Sir, I have a question/’ He said. “Hurry it up, Mister/' “Isn’t this a bit extreme, sir? We’re going out to take one man out of a primitive village where we’re not even sure he’s in trouble. And we’re carrying enough firepower to blast into an armed city.” “I don’t trust the Gooks,” the colonel said. “Their buco- lic way of life may be a fraud, designed to lull us into com- placency. Tonight we may dis- cover that they’re plotting the overthrow of the Garrison, using weapons and tactics they’ve kept secret. I hope such is the case, Lieutenant. It would give us adequate cause to wipe the Stinkers off Kansas and make this as clean a world as Titan.” “Sir. “Move, Mister,” Nef said. “Piacentelli has been in Stink- erville for fifty minutes. Let’s get him out.” The four trucks roared down the plateau toward the Indigenous Hominid hamlet at its foot. When the first Axen- ite Pioneers landed on the planet, bacteria-free as all men in space had to be, they’d set up camp near the spot where First Regiment Barracks now stood. They saw the fields of sunflowers, grown for food and cloth, and heard the na- tives call the nearest village Kansannamura. From that time on, this world was Kan- sas. There was no moonlight — Kansas has no moon — but the headlamps of the four vehicles were wasted against the bright ribbon of road, lighted as it was by the sheet of stars that melted together in a metallic ceiling over the night. The men sat with their rifles be- tween their knees, the plastic sleeves stripped off. Each of these Dardick-rifles could fire a solid stream of death. Each round of ammunition was fit- ted with a matrix that served as chamber, cartridge and the first fraction-of-an-inch of barrel. A magazine of forty such rounds could be hosed through the rifle in half a second. The troopers sped downhill, through sunflower fields black and silver in the light of the stars. THE personnel carriers and the jeeps scuffed to a halt by the village gate, the men scattering like shrapnel, ac- cording to the book. Colonel Nef spoke to Hartford on the command-band. “Move in, Lieutenant. Bring out Piacen- telli. Any Stinker resistance is to be treated as open rebel- lion.” “Yes, sir.” Hartford spoke to his men: “First squad, lead scout, forward to the gate.” The scout, his plastic safe- ty-suit and the glass of his THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 49

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helmet glinting highlights, scuttled to the gate. He kicked the gate open — Piacentelli had evidently left it ajar — and en- tered, rifle-first. “First squad, follow me in column. Open to Line-of-Skirmishers in the square. Second squad, follow in the same manner. Third squad^ maintain your interval and stand ready.” Hartford ran, pistol in hand, through the open gate. It was like charging some Roman ruin unpeopled for three cen- turies, like a field exercise with boulders marking obsta- cles to be won. There was no sign of natives. Their shop- boards hung bearing the pic- ture-script the Kansans used, quiet as the marbles in a ceme- tery. Hartford directed first squad in a sweep through the alleys, searching for Piacen- telli. Second squad clattered through the gate behind them, took up a skirmish line, and moved in to cover the square as first squad disappeared into the doorways and alleys of Stinkerville. The village, except for its beasts, might have been de- serted. These animals, came- lopards used for riding and to carry burdens, woke and gazed serenely down at the inter- rupters of their vegetable dreams, blinking their liquid half-shuttered eyes. Boots clattered on cobblestones. The houses were unlighted. “Throw on your i-r,” Hartford ordered. As they moved into the dark, narrow ways, the men beamed infra-red light from the projectors on their safety-suits, the bounced-back, invisible light being trans- duced to black-and-green chi- aroscuro by passage through the stereatronic goggles dropped inside their helmets. “Turn the Stinkers out, Mister,” Nef command-band- ed. “Into the houses,” Hartford signaled. Ahead, a boot slammed wood, and hinges burst. To the restless night sounds of the camelopards in their stalls, the click of mili- tary boots on brick, and the rustle of rifles against safety- suits was added the whisper- ing of families rousing from their beds. Hand in hand from father to mother to elder brother, dov/n the scale to the youngest, the Kansans stum- bled out into their little court- yards. “A no hito wa dare desu ka?” “Abunai yo/” “Shikata ga nai. . . ” U A NY sign of Piacentelli yet?” Nef demanded. “Not yet, sir,” Hartford signalled. “Feed a candle into every building, Lieutenant. We’ll get these Gooks in the open and interrogate till we find our man.” “Done and done, sir,” Hart- ford said, stepping out of the way of a little girl fleeing to- ward the village square with an even littler girl strapped to a pack-board on her back. He passed on the order. “Fire in 50 b> Allen Kim Lang

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ten seconds, nine, eight. *. now!” Each man of first squad tossed a Lake Erie Lightning Universal Gas Candle through the window nearest him. A lit- tle over a second later a dozen grenades spit out a cloud of smoke with a hiss like a burst- ing fire-hose, and the outer air was filled with an eye-sting- ing gas. The Indigenous Hom- inids spilled out of their homes in all directions now; coughing, choking, children rubbing the smoke particles into their half-wakened eyes. Two camelopards, blinded like their masters, blundered into the square, tears stream- ing from their reproachful eyes, twelve feet above the pavement. Second squad's men danced clear of the beasts and hallooed them out the gate. Somewhere back in an alley a first-squad trooper tapped his trigger, jetting steel against overhanging roof-tiles. ‘‘Nail that shot, Mister!” Nef demanded. Hartford heard the squad leader: “It’s Lieutenant Pia- centelli, sir. He’s here.” “Bring him out, man; bring him out!” Nef’s excited voice triggered a new string of rifle bursts. Hartford tongued his bitch- er full-volume: “Cease fire, you idiots! Piacentelli, head for the square.” “Stop it, for God’s sake, stop it!” Piacentelli shouted, his unamplified voice coming from a smoke-filled alley. Hartford plunged into the dark £moke — a tear-gas gre- nade had set afire some of the sun-flower-paper room divid- ers, and kindled with them a row of wooden houses — and shouted for Piacentelli. A bla- brigar, as blind in the smoke as the men, blundered against Hartford’s helmet. “ Yuke ! Yuke !” the bird screamed, grabbing hold of the transceiv- er-antenna that horned up from the helmet. Hartford grabbed the blabrigar and tossed it up above the melee. He heard it flying in circles, searching for its Stinker own- ers, chanting the last words they'd said to it: “Yuke\ Yuke! Yuke!" — “Go!” Everything was burn- ing. Even through the safety-suit Hartford suffered from the heat. He retracted his i-r goggles, useless in all this smoke. Nef called. “I'm coming in, Mister.” Hartford acknowledged. Great. One more blind man wandering in the smoke was what he need- ed. He tongued his bitcher loud and shouted; “Gabe! Come this way. Gabe ! Gabe !” The heat was intolerable. He posi- tive-pressured his suit, bal- looning the fabric away from his skin. How hot, he won- dred, would the rounds packed into the butt of his Dardick-pistol have to get be- fore they exploded? As though in answer, a snap of gunfire sounded from the fog ahead. Some meat-head THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 51

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had spooked. There were more shots as other troopers fired at their fantasies. “Cease fire, damn it!” Nef shouted over the command-circuit. “If any- one was hurt by you idiots, I’ll court-martial every man with smoke in his gun barrel.” Hartford hurried on. Ahead of him in the alley he heard Colonel Nef’s voice, uncharac- teristically soft. “Hartford, join me. I’ve found Piacentel- li.” Ahead in the smoke was a pinkness: the scarlet-suited commander kneeling above a body on the bricks. Here in the open of plane- tary air, available to all the microscopic beasts of Kansas, Piacentelli was wearing only Class B’s; his sneakers, shorts and tee-shirt. The center of the shirt sopped blood from the bullet-hole that funneled into Axenite Lieutenant Pia- centelli’s chest. Nef stood. “The Decontam- ination Vehicle should be standing by,” he said. “Get Piacentelli outside. We may be able to save him.” He sounded unhopeful. Hartford draped his friend’s body across his shoulder. The smoke was bad, but he’d mem- orized his course through it. The air sucked in through his filter was clean, but hot. His helmet steamed opaque. As he stumbled out, blind, but guid- ed by the colonel’s voice, two men came forward to take Pia- centelli over to the Decontam- ination Vehicle parked by the village gate. In the cooler air Hartford’s helmet cleared. A girl gnotobiotician from the Decontamination Squad pressed the pickup of her hel- met’s “ears” against Piacen- telli’s bloody chest. She looked up. “He’s dead, sir,” she said. Nef’s voice boomed from his bitcher. “Burn the Stinker village !” he shouted. “These Gooks will pay for Piacentel- li’s death with their homes.” Hartford felt imminent dan- ger of vomiting, bad business in a safety-suit. He fought it as he looked around. The col- umn of smoke rising from the buildings already fired was sweeping around, carried by the morning wind that poured off the plateau. Everything within the walls of the rammed-earth houses would be incinerated. Kansannamura was destroyed. “Regroup by the vehicles,” Hartford spoke to his troopers. He walked back to his jeep, the village flaming behind him. The Decontamination Squad checked Hartford’s safety- suit, and found it sound de- spite its roasting. Piacentelli they cocooned in plastic: he was contaminated and danger- ous. As the five trucks rolled back toward the Barracks, they met families of Indigen- ous Hominids, smoke-stained, who retreated back into the sunflower-fields as the troop- ers drew near them. The Stinkers seemed to have sal- vaged little from the flames beyond an occasional blab- 52 by Allen Kim Lang

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rigar, perched on an old man’s shoulder, or now and then a camelopard, fitted with a sad- dle and carrying a blanket- wrapped bundle of clothing and cooking-pots. V Hartford had to see Piacentelli’s body placed in the Barracks morgue, where a necropsy would be per- formed by a safety-suited gnotobiotician. It was seldom that an Axenite was contami- nated. Rarer yet was the death of a trooper who’d been exposed to bacteria. Informa- tion held in Pia’s body might someday save lives. Hartford, directing the sealing-off of the morgue from the rest of the Barracks, was not comforted by these reflections. He u n s u i t e d, shaved and showered, and put on fresh Class B’s to finish what remained of this O.G. tour. On his way back up to the Board Room he had to pass the morgue again. Colo- nel Nef, in the midst of a cluster of lesser ranks, was there. On a wheeled cart, cov- ered by a sheet, was a second body. Hartford stopped. “What happened, sir?” he demanded. “Who is it?” Nef raised the corner of the sheet with a hand that seemed infinitely weary. The body was Paula Piacentelli. “An- other accident,” the Colonel grunted. A hydroponics corporal, S.C., spoke up. “She was re- lieved of duty as soon as she heard about her husband’s death, sir. Someone should have stayed with her. She went up to Level Eight to be alone. There are only two of us on duty there through the night. She must have blun- dered off the walkway, blind- ed by her tears. However it happened, she caught hold of a lighting-cable where the in- sulation was frayed, and was electrocuted the moment she touched the wet seeding-bed. Colonel Nef found her there.” “I was going to console her on Gabriel Piacentelli’s death/’ Nef said. “Leave the body here and clear out, all of you.” No refrigeration was needed for Paula's corpse, of course. An uncontaminated Axenite was preserved by purity. The body might dry a bit, the integrity of the in- ternal organs suffer some- what from the corrosive ef- fects of their own juices; but Paula’s corpse would other- wise remain uncorrupted un- til taken outside and buried in bug-dirt. “Hartford,” Nef said, “I’d like to have a talk with you.” “I’m still on O.G., sir,” Hartford said. “And I relieve you of that duty,” Nef snapped. “Come up to my quarters.” Nasty Nef's sitting-room had the only window in the Barracks, a skylight through which poured the brilliatice of THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 53

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Kansas’s pyrotechnic flood of stars. "Rest, Hartford. Sit down. Brandy?” Hartford allowed that he could use some. “What do you think of to- night’s adventure, Lee?” Nef asked. “Don’t look startled. I know the first name of every officer and non-com in the Regiment.” “What happened, sir, was horrible,” Hartford said. “I understand your feel- ings,” Nef said. “Two tragic accidents, killing your two closest friends the same night. I am certain that the loss of these comrades will fire your zeal for getting the Stinkers under control. Isn’t that right, Lee?” Nef took a cigar from the humidor next his chair. “With all respect, sir,” Hartford said, placing his empty brandy-glass on the ta- ble to his right, “I can hardly see how the events tonight were caused by the Indi- genous Hominids.” “You must use the official name for the Gooks, mustn’t you?” Nef mused. His voice turned harsh: “Someone stripped the safety-suit off Piacentelli, Mister.” Hartford nodded, his face pale. The “A” of the Axenite’s alphabet was Ap- prehension. As a germ-free — axenic, gnotobiotic — h u m a n being, he is superior in most ways to ordinary men. He’s usually larger and stronger. He never has dental caries, pimples, appendicitis, the common cold or certain can- cers. No matter how much or how long he sweats, the Axenite doesn’t stink; nor do his other excretions. On a contaminated world, however, the Axenite is a tender flower indeed. A baby’s breath can be death to him, if that baby be a “normal” human; for no microbe is benign to the man without antibodies. To him a drop of rain may reek with pestilence, the scent of eve- ning may be a lethal gas. “I can’t understand their strip- ping Pia, sir,” he said. “Why would they do such a terrible thing?” “Because they’re Stinkers!” Nef said. “Can you imagine what it must be like to be one of them? Every inch of your skin a-crawl with living filth, your guts packed with foul- ness, your whole frame a com- promise with rottenness? Do you wonder that they’d de- light to make us as unwhole- some as they are themselves?” Colonel Nef lighted the cigar he’d been mulling. “Lee, do you think one Stinkerville de- stroyed is too high a price for them to pay for having mur- dered two Axenite troopers? For Piacentelli’s wife is as much their victim as her hus- band.” Hartford shook his head. “I’m not sure, sir. What both- ers me more than anything else is that it’s my fault Pia went out last night. He asked 54 by Allen Kim Lang

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me to arrange for him to re- place the scheduled picket of- ficer, and I did.” “Lee, why was Piacentelli so anxious to pull this extra duty?” Nef asked. Hartford tried unobtrusive- ly to squirm his chair out of the jet-stream from Nef’s cigar. “He told me he wanted to work on the language, sir,” he said. “Pia really had such a project. He’d never had con- tact with anyone with a speech other than Standard before, and the problem of transduc- ing one language into another fascinated him. The Kansans call their speech Nihon-go. Pia taught me to understand some of it.” “A waste of your time, Lee,” Nef said. “You’ll never have occasion to speak it. Be that as it may, unless Piacentelli was attempting to coax a course in Bedroom Kansan from a Stinker maiden, I can hardly understand why his lexigraphical labors should re- quire him to unsuit himself. No, Piacentelli was deliberate- ly murdered.” “I’m puzzled, sir,” Hartford admitted. “When we tossed those smoke-candles, I heard Pia shouting for us to stop it. Would he have done so if the Indigenous Hominids had him captive? Why did none of the natives lift a hand against us, though we were burning their homes? Why did Paula Pia- centelli seem to know why Pia was going outside tonight? Why did he take a microscope with him? Why did Paula kill herself?” ££T~\ON’T noise that last U ‘why’ around the Bar- racks, Mister,” Nef growled. “Officially, she died in tear- blinded grief, an accident.” He smiled. “Whatever our reason for burning out Stinkerville, Lee, we got it done. The fact that those half-humans down the hill bred and sweat and poisoned the soil within half an hour’s walk has been a stench in my nostrils ever since we got here. Now they’re gone. I’m as sorry as you that the Piacentelli’s are dead. But the manner of their dying was such as to assure Axenic man- kind a new home.” “I’m not sure I understand you, sir.” Nef poured them each a sec- ond brandy. He raised his; Hartford of necessity fol- lowed suit. “To Brotherhood,” the colonel said. He stared into Hartford’s eyes. “To the Brotherhood,” he amended. Hartford was tired, con- fused and in awe of Nef’s rank ; otherwise he might have ventured protest. Nef sipped his drink. “I must emphasize, Lee, that what I say is my opinion only, not Axenite pol- icy. You see my point.” “I do, sir,” Hartford said. “Forgive me, then, for prefacing my remarks with a bit of truism,” Nef said. “In all history before gnotobiotic man was cut from his mother through cellophane, the hu- THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 55

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man being was never pure or- ganism. Before us, every man who ever lived was, in fact, one mammal plus the sum of millions of viruses, rickettsia, bacteria, fungi and molds. When the old philosophers asked, ‘What is man?’ the an- swer could only be: ‘Foul smell and blood in a bag.’ We're the first men beyond that, Lee. The first real men, True Men, members of the winner-species. Homo gnoto- bioticus. “We must destroy the bridge that led to us. We must destroy the Stinkers. Not just these quasi-human natives here on Kansas, but the Stinkers on Earth, and on every other planet where bug- laden man has followed Axenite. What chance has Homo sapiens to match his sapiency against Homo gnoto- bioticus , when he is a bifur- cate septic tank, a polyculture of a thousand kinds of living dirt?” Hartford finished his brandy, wishing he were any- where else than in Nasty Nef’s quarters, tired, ill at ease and a little drunk from the two brandies. “What do you propose, sir?” he asked with Academy politeness. “Aha!” Nef rejoiced, pour- ing them each another drink. "You justify my trust, Lee. You perceive that I speak not merely if-ly, philosophically, but as a man of action, leashed only by temporary practicali- ty.” He leaned back in his chair and regarded Hartford more as a sculptor might re- gard a recent product than a father a son, with uncritical approval. “Where were you born, Lee?” “On Titan, sir.” iiT thought so. You have the -*-mark of natal excellence,” Nef said. “You’re a second or third-generation Axenite, then?” “Third, sir,” Hartford said. “Splendid. Your grandpar- ents were from their mothers’ wombs untimely ripp'd; your parents and yourself born nor- mally, in germ-free ambience. How fortunate we are, you and I ! T h i r d-generation Axenites. Eff-two of a new race.” Nef paused in his re- cital. “There is one fact that chafes us, though. We, per- force the Columbuses of to- morrow, explorers of the plan- ets beyond even the stars we see here on the frontier, are held back by our Stinker cous- ins. They have the proper feeling, that only pure man might pioneer the alien worlds, for fear of destroying what he finds there. But who will inherit those planets when we’ve finished our ex- plorations? Who will at the last till the fields of Kansas?” “Colonists from Earth, sir,” Hartford said. “From Eurus, Tinkle, Westside, Unashamed, T’ang, Williams’s World and Hope. From all the planets normal man has colonized.” “Doesn’t that annoy you, 56 by Allen Kim Lang

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Lee?” Nef asked. “That our work’s fruit is to be enjoyed by shiploads of Stinkers?” “They’re as human as we, sir,” Hartford said. He smiled. “You might say they just haven’t had our advantages.” “You’re tender-m i n d e d, Lee,” Nef said. “We garrison a hundred worlds on the Fron- tier, planets our Stinker mas- ters mustn’t visit yet, least Man contaminate some life- form yet unmet. We pioneer, clear planets as safe, and move on. For reward, we Axenites have three worlds of our own in the M’Bwene System, axe- nized for our use ; we have the Academies on Luna and Titan, and a dome on Pluto. It's not enough. We are the new men, the next-comers to humanity. We must have worlds of our own. I, and the Brotherhood whose hand here I am, intend that Kansas shall be ours.” “What about the Stinkers?” Hartford asked. “What will happen to them if we decide to axenize Kansas?” “Maybe they’ll leave,” Colo- nel Nef said, smiling in the manner that had won him the name “Nasty.” “A few more punitive expeditions like to- night’s— an incendiary gre- nade was thrown at Kansanna- mura, did you know that, Lee? I threw it — and we’ll have no Stinkers underfoot. We soon will be able to mop and polish this world to our own high standards. We’ll walk this lovely world without safety- suits and breathe unfiltered air. We’ll enter into our birth- right, Lee.” Nef gazed at his cigar admiringly, though it had gone out. “So much for the moment, Brother Hart- ford,” he said. “Perhaps we’d both do well to get some sleep.” Hartford jumped to atten- tion and formally requested permission to withdraw. Nef nodded. Hartford about-faced and left the room. VI THE things the colonel had told him hadn’t fallen into place in his mind yet. Hart- ford was numb of thought. Back in his own room in B.O.Q. the numbness cleared a bit. He poured himself a drink. Somehow, he thought, he’d become fairhaired boy to an Attila the Hun, an Alaric the Goth, a Hitler, a Hainan; an Ashurbanipal I, a Rameses II. For Nef was equally with these a servant of Siva the Destroyer, with his plan to make Man pure. His purification would in- volve the destruction of all non-afcenic men and women all the way from the Home World to the newest beach- head on the Frontier ; the sterilization of a hundred worlds as culture media for the new race; and the plant- ing on the newly axenized soil of colonies of Homo gnotobi - 57 THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS

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oticus , the feeder-on-hydropo- nic-greens, the inodorous, the thin-gutted, the strong toothed Superman. Nef’s pogrom had begun with the raid on the village, Hartford mused, his arms be- hind his head as he lay on his bunk. Nef had decided that this green and pleasant world belonged to the silver men, the true men, the new men. Us, Hartford thought. Earth's Stinker's, ordinary humanity with its common cold and its caries, would follow the Kan- san Indigenous Hominid, and the Great Auk, into history. The double funeral of the Lieutenants Piacentelli was to be held at Retreat, outside the Barracks. Hartford won- dered a bit at the haste with which the two bodies were to be consigned to the earth of Kansas. Perhaps haste was necessary because of the mi- cro-organisms with which poor Pia’s corpse was neces- sarily contaminated. Hartford grimaced. Contam- inated humans must lead disgusting lives. They smelled of ferments, were bloated with bacterially elaborated gases, suffered rot in their very teeth. Their corpses — poor forefathers! — suffered cor- ruption that would never touch an Axenite, whose un- embalmed cadaver would last longer than the best-mummi- fied Pharaoh. Whatever mysterious er- rand it had been that had tak- en Piacentelli outside the 58 Barracks, it had killed him. It was over. Hartford marched the Ter- rible Third into position fac- ing the graves, cut into the soil at the base of the hun- dred-foot flagpole. The entire regiment, less only the hand- ful of men and women neces- sary to secure the Barracks, was on the Parade Ground. Colonel Nef, his scarlet safe- ty-suit brilliant in the bght of the setting sun, stood be- side the graves, a finger of his right gauntlet inserted to mark his place in the black Book of Honors and Ceremo- nies. The regiment stood at pa- rade-rest as a truck brought the bodies of two comrades through its ranks. As the im- provised hearse halted and twelve blue-suited casket- bearers stepped forward to lift the flag-draped boxes, Nef called the regiment to atten- tion. The bearers slow- marched the caskets to the graves and placed them on the lowering-devices. VTEF’S words of funeral ^ were few. He spoke of the dedication of the two Axen- ites being laid to rest and bit- terly accused the Stinkers— r this word seemed rude, in so formal a setting — of having murdered the young couple. He spoke of condign justice, and of revenge. This done, he called: “Es- cort, less firing-party. Pre- sent, HAHMS! Firing-party, by Allen Kim Lang

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FIRE THREE VOLLEYS !” The shots of the Dardick- rifles echoed down the pla- teau to the smoldering village below. The Regimental Bu- gler, standing between the heads of the graves, flicked on his instrument. As the last volley spat from the muzzles of the rifles, the bugler played Taps. Four men stepped forward to recover and fold the green- silk Pioneer colors, and the caskets were lowered to cor- ruption in alien earth. The banner crept down the flag- staff, and the funeral was over. Bone-weary, Hartford went from the Syphon to the re- f r e s h e r-room, where he checked his safety-suit and hung it. Another officer was there, still in his blue safety-suit. Hartford wondered sleepily why he’d so long postponed unsuiting. Even the fellow's helmet was sealed. ‘‘Our first deaths on Kansas,” Hartford remarked, wanting to coax the man into conversation and learn who he was. “I’d never realized till now that we’re really soldiers, subject to vio- lent death and formal bury- ing.” The man must be a re- placement, come in on the supply ship a month ago, Hartford thought. Black hair, crewcut. Tanned. Must be from one of the M’Bwene Worlds, where an Axenite’s naked skin can be unfiltered sunlight. “Both the Piacen- tellis were my friends,” Hart- ford said, determined to coax speech from the stranger. The man’s bitcher boomed, evidently set on full volume. “Mattaku shirazu ” he said. “Excuse. Pia not teach entire use of Standard tongue.” Hartford’s right hand tore through the plastic pellicle over his Dardick-pistol and brought the weapon to bear on the figure before him. “You’re a Stinker!” he said. “Pia’s s a f e t y-suit — that’s the suit you’re wearing.” “ Tonshu ” the Indigenous Hominid said, bowing his head. He indicated the empty holster at his side : he was un- armed. “I come on taku , here to your honored precincts, to speak of things done and of future things. You are Hart- ford?” Hartford thought quickly. His responsibility was to the Garrison. This stranger was above all else a possible source of contamination, a carrier of the micro-bugs that could kill every Axenite on Kansas. Shooting him would rupture the safety-suit he wore. As it was, his exterior surface was clean ; he could have entered the Barracks only by march- ing in from Retreat with the rest of the regiment, through the sterilizing Syphon. “I am Harford. Lee Hartford.” iCTylA said you are a good ^ man,” the stranger said, bowing. “What is your name?” THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 59

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“Renkei. As you say, I take Pia’s uwa-z ut sum i9 this smooth garment.” Renkei indi- cated the safety-suit by slick- ing his hands over it. “I must enter here to talk with Hart- ford. To enter, I must have garment. Pia, my brother, is dead. I borrowed his garment. Can I, with you, stop the ugly thing that began last night in Kansannamura ? Kuwashiku wa zonzezu; I do not know. I can but try.” What a perfect disguise a safety-suit made, Hartford thought. Besides, it was the only passport a man needed to enter the Barracks. He stared at the stranger. He looked no different to men Hartford had met before, Axenites whose grandparents had been born by aseptic Caesarian section in Nagoya or Canton, two of the great gnotobiotic centers of fifty years ago. Renkei was a Stinker, a Kansan, an Indige- nous Hominid (ignominious name!) ; he was also, Hartford felt, a man. “Tell me why you made the dangerous journey here, into the midst of your enemies,” he said. “The death of our friend Pia. The burning of Kansan- namura. The war between my people and you who wear smooth garments,” he said. “This is aru-majiki koto*9 “A thing that ought not to be,” Hartford said, translating. He was glad for the practice he’d gotten with Pia, speaking the native tongue. “Sit down,” he said. “You must explain, Renkei.” The refresher-room, a hall filled with lockers and the machinery that automatically tested and refitted the safety- suits each time they returned to the Barracks, had a dozen entrances and exits. As Ren- kei, still completely sealed in Pia’s safety suit, sat on the bench beside Hartford, the doors all closed at once. They hissed as the pneumatic seals were set in their frames. Contamination Alert! Some- one, most likely the Service girl on watch at the Status Board, had discovered that there was one more person in the Barracks than could be accounted for. A crash-prior- ity head-count had been made. Each room and com- partment had doubtless been eavesdropped through the built-in TV eyes and micro- phone ears. One door at the far end of the hall burst open. A squad of safety-suited Service Po- lice spilled in. At the point of their wedge was the scarlet uniform of Colonel Nef. Dar- dick-pistol in hand, he ran to- ward Renkei. “Don’t shoot!” Hartford shouted, springing up. “Get back, Mister,” the colo- nel yelled. He dropped to one knee and squeezed all twelve rounds into the seated figure to Hartford’s right. Service Police swooped down to pull Hartford away from the shat- tered body of Renkei. The 60 by Allen Kim Lang

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lieutenant's tee-shirt was stained, however, by flecks of blood splashed up as the SPs' bullets chewed into the Kan- san. Hartford was contamin- ated. FOR the next hour, Hartford had no more to say about his disposition than an angry bullock being dipped and scrubbed against an epidemic of cattle ticks. His purification consisted in a sudsing with antiseptic soaps, this administered by a team of three Service Com- pany gnotobioticians who were completely indifferent to his modesty and who seemed determined to peel off the outer surface of his skin. The women, safety-suited against being themselves contamin- ated, shaved off all his hair and ostentatiously packaged- up the shavings to be burned. They administered parenteral and enteric doses of broad- spectrum antibiotics. By the time the gnoto girls were fin- ished, Hartford was as bald all over as a six-weeks foetus, as sore as though he’d been sand- blasted, slightly feverish as a result of the injections and madder than hell. Ignoring his demands to see Colonel Nef at once, the Serv- ice Company troopers helped him into his safety-suit. Hart- ford would have to live inside the suit for a week's quaran- tine, watched carefully to see whether a missed microbe would breed within him in spite of all the measures tak- en. Hartford's company com- mander refused him permis- sion to speak to the colonel. The lieutenant was to speak to no one concerning Renkei's invasion of the Barracks. He would remain safety-suited in- side the Barracks or out; but would otherwise continue with his regular duties. Hartford returned to the re- fresher-room where the mur- der had taken place. Renkei’s macerated body had been re- moved for burning. The room had been carefully decontam- inated, to the extent of hosing it down with detergent steam and individually re-refreshing each safety-suit in the huge hall’s rows of lockers. There was nothing to be done against Nef’s madness, Hartford thought. He sat on the bench where Renkei had sat. The ultimate breakdown in communication is silencing one side of the dialogue, he thought. That's why killing a man is the ultimate sin; it re- moves forever the hope of un- derstanding him. It ends for all time the conversation by which brothers may touch one another’s mind. What crap to find in a Sol- dier’s thoughts, Hartford told himself. He was an Axenite trooper, a Pioneer, a pistol- packing officer of infantry, commander of the Terrible Third Platoon. He was an Axenite, dedicated by the im- maculacy of his birth to the 61 THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS

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conquest of Man’s frontiers, Hartford snapped his plas- tic-sheathed Dardick-p i s t o 1, death in a supermarket wrap- per, from his belt and placed it on the shelf of his locker. He’d seen the village of Kan- sannamura burned. Pia had died across his shoulder. Paula lay buried, too. Renkei’s life had been splashed out on a stream of bullets. Enough of death. Hartford picked up a pack of field-ration squeeze-tubes and walked down the hallway toward the Syphon. His leaving would show on the Status Board, of course, but that didn’t matter any more. He was deserting the regiment. HE walked through the val- ley of desert that was the Hot Gut, and down into the birth-canal that was the Wet Gut, to emerge in the evening air of Kansas. The motor ser- geant, stationed outside to guard the vehicles, saluted. “Going for a walk, sir?” he asked. “If you’ll lend me a jeep, I’ll go for a ride,” Hartford said. “I’d like to see how things look, down in the village.” “It’s against regulations, but if you’ll have the truck back by dark I can let it go, sir.” “Thank you, Sergeant.” Hartford returned the salute and drove off downhill, to- ward Kansannamura. What would happen to H a r t f o r d-the-deserter? he wondered. At best, he’d be booted out of the troopers and grounded on Titan, or Luna or one of the M’Bwene plan- ets, to serve the rest of his life as a paper-pusher, the bureaucratic equivalent of an endless Kitchen Police. At worst, he’d be exiled to Earth. That meant exposure to bac- teria, a gradual contamination till he’d been exposed to the full dirtiness in which earth- lings daily lived, till he’d equipped himself with anti- bodies and a Stinker’s im- mune-response. The Service Police weuld be after him soon. Once out 6f sight of the Barracks, he turned his jeep off the road, onto one of the numberless paths used by camelopard riders on their trips between Stinker villages. He was head- ed upgrade, now, toward the mountains. On either side of the jeep were the fields of sunflowers, silent in the twi- light calm. In a few moments the cool winds from the sea would flow into the land, stir- ring the billions of heart- shaped sunflower-leaves into the whisper that filled the evening and early-morning hours of Kansas. His heart filled with hope and hopelessness, feeling like a happy suicide, Hartford sang to himself as the sun- flower heads and leaves tat- tooed against his windshield. Pioneers! O Pioneers he sang, the anthem of the Axenites, 62 by Allen Kim Lang

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the fellowship he was leaving forever: Lo, the darting bowling orb! Lo, the brother orbs around, all the clustering suns and planets, All the dazzling days, all the mystic nights with dreams, Pioneers! O pio- neers ! The crunching of the jeep over the narrow track, the whipping of the plants against the vehicle and his singing all combined to drown out whatever noise it was the girl might have made. Hart- ford didn’t see her till the jeep, rearing like a startled pony, climbing the flank of the camelopard the girl rode, tossed him into a tangle of green stalks and golden flow- ers. VII THE riding camelopard bleated only a moment and was dead, its great neck brok- en by the jeep’s charge. The girl, thrown clear, was up be- fore Hartford. A scarlet bird circled the scene of the wreck, the dead beast, the stalled jeep, the man and the woman sprawled by the side of the path. “ Miyo ! Miyol Miyo!” cried the bla- brigar: “See! See! See!” Hartford rose and went to the girl, who was rubbing the shoulder she’d landed on. She stared, but didn’t back away. “Kinodoku semban/* he said very carefully: a thousand - myriad pardons . His bitcher, unfortunately, was set on full volume; his words of comfort blatted at the girl with parade- ground force. She put her hands over her ears. The blabrigar above them, impressed by Hartford’s sten- torian voice, circled repeating “ Kinodoku semban ” over and over, till the girl called it down to rest quietly on her shoulder. The girl spoke to the bird, which stared at her lips with his head cocked to one side, an attentive student. She repeated four times the same message. The bird nodded, and repeated the phrase to her. “Yuke!” the girl said. The blabrigar spread its scarlet wings and flew up. It circled twice, then headed north, up into the mountains. Of the girl’s message Hartford had understood only the native word for camelopard : giraffu . His Kansan was inadequate. He could understand it only if it were slowly spoken. Hartford tongued his hitch- er’s controls to a conversation- al level. “Kinodoku semban ” he repeated, bowing. The girl knelt beside the dead camelopard and stroked its head, over the central, ves- tigal horn. She looked up at Hartford with tears in her eyes. “Tonshu” Hartford said : I bow my head. “Anata we dare desu ka?” she asked. “Lee Hartford,” he replied. THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 63

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The girl spoke slowly. “I am named Take.” She knit her hands before her and bowed. “Forgive my bad actions/’ she said. “The fault is entirely mine, Takeko,” Hartford replied. He was sorry, of course, to have killed the girl’s steed and to have subjected her to danger; he was very glad to have met her. Takeko wore what must have been the Kansan riding costume : short trousers and a jacket woven of floss from retted sunflower stalk, dyed a golden brown. Most curious, he thought, was her perfume; mild, flowerlike, slightly pun- gent. The smell of this lovely Stinker belied the trooper epithet. Then it hit him. The filters of a safety-suit remove, together with all the dust of the ambient air, all its character, including odor. The clean, characteristic smells of the Barracks, together with the bland spit-and-sweat odors of a long-worn safety-suit, were all an Axenite came in contact with. If he were able to smell the outside world, it could only be because his gnotobiotic se- curity was compromised. Hartford inspected his safe- ty-suit, peering where he could and twisting and feeling the surfaces he couldn't see. Takeko laughed. She reached across his shoulder and lifted a flap of torn fabric, ripped loose when Hartford had flown from his jeep. HIS panic would have been unmanly in a normal human; but Hartford all his life had been impressed with the horror of contamination. He ran blindly, though he knew that his deepened breathing was drawing the germ-laden air of Kansas deeper into his lungs. He ran through lanes of sunflowers, flailing his arms, into the darkness, away from the alien girl, away from the fear of go- ing septic. He ran and stum- bled and fell and ran again. All his life he’d been warned of the consequences of becom- ing infected with the bacteria against which he had no de- fenses. Now he was so infect- ed. When Hartford fell the last time it was for sheer lack of wind. He opened his helmet and tossed it aside. Dead already, he could lose nothing by mak- ing himself comfortable for dying. He shivered. The chill of infection? No, the night was cool. He looked about him in the light of the sky of stars. The fields were below him, rustling in a million private conversations as the breeze fil- tered through them. It was a lovely place to die, here on the crest of a hill. Hartford lay back and stared into the curtain of stars that rippled above him. Perhaps he wouldn’t wake, he thought. With this thought he slept. The sunlight stung his eyes. by- Allen Kim Lang 64

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He sprang to his feet, then bent and groaned. Sore. He'd slept on naked soil, packed hard by the hillcrest winds. He stretched his hard-bedded muscles. For a dead man, he felt good. The alien bacteria and viruses within him were establishing beachheads, mul- tiplying their platoons to com- panies, their companies to bat- talions. By the time they’d reached division-strength, he thought, he’d be well aware of the invasion. Meanwhile, breakfast. He opened a package of field-r ations, squeeze-tube beans. He inserted the nozzle of the tube into his mouth and fed himself a dollop of the stuff. It felt strange to eat di- rectly from the tube, not hav- ing inserted the adjutage into his helmet-opening to be ster- ilized first. Being septic saved a lot of time. He finished the squeeze- tube beans and was thirsty. Down at the base of his hill was a little stream. Hartford thoughtfully peeled off his safety-suit. Dressed only in his shorts, shirtless, barefoot and tender, he made his way down to the water. It was delicious. Did bacteria impart that brisk taste? Hartford won- dered. So far committed to contamination that nothing mattered, he shed his shorts and dived into the stream. It was chilly, delightful. He re- turned to shore and lay on the grass for the sun to toast him dry. He began to relax. . . The girl giggled. Hartford snatched up his shorts and pulled them on. It was Takeko. She was afoot, wearing the cos- tume he'd last seen her with; but she had strapped on her back a leather wallet. A bla- brigar sat on Takeko’s shoul- der. She spoke to it, repeating her message four times and listening to the bird repeat once. Then she shooed the scarlet bird away, to carry north the message that Hart- ford had been found. “I laugh. Excuse me,” she said. “But you funny.” Take- ko patted her head. Hartford understood. Shaved by the De- contamination Squad, he was bald and eyebrowless, entirely lacking in body hair. He . smiled. “Hai.” “Your skin is like the hide of a giraffu,” she said. Hartford looked down at his freckled arm. True, the pat- tern of brown against pink was very like the reticulations of a camelopard. “Where did you learn to speak Standard, Takeko ?” “Pia-san talked to my cous- in, and I listened,” she said. “Kansannamura was my home. Pia often visited us.” Hart- ford, who after Nasty Nef was the man most responsible for the burning of Takeko’s vil- lage, was silent. “When your jeepu-kuruma hit my giraffu , I think you are Renkei,” the Kansan girl said. “Renkei is THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 65

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my cousin. He go to see what can be done.” “Renkei is dead,” Hartford told her. “lie !” Takeko pressed her hands against her face. “You strangers are quick to kill, to burn, to sweep away.” “I did not wish him harmed,” Hartford said. “You pink folk will not be happy until all our people are dead and under the ground,” Takeko moaned. “You will not be pleased until you can march across our graves.” “That is not so.” “Pia-san said it,” Takeko said. “He said that your Nef is a master of the Brother- hood, which wishes death to all people who do not wear glass heads.” “If that is true, I am no longer a part of it, Takeko- san,” Hartford said. “I have left Nef and his Barracks. I am a dead man.” “You will come with me,” Takeko said. “You will not be dead for many years, unless Nef and his Brotherhood kill you.” She looked into the sky, where a red bird was circling. It hawked down to her shoul- der and sat there, its head tilt- ed to her. “Takeko,” the girl said to the bird. With this key to unlock its message the bla- brigar spilled its rote. Hart- ford recognized a word or two of the bird-o-gram, but not the full sense of the message. Takeko reached into the pocket of her short trousers for a few zebra-striped sun- flower-seeds. The blabrigar picked these daintily from her hand, using its beak like a pair of precise tweezers, pinching up one seed at a time and cracking it. “There will soon come giraffu to take us to a further village,” Takeko said. “You are to speak to our chief men there, to tell them what happened to Renkei, why he was killed in the Stone House.” “I may not live through this day,” Hartford said. “It is not easy to explain. We wear the ‘glass head’ to keep out your air. It is deadly, doku , to us. Do you understand, Takeko?” {{'VT'OU may be tired, having 1 slept on the old bones of the hill,” she said. “You may be hungry, having eaten only the squeezings of your metal sausages. But you are not hurt badly, nor are you old, Lee- san. Why should you die?” “You cannot understand,” Hartford said. He spoke more to himself than to the girl. “The medicine here is certain- ly primitive. You have no con- cept of the biological nature of disease. Tell me, Takeko- san, do you Kansans know anything of the very, very small. . . ” “Microscopic?” Takeko asked. “Piacentelli did a splendid job of teaching you the Stand- ard language,” Hartford said. He looked up and down Take- ko's trim, just post-adolescent figure in frank appraisal, jeal- 66 by Allan Kim Lang

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ously wondering whether the chapattis and molded to Gabe could have achieved his the hook took the fancy of remarkable pedagogical re- Kansas fish as well as Take- suits by means of the pillow- ko’s offerings. With a sense book method of linguistic in- of at last participating in the struction so popular with sol- affairs of the universe, he de- diers of occupation in every capitated and decaudated the time and climate. That six fish they ended with, and thought, he rebuked himself, gutted them with a rich de- was unworthy of Pia’s mem- light in the juicy messiness of ory. In any case, his friend the task. had conducted his researches Hartford and Takeko scis- wearing that guarantee of sored the fillets in split twigs chastity, a safety-suit. and roasted them, like aquatic “ We’ll have to wait an hour weenies, over a fire built from or so until the giraffu came,” the pithy stalks of dead sun- Takeko said. flowers. The firepit, a saucer She unstrapped the wallet of scooped-out dirt, had bur- from her back and unpacked ied beneath it half a dozen of it on the grass at the edge of the swollen roots of sunflow- the little stream. The Kansan ers, each wrapped in the cordi- girl took out a coil of line, form, sharkskin-sunfaced leaf spun from the stalk of the of the parent plant, to roast sunflower, and a bronze hook, beneath the coals. “We will feed the gentleman from the Stone House, ” she 'T’HEY seasoned their fish said. Hartford watched with A with daikon , a kind of amusement as she baited the horseradish; and their plates hook with a bit of the bread were the fresh-baked, flat, un- from her knapsack, twirled the leavened chappattis Takeko line about her head and had brought in her pack. The dropped it into the center of tubers, eaten from a fresh the stream. “This place has leaf-plate, needed only butter, many fish,” she said. “We will Takeko had this, too, churned not wait long before we eat.” of camelopard-milk cream. It took Takeko only ten Buds or flower-heads of the minutes to have three seven- sunflower were eaten with inch fish, so plump and meaty- sunflower oil, like artichokes, looking that not even a xenol- “Your people have a good ogist would have wasted time friend in the sunflower;” studying them, lying on the Hartford remarked, wiping his grass. lips. Hartford demanded equal “With the golden flower time with the fishline, and and the golden giraffu , with discovered to his gratification the take- grass and the good That the dough he pinched off soil, we had a rich life here THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 67

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before you glass-headed men came/' Takeko said. “Now we are treated in our own villages like rats to be driven out, in our fields as gnawing vermin. Why is your Brotherhood so angry with us, Lee-san, who live in only a few places on a wide world? Is there no law among the light-skinned peo- ple? We have lived here, on the world you call Kansas, for many generations. We were once of Earth, as were your grandfathers.” “All humans were once of Earth,” Hartford said. “If we are as much human as you,” she said, “why does your Nef call us Hominids? Is that a name to give a broth- er?” “It is better than Stinker ” Hartford suggested. “Hai! I tell you, Lee-san why you must re-name us. It is because men do not kill men until they give their brother- enemy a monstrous name. Why do you wish to kill us all?” she asked. “I’m not a member of the Brotherhood,” Hartford said. “I'm only a man who was born on Axenite. That means, until your beast and my jeep collid- ed, tearing my safety-suit, I was an animal uncontaminated by microscopic life. These microscopic animals, Takeko, are deadly to an Axenite.” “You are not dead, though,” Takeko suggested. “ Ne ?” “I've been breathing con- taminated air for twelve hours,” Hartford said. “It's 68 true. I cannot understand why I have no fever, no malaise, no symptoms of pneumonia.” Takeko giggled. “Forgive me,” she said. “Kinodoku sem - ban ; but you seem to be sorry to be alive.” She was silent for a moment, listening. She pointed north. “My father will appear with our giraffu soon,” she said. “I can hear them.” Takeko's father rode up a moment later, an unbent man of seventy. He sat astride his camelopard, a comic quad- ruped little better designed as a beast of burden than an os- trich, with as much dignity as though his steed were an Ara- bian stallion. His name, Take- ko said, was Kiwa-san. The old man bowed from his sad- dle when his daughter intro- duced Hartford. AT Kiwa-san’s command the two giraffu he'd brought along on lead-reins spread their legs to bring their down- sloping backs a scant four feet from the ground. The saddles, with dangling, boot-like gam- badoes in place of ordinary stirrups, seemed inaccessible to Hartford. “Watch me,” Ta- keko told him. She took a short run up behind her giraf- fu and, with a movement like a leap-frog hurdle, flipped herself up into the saddle. Hartford stepped back, ran and leaped. He succeeded only in banging his shoes into the right sifle-joint of his mount and in flipping himself to the ground. In the interest of by Allen Kim Lang

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haste, grace was abandoned. Hartford monkey-crawled up a sturdy cane of bamboo grow- ing nearby and, as Kiwa-san maneuvered his beast, stepped over into the saddle. “I'd better take my safety- suit and helmet/' he said. “If the troopers should find it, they could follow our trail." “Hai!” Takeko said, agree- ing. She leaped from her giraffu, packed the safety-suit and helmet onto the beast, and remounted. “We will now go to Yamamura," she said. Old Kiwa spoke, and she translat- ed: “We must move quickly and with care," she said. “My father heard an hikoki — how do you say?" she asked, rais- ing and lowering her hand. “A veeto-platform," Hart- ford said. “I mustn't be seen, Takeko. Colonel Nef would use my presence as an excuse to kill any of your people around me." The ride, though cautious, was indeed demanding. Hart- ford felt tendons stretch he didn't know he had. Muscles were bruised from his instep to his upper back, and the skin was chafed away from his in- ner thighs as though he'd been riding an unplaned plank. He understood, well before the journey to the mountain vil- lage was over, the importance of that lifetime exercise, best begun by riding young, known to generations of horsemen as “stretching the crutch." He swore to himself that his fu- ture transportation, if he had a future through which to transport himself, would be by boots or wheeled vehicle. The three of them were fol- lowing no clear path. Kiwa led. Hartford noted that their course took them along the contours of streams, on the borders of fields, through con- trasting background that would make their presence less obvious from the air. They were in a thicket of bamboo when the veeto-plat- form did appear. The instant they heard its whistle, Kiwa spoke a sharp word. He and his daughter slipped from their mounts, loosed the brow-bands of their camelopards and unlocked their girths, tossed off the saddles and dangling gamba- does and gave the animals each a sharp slap on the rump that sent them crashing through the bamboo. They helped Hartford unsaddle and send his beast off in another direction, and lay down in the direction the late-morning sun dialed the shadows of the bamboo stems. If the veeto-pilot saw the giraffu now, they were sad- dleless and innocent. The downdraft of the veeto- platform puffed dust up from the ground around them, and pressed down the leafy tops of the bamboo like a great hand stroking across the thicket. Hartford, aware of the way his bald head and pink face would stand out, dusted his hands with the soil and 70 by Allen Kim Lang

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laced his dusty fingers over his scalp. The platform passed almost directly over them, shooting fragments of dust and bam- boo-duff into every particle of clothing, into ears and eyes and nostrils, with the whirl- wind of its passage. VIII IT took them half an hour to recover their giraifu and saddle up again, but Hartford did not regret the delay. Aboard the grotesque mount again, he groaned. To mask the misery of his unaccus- tomed pounding he paid sci- entific attention to the land- scape, the gait of the camelo- pards, the leather of the sad- dles, and the posture and per- son of Takeko — this last by far the most effective of his analgesic thoughts. They rode on an ancient piedmont, among the foothills of a worn-down mountain- range. The leather of their saddles and gambadoes was, by its pattern, obviously tanned camelopard-hide. Hart- ford was certain that this pat- tern would by the end of their journey be an indelible part of his own hide. The giraifu, remarkably swift and easy- moving over the rugged, heavily grown terrain, ambled, moving both legs on the same side together. And Takeko was lovely. Hartford decided to essay his Kansan. He practiced his question: "Is Yamamura far from here?” mentally, moving his lips, until he was sure he’d mastered the phrasing. Then he addressed Old Kiwa. " Yamamura wa koko *kara toi desu ka?” Kiwa smiled, and rattled off an answer much too brisk for Hartford to catch. He pointed ahead and up. "He says we must go through the pass, un- der the Great Buddha,” Take- ko explained. "We have only an hour to go.” " Arigato ,” Hartford said, suppressing a moan. Another hour ! The pass Kiwa had spoken of loomed ahead. It was quite narrow, and walled on either side by the almost perpendic- ular flanks of mountains, shoulder to shoulder. Kiwa went first, for the cleft could only be negotiated in single file. Takeko followed her fa- ther, and Hartford took up the rear. In the ravine it was dark. The camelopards, sensing their mangers up ahead, paced more quickly. Suddenly the canyon was light, the walls spreading further apart here. Far up on Hartford’s right, seated on a shelf left from some ancient avalanche, was a gigantic figure cast of a cop- pery metal, green now against the granite wall. "Who is that?” Hartford called to Ta- keko. "It is our Daibutsu” Take- ko said. "It is the Amida Bud- dha, the Lord of Boundless Light.” THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 71

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“Do you worship him?” Takeko smiled and shook her head. “We worship not any man, but a Way,” she said. “ Butsudo — the Way of the Buddha. We are nearly to the village now, Lee-san.” “I thank the Lord Buddha for that,” Hartford said, bow- ing from his saddle toward the great bronze image. YAMAMURA nestled in a fold of the high moun- tains. The fields that support- ed the village, its population now doubled by the refugees from Kansannamura, were tucked here and there on nar- row ledges, watered by bam- boo flumes that stole water from the mountain streams. The crop of greatest impor- tance was the ubiquitous sun- flower, supplier of bread and soap ash, of cloth and bath oil, birdseed and writing pa- per. Bamboo grew in clefts and shelves too slight for cul- tivation. This was the wood for tools, the water pipe, the house wattles and, in its youth, the salad of the people, the only wood eaten in its na- tive state. There were also carrots, beets and tiny plum- trees, and the horseradish, daikon. Yamamura was a love- ly place, Hartford decided. It was twenty hours from the moment of his contamina- tion that Hartford dismount- ed. He moved into the house Kiwa invited him to with as much tenderness as though he’d been carefully bastin- adoed and flayed. He was, nonetheless, free of febrile symptoms. He had breathed Kansan air, had eaten its fish and drunk its water; he’d spoken with a Kansan native and had lain with his face in Kansan dust. He was still as healthy as any Axenite, never before in the saddle, would be after a five-hour ride. Kiwa’s wife and Takeko’s mother was a little woman named Toyomi-san, dressed in brightly patterned garments a good deal more formal than her daughter’s jacket and shorts. Toyomi-san spoke no Standard, but she made quite clear to Hartford his welcome. She led him into a large, steam-filled room, where she indicated he was first to wash himself then soak, then dry and dress in the clean clothing she’d laid out for his use. The soaking water was very hot, and very welcome. Hart- ford sat in the copper-bot- tomed tub, his muscles hard and sore, until he felt the very marrow of his bones had cooked. He stepped from the tub then and dried gently, easy on his chafed back and legs. "The oil will help,” Takeko said, slipping a screen shut behind her. She had bathed and brushed her black hair free of the bamboo-thicket dust, and wore now a brilliant, silk kimono of the sort her mother was wearing. Hartford held the towel at his waist. 72 by Allen Kim Lang

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“Excuse me,” he said. Takeko giggled. “Are you unique, Lee-san, that you must hide yourself? Lie down on the cot, and I will make you comfortable.” Wondering greatly at the folkways of Kansas, but de- termined to commit no gaffe that would imperil his rela- tions with this girl, Hartford lay face down on the mat-cov- ered cot. Takeko removed the tenugi towel with which he'd modestly draped himself and gently stroked sweet-scented sunflower-seed oil into his macerated skin. Using the radical border of her hands, which were remarkably strong, Takeko coaxed the muscles to relax with effleu- rage; and she further softened the clonic hardness with a kneading motion. “This is,” she said, working her thumb- knuckles up his spinal-column as though telling the beads of his vertebrae, “one of the good things my ancestors brought from earth.” “ Yoroshiku soro ” Hartford grunted agreement. “It is good.” HALF an hour later, his skin soothed with oil and his muscles suppled by Take- ko’s massage, Hartford joined the family for supper. The Kansans used paired sticks for eating. Hartford, who’d not yet been introduced to the skill of using these o-hashi, and who was too hungry to practice now, was given a metal spoon with which to eat. When they'd finished their meal, several elder Kansans entered Kiwa-san’s house. Each bowed to Hartford, who, bald-headed, his feet socked into unfamiliar geta and wear- ing mitten-toed stockings, bowed in return. The new- comers each spoke some Standard, but it was obvious that Takeko was the most flu- ent of them all. “Pia-san taught Renkei; Renkei taught me,” the girl explained. “I was the second-best speaker. It would be better if Renkei were here.” “I regret his death more deeply than I can tell you,” Hartford said. “Renkei and Pia my friend are both dead now. This is what Renkei told me: aru-majiki koto , a thing that ought not to be.” The Kansans, seated on the cushions about the room, nodded. “Do you know, Lee- san, the greatest law of life?” Takeko asked. “You said, beside the stream where we fished, that men do not kill men,” Hartford an- swered. “But they do.” “It is an ideal we have more nearly than the glass-heads,” one of the Kansan elders said. “In the past four days, Ren- kei has died, and Pia-san. In the years before you Latecom- ers came to build the Stone House and cut roads and prac- tice making holes in paper at a distance, no man died here at the hand of another.” “We cannot teach the glass- 73 THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS

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heads our way when they walk about only with guns, when they live in the Stone House none of us can enter without dying, when they look at us with glass bowls over their faces and hate in their hearts,” Takeko said. “The hate is hardly need- ful,” Hartford said. “But the helmets must remain if Axen- ites are to live on Kansas.” “Do you live?” Takeko asked quietly. “I do,” Hartford said. “It puzzles me.” “Does it not puzzle you that none of us harbors open sores, or coughs up phlegm, or dies of fever?” Kiwa asked, speak- ing through his daughter’s in- termediation. “I had not thought of that,” Hartford admitted. “I have never before lived so. close to Stinkers.” Embarrassed, he stopped short. “I'm sorry,” he said. “Shitsurei shimashita ” “You meant us no dis- co u r t e s y,” Takeko said. “Think, Lee, of the word you used. Do we indeed stink?” “No,” Hartford said. “It's strange. I've been told all my life of the rot and fermenta- tion within ordinary mam- mals, and of the evil smells elaborated by these processes. But you, and all of Kansas, stink no more than Axenites do. You have, as we, the mul- berry odor of saliva, the wheat smell of thiamin, the faint musk oil of the hair. Even your camelopards smell sweet.” THE girl laughed. “If you think all Kansas a place of sweet perfumes, smell this, Lee-san,” she said. She took a covered dish and opened it. “This is takuwan/* she said. A smell strong as that of limburger cheese made itself known in the room. “It is pickled turnip, made in the old manner of our island forefathers on Earth.” “Whew!” Hartford said. “There is the true Stinker of Kansas.” “Pia-san learned much from the bad-smelling takuwan /* Takeko said. “His wife knew about the small stink-makers, these bacteria; she was a user of microscopes. She looked for them in the air of Kansas, and in our soil. Pia-san went even further. He took drops of our blood and other things to test.” “Tell our guest, Take-chan, what Pia found,” Old Kiwa told his daughter. “Hai, O t o s a n .” The girl turned to Hartford. “In our bodies there are no mischief- makers of the sort Earth-peo- ple know. There are not even those juices Pia-san called ‘footprints of the bugs.' ” “He must have meant you have no bacterial antibodies,” Hartford said. “That explains the whole package,” he went on, with growing excitement. “Why I'm alive without my safety-suit. What Piacentelli went outside to find. And, when he found it, why he un- suited himself, knowing this 74 by Allen Kim Lang

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world as pure as Titan. You're ceritelli had taken from the A x e n i t e s, you Kansans! Barracks on his fatal expedi- You're as germ-free as the tion. troopers.” Takeko dipped a chopstick “The whole truth is less into a dish and placed it be- simple,” said the lean old man neath the objective of the who’d been introduced to microscope. “We shall look at Hartford as Yamata, the calli- a spot of evil-smelling taku- grapher. wan- juice,” she said. “There is “Does the rubble of your light enough. Make it fit your forest-floors never turn to eyes, Lee-san; and you will mould, then?” Hartford asked, know the secret of Jodo, this “Do the bodies of your buried world you call Kansas.” fathers lie uncorrupted in their graves?” IX “Of course not,” Takeko said. “If that happened, we TJARTFORD knelt over the would be buried ourselves in AX microscope in the yoga- unmouldered leaves. The bod- posture called for by its being ies of our ancestors would be so near the floor and tried to stacked about us, unchanging, adjust the instrument as he re- like logs for the charcoal- membered having seen it done, burners. Our soil would die, He focused the coarse adjust- and all men would die with it, ment of the ’scope till he saw if dead things did not crum- spots darting about the fluid ble to make new soil.” Takeko had placed on the “Show our friend the hero slide. He nailed the spots of our epic,” the calligrapher down with a gentle hand on told her. the fine adjustment. “//a/.” Takeko stood and The juice of the pickled went to another room, going turnip was aswim with tiny through the ritual of kneeling bodies that looked like tad- to slide the door screen, stand- poles. “What are they?” he ing, kneeling, standing, with asked, peering into the micro- a grace that made the kimono world below him. she wore the loveliest of gar- “Pia-san named them mo- ments. She brought to the nads,” said the carpenter, small table at the center of the white-bearded Togo. “We all room a heavy object wrapped have them in our bodies. You in a yellow silk tenugui. Near have them now in yours. Our this on the table she placed a soil is alive with them. They small lamp, fueled with sun- chew the chaff of our fields flower-seed oil. She lighted into black loam; they turn to the lamp and uncovered the dust the flesh of oiir fathers, instrument she’d brought in. They cause turnips to become It was the microscope Pia- takuwan” THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 75

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Hartford rocked back from the microscope to sit again on his heels. “You have no dis- ease, no benign bacterial flora and of course no bacterial an- tibodies. Instead you have this whip-tailed animalcule, this monad. Is this correct?” “So Pia-san said,” Takeko agreed. “He said that the monad is a jealous beast. It is a tiger among the pygmies, he said. No little nuisance- makers can exist on Kansas; the monad would eat them in a rage.” “The ultimate antibiotic,” Hartford said. “A micro- organism that functions as a saprophyte, a soil-former and a scavenger. Besides all this, it’s a universal phagocyte, policing up the human en- vironment inside and out, to keep it clean of any other mi- croscopic organisms. The monad fills every niche in the micro-ecology of the planet.” “This is what Pia-san and his okusama, poor dead girl, discovered,” Takeko said. “Renkei entered the Stone House to tell you that we do not stink, that we are not dan- gerous. Three people have died to tell this — and Nef still does not know.” “I think he may know it af- ter all,” Hartford said. “He knows about the monad, and fears it. This little bug means that every member of the hu- man race can join his damned Brotherhood. A crew of monads in his gut would make every man on Stinker Earth 76 a dignotobiote, germ-free ex- cept for his housekeeping pro- tozoa. “Until Pia-san told us,” Ya- mata said, “we knew nothing except that we lived longer than our ancestors had. We knew that we did not suffer from the strange tirednesses the books told of, ills caused by the little animals. We did not know that the smallest na- tives of this planet had made of us. their fortresses.” “If I could only get past Nasty Nef to tell this to the Axenites,” Hartford said. “Ron yori shoko ” Kiwa-san said. Takeko translated for her father. “He says, Proof is stronger than argument.” “Indeed,” Hartford agreed. “But how do I prove to the troopers that the monad sweeps Kansas cleaner than their Barracks floors?” “As Pia-san tried to,” Take- ko said. “He removed his glasshead and his silken suit. He breathed our air and ate our food. He wanted to prove that he could live, but he was killed before he could. Now you have made that proof. Your brothers of the Stone House must undress of their silken suits and come among us, Lee-san.” {{'THAT they will not,” A Hartford said. “They are certain they will die if they inhale a breath of Kan- sas air, chew a bite of Kansas food, drink your clear stream water. I was certain I would by Allen Kim Lang

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die when my safety-suit was torn : remember our meeting, Takeko-san? It will not be easy to persuade my brothers and sisters in the Barracks to forget their fears. We are so sure, we Axenites, that con- tamination will kill us that we’d rather dance with light- ning and eat stones than walk this world unprotected and eat its fruits.” When Takeko had respoken these words to her father, the old man said again : “Ron yori skoko” Proof is greater than argrment. “Proof?” Hartford asked. “I am not proof enough to have a Regiment of Axenites shed their safety-suits and declare the Kansans their brothers. It would take years of lab work before the first of them would walk suitless onto bug-dirt. We’d have to knock down the walls of the Barracks and burn two thousand-odd safety-suits, before we’d have the Axenite troopers here trapped into be- ing guinea-pigs.” “Each trooper carries the Stone House with him when he walks our roads,” the calli- grapher remarked. “We have but to break through the silk- en suit he wears to make a trooper know the garment isn’t needed here.” “He’d die of fright,” Hart- ford said. “I very nearly did. Besides, each column of troop- ers, a squad or the Regiment, goes out with a Decontamina- tion Team. If a man becomes septic through some sort of accident, he’s hustled by a cleanup squad into a Decon- tamination Vehicle for his shower, shave and shots. I know the process well,” he said, running his palm over his naked head. “A no ne,” Kiwa said. “Will this Decontamination-fcuru/na house two thousand men? Two hundred? Twenty?” “It will hold two or three troopers at once,” Hartford answered. “We have several of them, though.” “So. . . ka ?” white - bearded Togo exclaimed. He leaned over to whisper into the ear of Takeko’s father, who nod- ded and smiled. Old Kiwa spoke, and Take- ko interpreted. “We must sur- prise a group of troopers,” he said. “We must cause all their silken suits to be torn, or all their glass heads shattered, at one time. It is so simple as that.” “Simple in all but the do- ing,” said Yamata the calli- grapher. He picked up a brush and sketched on the mat be- fore him a line of trooper-sil- houettes, a platoon, marching single-file. “How do we break into all those Stone Houses at once?” he asked. Hartford’s face was pale. “We could use grenades, per- haps,” he said. “Or bombs. Af- ter all, these troopers we speak of are no more than my family, my village, my people. I may of course be expected to cooperate in their destruc- tion.” THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 77

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TAKEKO reached over and took his hand, then dropped it. “ Ano ne! You do not understand! We can no more injure your brothers than you can, Lee-san. We may not harm any living per- son. Forgive us. You misun- derstand us. We are bound, Lee-sensei, by Butsudo : the Peaceful Path of the Lord Buddha.” She bowed toward him, her hands clasped togeth- er, her head touching the ta- tami. “It is my fault if I have misunderstood,” Hartford said. The men were staring, Takeko’s eyes were filled with tears, the room was silent. “I do not know you well. I did not know you do not kill.” “Let me tell you, then,” Ta- keko said, rising to sit beside him. “Our people, who once lived on islands in the greater sea of Earth, were folk mighty in battle. Their pride was named the Way of the Warrior, which is called Bu- shido. Their loveliest flower, the sakura or cherry-blossom, they made the symbol of the warrior, so highly did they hold his calling. “After their villages had been crushed many times in war, our ancestbrs vowed for- ever to abandon Bushido , the warrior’s path, and to place their feet in the path of the Lord Buddha, called Butsudo. This was many years ago, be- fore any man had ventured into space, before our ances- tors found this world you call Kansas. When they came here, they came in peace. And they named this place Jodo , which we still call it. It means the Pure Land, where men are just. And all justice is built on a single law. No man shall take man’s life.” “I spoke of the Axenite Brotherhood,” Hartford said. “These men are a group of our leaders — Colonel Nef is one ; he invited me to join him — who have decided that Stinker humanity must go. They’re dedicated men, pre- pared to extinguish all the rest of mankind, to sterilize Earth and reseed it as a gno- tobiotopic Paradise. Nef has, I fear, already killed three peo- ple to this end. “Yo,u who cannot kill will face an enemy trained in kill- ing,” he went on. “Your camel- opard-mounted messengers will meet veeto-platforms with machine-guns. Your peaceful words will be drowned out by the roar of Dardick-rifles. How can you hope to live if you will not kill?” “If the choice were death or killing, Lee-san, we would gladly die,” Takeko said. “We have a saying, Muriga toreba dori ga hikkomu. When might takes charge justice with- draws. We will not kill, and neither will we be defeated.” Yamata the calligrapher ad- dressed Hartford. “How badly torn must a safety-suit be, to make necessary the wearer’s going into the purification cart?” he asked. 78 by Allen Kim Lang

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“Only so much as the point of a pin would make would be enough,’ ” Hartford said. “We have to drive pins into several dozens of men's cloth- ing at one time," Yamata said. He smiled. “So phrased, the mountain does not seem too tall to be climbed." “It would be difficult to puncture the safety-suits without hurting the wearers," Hartford said. “Few armies are so solicitous." “ Butsudo forbids us to kill men," Takeko said. “It does not deny us the right, in pointing them to the path of knowledge, to jab them a bit." She smiled at Hartford. CCY TOW do you propose to do this jabbing?" he asked. “I remind you all, if you need reminding, that our troopers travel with Dardick- rifles and machine-guns, with rocket-mounted jeeps and vee- to-platforms from which bombs can be dropped." Kiwa spoke. “We are like a bear after honey," he said. “We are hungry, but do not wish to taste the stings of the guardians of the hive. We must surprise them.” Hartford, his knees stiff with kneeling, his backside sore from the camelopard-sad- dle despite the expert mas- sage, got up to pace the floor. “We need a needle-gun of some sort," he said. “No gun," insisted white- bearded Togo. “It need have only slight power," Hartford said. “It would throw its projectile only forcefully enough to penetrate the fabric of a safe- ty-suit." “It has been so many gener- ations since we have been sol- diers, we know nothing of weapons," Yamata-san said. He wet a fine brush with sumi, Chinese ink, and sketched rapidly. “I remember seeing pictures of Bushi carrying a sort of throwing-sticks with pointed ends in pockets on their backs, and flinging them like little spears with a kind of one-stringed lute." Hartford stared at the calli- grapher’s drawing, then ex- claimed. “Of course ! A bow and arrow." Takeko inspected the sketch. “The man who threw the stick is standing,” she said. “Could we stand against troopers?" “A man would have to stand exposed to shoot an arrow," Hartford admitted. “The Dar- dick-guns would mow us down before we’d punctured a sin- gle safety-suit." He paced up and down the room, the only trained warrior there, trying to devise his unkilling weap- on. “We have wine, Lee-san,” Takeko said. “Please sit and drink." Hartford, bemused with his problem, folded his legs onto his cushion and lowered him- self gently. Takeko’s mother appeared with tiny cups of hot wine, sake. Hartford THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 79

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bowed with the others and sipped. The stuff was good, rather like a dry sherry. Takeko bowed to leave the room, returned, bowed and commenced playing a tune with the instrument she’d brought in. It was a flute made of bamboo, with a high- pitched, pure sound Hartford found quite pleasant. He frowned, though, after a mo- ment. Takeko took the pipe from her lips. “You do not en- joy my playing?” she asked. “What is that made of?” Hartford demanded "Just bamboo, isn’t it?” “ Hai , take ,” Takeko agreed. “It is my name. Take — bam- boo. This is only a shakuha- chi\ for very simple music.” Hartford smiled and bowed toward Togo-san, the white- bearded carpenter. “S::r,” he said, “if we may have your ad- vice, I believe Takeko-chan has helped us find our weap- on.” X THE meeting broke up to adjourn to Togo-san's workshop. There was bamboo there in plenty, and young men eager to help the ex-lieu- tenant of Axenites in testing hts device. As the week wore on, young Kansans appeared from other villages, called by blabrigars and messengers on camelopard-back to join the army that was to make broth- ers and sisters of the troopers of First Regiment. The blowgun Hartford fi- nally established as his field model was some two yards long, made of bamboo bored through the joints and pol- ished smooth within, of a. cal- iber somewhat less than the diameter of a man’s little fin- ger. Though the bamboo-tube was somewhat flexible, Togo- san and his apprentices were able to bind a front sight to the muzzle, allowing some- what greater accuracy that could be obtained by pointing and hop'ng. The dart was about the length of a man’s hand. Its point was a sliver of bamboo, sharp as steel, entirely sharp enough to penetrate the tough material of a safety-suit if puffed from the blowgun with enough force. All the craftsmen of the village became arms-makers. They drilled bamboo, pob’shed the bore with abrasive-coated cord, fitted on the sights and tested their blowguns against the targets. Hundreds of darts were turned out for practice, and the most perfect were, saved for the battlefield it- self. The blowgunners began their drill, shooting from a prone position at targets as far as ten yards off, as great a range as amateurs cou7d be expected to shoot with accura- cy in the short time these had for practice. To fire the blowgun, the dart was wrapped in a bit of silk of sunflower-stalk-fluff, so that it would fit tightly 80 by Allen Kim Lang

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into the tube. The puff that sent it on its way had to be sharp and hard. Achieving the proper slap of air took more practice even than aiming. Hartford became every day a better horseman, or rather camelopardist. He in fact re- joiced in opportunities to leap- frog into his saddle, fit his feet and legs into the leather gambadoes, and go hailing off into the hills to recruit men and material. He carried with him the radio he’d salvaged from his safety suit, and could from time to time pick up First Regiment transmissions. The bitcher from his suit was useful in training large num- bers of recruits on the blow- gun range, and would be used when the Kansan guerrillas took the field against the troopers. He was picking up the language rapidly, now. He had to use Takeko’s services as interpreter less and less. Her usefulness declined not a bit, though, as the girl became his first lieutenant in charge of details. The band of expert puff- gunners was joined by a com- pany of scouts. These men and women skulked the hills afoot or astride camelopards, spying out the programs of the Regi- ment. Having no radio to maintain contact with Yama- mura, each scout carried a pair of blabrigars, trained to report to a specific person in its home village when given a se- lected prompt-word. Yamata-sah, the calligra- pher, became a cartographer. He drew in jet-black sumi ink the contours of the mountains, greened in the stands of bam- boo, drew blue streams and broad brown fields of sun- flowers, till at last the map that filled the largest room in Yamamura was almost as real as the Kansan soil it reflect- ed. Walking across this map in his tabi -stockinged feet, Hartford and the others of Kansas Intelligence would move toy troopers, made of wood like kokeshi-dolls, into the positions where the blabri- gars reported patrols to be. THE plan of battle of the Kansas forces was yawara - do , the Gentle Way also called judo. They would wait till the enemy made a move they could use, then they’d trip him up by re-directing his own strength. The move they most wanted the troopers to make was into the ravine that led toward the village of Yamamura, the pass under the Daibutsu , the huge bronze Buddha set there by their ancestors. In that ravine, under the gaze of the Lord of Boundless Light, the Kansas forces would either prevail againt the invader and make him their brother by darts and sweet reason, or they would all die in the attempt. The camelopards were sta- bled, ready as the steeds of any march-patrolling cavalry troop. The dartsmen, and those of the women who’d THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 81

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shown skill in handling the blowgun, were trained and eager. The path through the pass had been memorized in infinite detail by every one of the guerrillas. The squad of sappers responsible for check- mating the troopers had pre- pared their levers, their blocks and skids. Nothing remained now but to coax the enemy into the battlefield of the Kansans’ choosing. “Take out what’s left of the safety-suit,” Hartford ordered one of his men. “Leave it here — ” He stabbed a toe at the map they both stood on. “Would it be well for me to leave beside the torn and broken suit signs of a fight?” asked the boy, Ito Tiro, son of Old Ito-san, the knife-maker. “If the troopers are angry, they will be careless.” “If only you believed in war, Jiro-chan, you’d make a fine warrior,” Hartford grinned. “Do it your way, and hurry back.” Jiro placed the bait under the Regiment’s nose early in the day, and returned to Ya- mamura. It was midday when a blabrigar flew in from one of the scouts posted to watch First Regiment’s reaction. The bird prated its message into the ear of its receiver. Troopers, a band of fifty-odd, were scouring the hills to the west, following the camelo- pard-hoofprints left by Jiro. Aiding them in their search was the Regiment’s veeto-plat- form, skimming, hovering, pouncing to pick up clues. “They’re on the scent,” Hart- ford said. He turned again to Ito Jiro, fleetest of the camel- opard-riders. “Jiro-chan, lead them a chase that will bring them to the ravine no sooner than the Hour of the Dog. Be very cautious of the flying- thing; it can surprise you.” “//a/,” Jiro said, bowing. “The Hour of the Dog they will call upon you near the Daibutsu” Ito-san the knife- maker watched his son run to- ward the stables, the boy as excited as though he were go- ing to a festival rather than to face alone half a company of full-armed Axenites. The bla- brigars that would ride out with Jito were trained to re- port to the father. It would be a long afternoon for the old man, Hartford thought. There was much to do be- fore the scarlet bird came winging in from Jiro’s shoul- der with the message that the trap was sprung. At the Hour of the Monkey, four hours be- fore the troopers were to be in ambush, the first blabrigar flew in to report to Ito-san that the boy’s mount was winded, the enemy was draw- ing nearer the ravine, and that Jiro was approaching the point of rendezvous where he would find a fresh camelo- pard. Hartford ordered out two youths to join Jiro there in his harassment of the foot- soldiers from Regiment. - “It is time we take up our positions,” he told his band of 82 by Allen Kim Lang

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dartsmen. “Let us go in hope.” KIWA-SAN, Takeko’s fa- ther, stepped forward to pronounce a benediction upon the little company. “The En- lightened One, speaking at Rajagriha, spake, saying: ‘Re- member one thing, O beloved disciples, that hatred cannot be silenced by lies but by truth.* ” The irregulars, heads bowed, replied, “Namu Amida Butsu,** Glory to the Amida Buddha! Hartford, though his training as an Axenite trooper had left him as untouched by religions as by microbes, joined the prayer, feeling that a degree of celestial interest in their stratagem would not be unwelcome. The camelopardists vaulted into their saddles, adjusted their legs in the bootlike gambadoes, and slapped the reins to head their giraffu to- ward the ravine where the endgame would be played. Hartford rode at the head of the band, Takeko beside him. The others were dispersed at wide interval, a precaution against the veeto-platform’s swooping over the horizon to surprise them en route. As they left Yamamura, the wom- en and children of the village were leaving from the other side, together with the men too old to go out with the guerrillas. Yamamura was be- ing abandoned until the out- come of battle made itself known. The canyon that led up the mountain’s groin had once been the deep-cut bed of a stream. Collapse of over-bee- tling rock had formed a vault over the stream, which was consequently underground. Soil had filtered into the rocks, and bamboo had taken root. In result the lower ra- vine was a green enfilade hardly wider than a hallway, the walls on either side rising squarely from its floor. Well within the pass, set into the left-hand wall as one rode down from Yamamura, was a niche very like the tokonoma or honored alcove of a Kansan home. In this alcove, some fif- ty feet from the bottom of the pass, was set the great bronze image of Buddha, the Daibut- su of Kansas. Further down, below the Daibutsu- niche, the canyon became irregular. Along either side, some ten feet from the floor, were ledges marking the fracture planes along which ancient avalanches had calved. It was from these shelves that the Kansans hoped to ambush the men from First Regiment. The narrowness of the ravine, and the overhang of willow trees — these growing in clefts of rock, fingering their roots down to the subterranean stream — were enough, Hart- ford prayed, to prevent the veeto-platform’s pilot from spotting the Kansans lying in wait with their blowguns. Hartford disposed his troops on the shelves, check- THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 83

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in g to see that each man had a good field of fire and ade- quate cover. He glanced at the sun, the Kansan timepiece. It was between six and eight in the evening, he judged, the Hour of the Clock. He pressed his ear to the radio-receiver. Short-range, the safety-suit radio picked up only occasion- al orders from Axenite offi- cers and non-coms. Twice Hartford caught the name, “Lieutenant Felix.” He smiled, feeling mixed emo- tions. Felix had been his old Platoon Sergeant, and they would face each other in an hour or so as enemies. Very likely the fifty troopers chas- ing Ito Juro and his fellows toward the canyon included men of the Terrible Third Platoon, his old command. Hartford checked to see his bitcher worked and waited the arrival of the message-blabri- gars with fresh news. XI THE first bird arrived a few moments before the radio began coming in clear. “Sakura” Hartford said, this being the prompt-word to which the blabrigar was trained to reply. “Fifty men, sir; fifty men, sir; on the way, sir; on the way, sir,” the bird chanted into Hartford's ear. He let the bird rest on his shoulder; it would have to fly back to the scout who'd sent it soon, to tell him to join the rest of them at the ambush-point. The sun was low in the sky. H-hour was near. The signals began coming closer-together. “Saw one Stinker off your left flank, Miller... Left flank- guard reporting, sir. That Gook took off due east. Bla- brigar on his shoulder. . . Lieutenant Felix here. Any- thing on the right flank?... Nothing, sir... Keep moving, Lieutenant.” This last voice was the colonel's. Hartford frowned. If Nasty Nef had come out in person, the game would have to be played fast and dirty. Hartford set his bitcher low. “Abunai yo !” he said to his guerrillas, sprawled out all along the ledge like figurines on a mantlepiece. “Be cau- tious. Shoot your dart and get behind something. From now on, be silent. The enemy is near.” Takeko spoke: “You mean, Lee-chan, that our brothers draw near.” The other Kan- sans smiled. Some saluted, a gesture they'd observed among the Axenites they’d been spying upon for the past few days. The first of the scouts came galloping up the gullet of the canyon. Without a sound he signaled his watching com- rades, invisible above him. He made a circle with his hand, pointing up. That meant the Regiment’s veeto-p latf orm was scouting ahead of the ap- proaching Axenites. The first man slapped his giraffu to 84 by Allen Kim Lang

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hasten it up the pass, past the Daibutsu. Two other scouts, the foxes urging on the hounds, came shouting into the canyon. Neither of them was Ito Jiro. As his name signified, Jiro was the young- est son of Ito-san, the knife- maker. He was the darling of the family. Where was he? Hartford worried. The radio, no longer masked by the rocks, was filled with information. Hartford heard the veeto-pilot reporting: “They're headed up the gulch past the big idol, sir,” he said. “There's a village up there. That's where they’re probably headed. What do you want me to do, sir?" The platform hovered over the canyon, un- willing to work its way into the jagged, bamboo-and-pine- prickly fissure. “Keep in touch, Sky-Eye," Nef ordered. “We’re coming right up.” “Felix here, sir," the lieu- tenant reported. “We’ve got one of the Gooks prisoner. He's just a kid. Doesn’t seem to know a thing." ■% “Hold him till we get some- one who talks Stinker," Nef said. They got Jiro, Hartford thought. Damn. THE first of the troopers, an officer in the blue safe- ty-suit, spearheaded the col- umn. “Nothing in sight yet," Felix's voice reported. The officer signaled “Come on” with the sweep of his arm, and the first squad of Axenites, dispersed as skirmishers, formed themselves into a file to enter the canyon. The vee- to-platform above kept the foliage pressed down with its jet of air, stirring dust that both improved concealment and threatened to trigger a sneeze from one of the am* bushers. Hartford peered cautiously over the edge of the shelf. He’d set his forces far enough back in the canyon that the entire Axenite column would be encased. “Sir, this is Fe- lix," the radio said. “Do you agree, sir, that I should place one squad in reserve till the rest get through the gully?" “Peel off one squad and stay with it, Felix," Nef said. Felix’s voice again: “Sir, it was our Lieutenant Hartford that the Gooks got. I’d like to go in early." “Very well, Felix. Miller, hold your squad where it is. Disperse them well, and wait my order before bringing them into the ditch. Confirm." “Done and done, sir," Miller snapped. The first two dozen troop- ers were in the canyon now, half the Axenite force. Colo- nel Nef had shown the good sense to don an ordinary blue safety-suit; his scarlet com- mand-suit would have made him a splendid target. Anoth- er squad entered, their Dar- dick-rifles held at the ready. This would have to be quick, Hartford thought, or he’d lose THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 85

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his entire corps at their first volley. He raised his hand, a signal visible only to Takeko. She cupped her hands around her mouth and whistled the call of the nightingale, “Ho-o- kekyo . . . kekyo !" Before the echoed notes had died, the darts had found their targets. The radio was a clutter of undisciplined Damn's, cries of “I've been hit!" One trooper, quicker than the rest, caught sight of a Kansan. He raised his rifle and purred out a stream of Dardick-pellets. Yoritomo, apprentice to the paper-maker, tumbled over the lip of the ledge, his blowpipe falling with him like a jack- straw. There was a babble on the radio. Nef overrode all other circuits to command : “At ease! Rake the ledges with sustained fire." The canyon was blasted with a confetti of metal and spalled rock as the troopers hosed the shelves with bullets. The angle made aiming im- possible. But by luck and the intensity of the barrage an- other man, the carpenter’s son, had toppled to his death. “Sky -Eye! Get your butt down here!" Nef bellowed. “Decontamination Team! Bring the vehicle to the mouth of the canyon. We've got men septic." He tongued-on his bitcher and bellowed at the troopers. “On the double, through the ditch." “Yuke!” Hartford shouted to the men far up the wall, in the niche that held the Dai- butsu. “Go!" THE sappers at the back of the giant bronze statue bent to their levers. The tons of metal scooted slowly for- ward, hit the fat-smeared edge of the shelf. As quietly as a man rocking forward in prayer, the Daibutsu dropped head-down into the ravine. It struck the bottom with the sound of a great gong, and rocked, unshattered, plugging the throat of the canyon, standing as a dam. The hands of the Enlightened One were held in the positions of Pro- tection and of Giving; His face bore still a quiet smile. About the head of the image a fountain of water burst, squeezed up from the stream below. “ Nainu Amida ButsuT Takeko said, cuddled against Hartford, staring down. “Keep down," he said. He lifted his suit-radio and flicked on the transmission- switch. “This is Lee Hartford, late of the First Regiment," he announced. “The safety- suits of most of you have been breached. There is not room for more than three of you in the Decontamination Vehicle. You are not septic. I repeat: you have not been contaminat- ed. Kansas is as safe for you as the Barracks, or Titan, or the M’Bwene planets, or in the cells at Luna. You do not need your safety-suits on Kan- 86 by Allen Kim Lang

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“Find that man and gun the traitor down,” Net's voice de- manded from the speaker on his suit. “I am coming out unarmed,” Hartford radioed. “Fire the moment you see him,” Nef said. One of the officers had his Dardick- pistol drawn, his eyes travers- ing the canyon walls. “No, sir!” Felix's voice snapped from his bitcher. “You can't shoot the man till he's had a chance to speak.” “Go to the rear at once, Private Felix,” Nef bellowed. Felix pointed his handgun toward Nef. “No, sir,” he re- plied. “Hartford was my C.O., and an honest man. I'll hear him before I see him killed. Or by my life, sir, I'll kill you after him.” * “This is treason,” Nef said. “Drop your pistol, sir, or I'll have to try to shoot it from your hand. Excuse me, sir,” Felix said. Nef's gun dropped. “You all hear me?” Felix bitched. “Hear me out there, Miller?” There was a chorus of “Roger!” Felix went on: “I'm going to unclam my hel- met, troopers. I'm going to take off my safety-suit. That's how much I trust Lee Hart- ford, troopers. The man who tries to stop Hartford better begin with me.” Felix opened his helmet, removed it, and placed it on the rocks beside him. He went up to drink from the fountain that sparkled about the head of the Daibut- su, cupping his hands. “It’s good water, men,” he said. “Come on down, Hartford,” he shouted through the clear night air. LEE Hartford twisted over the edge of the shelf, held himself by his finger-tips, and dropped. He stood before his old comrades in arms dressed as a country Kansan. His head bore only a stubble of hair, and a scarlet blabrigar came down to settle familiarly on his shoulder. “I caused your suits to be breached for good reason,” he said, speaking into the bitcher he'd recovered from his safety-suit. “If any of you has a sore backside be- cause of the darts my men sent at you, please accept my a p o 1 o g i e s.” Two more Axenites removed their hel- mets, and stood grinning un- certainly at Hartford. “I have lived on Kansas for two weeks, living like a native. I've breathed Kansan air, eat- en their wonderful food and even kissed one of their girls.” There was a murmur of laugh- ter. “I’m as healthy as ever I was inside the Barracks,” Hartford said. “And I'm a good deal happier.” There was louder laughter among the Axenites, and more helmets opened. Hartford turned to look behind him. Takeko was hanging by her fingertips off the shelf, try- ing to work up the courage to drop. He went over to stand below her. “Fall to me, dar- THE CHEMICALLY PURE WARRIORS 87

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ling/' he said. ‘'Fall into my arms.*' “I hear, shujin , and obey,” Takeko squeaked, and dropped. When Hartford released Takeko and turned to face the troopers, every helmet but Nef’s was opened. Half a dozen of the men had already stripped to their Class B’s. They had their faces tilted into the wind that was sweep- ing up the gullet of the can- yon, smelling for the first time in their lives the scents of open nature, the spice of green life in the air. They were seeing the Kansas sky; a mosaic of stars, unfiltered by he 'me ts. They were breath- ing air not humid with their own perspiration. Holding Ta- keko’s hand in his, Hartford walked up to Felix. "You saved the day, old buddy,” he said. There was the cough of a tapoed-off Dardick-round. Felix fell. Colonel Nef, his pistol held at the hip, tilted it toward Hartford. He looked startled for a moment, then dropped the pistol. In his wrist were three blowgun- darts. Mustered across his chest were half a dozen more. Hartford waved at the Kan- sans on the ledge. “ Arigato!” he shouted, and told them to come down. Two men had died in the engagement : Yoritomo the pa- permaker and Sannosvke the carpenter’s son. Felix’s thigh- bone had been broken by Nef’s shot; and Colonel Nef’s right wrist would require attention. A medical officer had been sent for from the Barracks to set Felix’s leg. The dead men were carried on litters up to the shelves and around the fallen Daibutsu to the village. Hartford splinted his friend’s broken leg. "What now, Hart- ford?” Felix asked. "I suggest that you all be- come guests in Yamamura.” "Done and done,” Felix said. Takeko came up to lay a bunch of flowers on his chest. "They smell sweet,” she said. "Courage such as yours smells sweet in the nostrils of heav- en.” "Thank you, Ma’am,” Felix said. He turned his head to follow the girl as she took a second handful of flowers to place it beside the fountain that jetted about the head- standing Daibutsu. "I can see where this will be a popular planet to do duty on, Lieu- tenant,” he said. "What you discovered here will pretty well wipe out the Brother- hood.” 1 "You’re right,” Hartford said. "The Brotherhood is doomed.” They watched as Takeko knelt before the inverted image. “Namu. Amida Butsu ,” she said. "All men are the same in the sight of Amida, the Lord of Boundless Light.” "Maybe I’m wrong, Lieuten- ant,” Felix said. "Maybe the Brotherhood just got start- ed.” end 88 by Allen Kim Lang

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IF • Feature UNCLE SAM’S TIME MACHINE BY THEODORE STURGEON IN the great gray Groff Conklin’s introduction to my Funk & Wagnalls collec- tion A Way Home , he men- tions my “beautiful black- banged wife.” This remark- able lady, while operating a meticulous household and beautifully raising four kids, two fish and a dog, writes haiku, does Japanese calli- graphy and, having trimmed and suppled herself at ballet, paints in oils. Needing there- fore some spare time activity, she became a den mother, and every week, for an hour, my placid studio becomes a ca- cophonous cave and we are all up to here in Cub Scouts. Now a Cub Scout den in a spread-out community like ours calls for a surprising de- gree of synchronized logis- tics. (Anybody who forgets the refreshments will never do it again.) The boys arrive from different directions and different schools and are picked up by volunteer dis- taff-type chauffeurs with wor- ries of their own ; so above all, there has to be timing. It happened one day recent- ly that at some point during the rituals, the clock stopped. The only Cub with a wrist- watch that was running had both of its hands off and skat- ing around under the crystal. There came a great wail of temporal disorientation, to which I responded by invad- ing the sanctum, switching on my all-wave radio, tuning it to 2.5 megacycles and flood- 89

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in g the room with a pure con- cert A, which was punctuated by a series of sharp clicks at one-second intervals. An awed and attentive silence fell, and in a moment a man’s voice re- marked : “National Bureau of Standards, WWV. When the tone returns, the time will be ...five five P.M., Eastern Standard Time.” The tone re- turned and the voice said, “Five five P.M.” The clock was set, order restored, and we returned, they to their B-P inspirationals, I to my baby- sitting. Aside from a warm feeling of having saved the day, I did not realize that I had made a major magic until the phone began to ring that evening, and one after another of the participants and/or their par- ents began calling to find out just what was that radio sta- tion I had evoked. Well, WWV and I have been friends and associates for at least 15 years now, and I was happy to say so. I thought I knew a good deal about its many functions and uses, and it occurred to me that you might like to know something about it too. So I wrote to the station and asked for some ma- terial. PROMPTLY and with the ^greatest courtesy, they sent it Brother! It was like the discovery after expert years of pulling pigtails that there’s much more you can do with girls. I’m now a good deal 90 more astonished and im- pressed by WWV than are the Scouts of Den 2, Pack 34. As you may know, I jangle a bit of guitar, and it’s nice to have a readily available con- cert A for tuning up the gourd. Since WWV is on the air 24 hours a day, it doesn’t matter how late the party gets. It’s also nice to be able to find out what time it is without having to listen to the yowl- ing of some catamount backed up by a piano imitating a loose skid-chain, followed by two commercials. I was aware as well that WWV broadcasts on a number of different fre- quencies and is kept very ac- curately on them, so that if you like to have your tuning dial telling the truth, you can calibrate it against WWV’s signal. Or say someone wants to sell you a three or four- band receiver, and you want to know if the tuning is ac- curate on all of them, and not one or two only; WWV will tell you about that right now and with no argument. I knew also, or could de- duce, that WWV provided a standard for manufacturers of clocks and watches, of musi- cal instruments, of electronic components like signal gener- ators and vacuum tube volt- meters and the like, as well as radio receivers. And of course radio hams and Signal Corps- men and ship-to-shore tele- phone maintenance personnel would find a use for such a standard. And symphony or- by Theodore Sturgeon

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chestras. And radio-TV net- works, who must synchronize their equipment across three, or five, or eight time zones. And Western Union's radio- relay systems. And ships and planes, whose navigators tak- ing star or sun-shots must have accurate time measure- ment in order to calculate their positions. The more you think of it, the more uses you can dream up for such a serv- ice, and a lot of them are above and beyond mere con- venience. When I began wondering about WWV, and while I was waiting for their reply to my query (which wasn’t long: they were as prompt as they were helpful) I began listen- ing a little more attentively to it. I noticed that part of the time they broadcast another, higher note than the A-440, that sometimes they kept the one-second tick but dropped the audio tone altogether, that occasionally the tick would be tick-tick instead, that at the time of the voice announce- ment the audio tone would do a dit-dah bit in Morse code, that once in a while there would be a minute or so of a sound like a faulty electric shaver (my five-year-old says it sounds like jingle-bells, and in a way she’s right) and that every now and then the whole shebang goes off the air for a few minutes. Then came the mailing from WWV, and I’m going to have a heck of a job boiling it down into the available space. How so very much can be packed into a radio program consist- ing of some toots and a tick simply stretches belief. In a way it reminds me of a re- markable biologist called Noel Monkman, who once organ- ized an expedition to investi- gate the crater of an extinct volcano, traveled and climbed for days to get there, had him- self lowered a hundred-odd feet down into the hole and found nothing there but scum- my water. He yelled up for his companions to dump out and wash a thermos flash and lower it to him. He filled it and corked it, and with less than a pint of smelly liquid to show for his trouble, he wrote a book and made a full-length movie from his observations of it. To me, WWV’s toot and tick offer just that sort of marvelous microcosm. The best way to get an over- all idea of how much informa- tion is packed into this slen- der hiccuping thread of sound is to see what they started with and what they added to it. As you read, pay special at- tention to the remarks on ac- curacy, because they build up to one of the darnedest dead- pan punchlines I have yet en- countered. IN March 1923, the National Bureau of Standards began transmitting, for use by the public, radio signals of defi- nite announced frequency, to help with the standardization UNCLE SAM S TIME MACHINE 91

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of meters and radio gear. The station : WWV. The place : Washington, D.C. The signals were accurate in frequency to about 5 parts in 100,000, and were transmitted for a while each month in the range 125 to 7200 kc. In January 1931 a new transmitter was set up at Col- lege Park, Md., and an extend- ed service was begun, featur- ing a crystal-controlled broad- cast on 5000 kc which was ac- curate to 3 parts in a million. The move to Beltsville, Md., came in 1932, and there WWV lives and works to this day. The new transmitter had accuracy of one part in 5,000,000. In 1933 a high-power transmitter was installed, and in 1934 they added frequencies of 10 and 15 megacycles. In 1935 a modulation frequency of one kc was added, and in 1937 they began broadcasting the standard musical pitch, A/440, which they sent out on 5 megacycles. In July ’38 came the ticks, or seconds-pulses. In 1939 the station went on a 24-hour schedule, and accu- racy was increased to one part in 10 million. Upon which the whole thing burned down. That was on November 6, 1940. Five days later WWV was back on the air, with re- duced service, but anyway, back on the air, with one kilo- watt of power on 5000 kc. By March 1941 the “ticks” and the musical A/440 were back, and in December of the same year the 15,000 kilocycle car- rier was restored at one kilo- watt. The station was moved to a new site in Beltsville in 1943, with high power operation on 5, 10 and 15 me. On January 9, 1946, after inclusion of broad- casts on 2.5, 20, and 25 me, ra- dio propagation disturbance warning notices were added. And now we can pause and look at what they had achieved, because it was at this point that they served the public with the six main func- tions which they carry out to this day. First of all, there were the six broadcast frequency stand- ards mentioned above; when you calibrated your equip- ment to these, you knew you were right. Then there was the time, and the time intervals; you could count on there be- ing just about exactly one sec- ond between those ticks. Then there was the concert A. This was 440 cycles per second and not 439-point-any-number-of- nines. They were also sending (I forgot to mention) a 4000- cycle audio note, for an inter- mediate frequency check. They were actually announc- ing the time in Morse, as well as marking it, and finally, there were these radio propa- gation notices. Here’s the way these work. The Bureau of Standards has a propagation laboratory at Ft. Belvoir, Va., and prepares short-term forecasts on the broadcasting conditions cur- rently existing on North At- 92 by Theodore Sturgeon

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lantic radio paths, such as Washington to London or New York to Berlin. These forecasts are based on infor- mation secured from a world- wide network of geophysical and solar observations, balloon soundings, reports on short- wave reception and the like, and are issued four times a day. WWV, using the audio tone they happen to be broad- casting at the time, gives this material in Morse code. It is scheduled for 19.5 and 49.5 minutes past each hour; that is to say, the forecasts are corrected four times a day and sent out twice each hour. The code takes the form of a let- ter and a digit. “W” means “disturbed” and is used with numbers 1 to 4, which signi- fy degrees of mush from “useless” to “poor-to-fair”. “U” is “unsettled” and is used with the numeral 5. “N” means “normal” and is followed by numerals 6 to 9, signifying conditions varying from fair- to-good all the way up to ex- cellent. This kind of informa- tion, of course, is vital for ra- dio-telephony, s h o r t-wave links and all such traffic, and enables overseas operators to decide when to hold and when to send transmissions. And in this letter-and-number system is even more information; for if conditions are expected to worsen, the number won't be- long to the letter; that is, “N4” means “It's okay now but it’s going to get foggy pretty quick.” And “U-8” UNCLE SAM’S TIME MACHINE would mean “Not so hot just now, but it’s clearing up.” SO back to our history. In November 1948 the Pacific began to get the same kind of service via the sister station WWVH at Maui in Hawaii. And in January 1950, the 4000- cycle audio note was discon- tinued and a 600-cycle note substituted to alternate with the A/440. Why 600? So that power-plants half around the world could have a really ac- curate check of the 60-cycle alternation of their output — that good old 60 cycles that drives your four-dollar elec- tric clock and keeps it to an accuracy almost undreamed of in the days of springs and pendulums and balance- wheels. 600 cycles is a useful middle-frequency note in it- self, and it’s a multiple of your house-current. During 1956 (you’ve been watching this?) the broadcasts were refined from one part in 50 million to one part in 100 million. In addition, the sta- bility of the frequencies broadcast was increased to about (that “about” is straight from the material BuStand- ards sent me) one part in a billion at WWV and to 5 parts in a billion at WWVH. Also in 1956 a change was made in the manner of send- ing tones. The audio was re- duced from four to three min- utes of each five, and in addi- tion a silent period was intro- duced : the WWV carriers are 93

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removed from the air altogeth- er for four minutes, beginning at 45 minutes, 15 seconds after each hour. I haven’t been able to ascertain just why, but it’s easy to imagine certain elec- tronic watch-dog or control equipment which might be precisely turned off and on or modulated by the removal and return of these signals. The way the time announce- ments are made, and their ana- tomy, are particularly fasci- nating. The first thing you notice about a WWV signal is the tick — tick—oi the seconds pulse. Listen very carefully and you’ll notice that the last second of each minute has no tick; it’s omitted. The first second of the next minute is marked by two ticks a tenth of a second apart; the first of these marks the beginning of the second. And in a moment you’ll notice that the tone is not, as it first seemed, contin- uous, with the “tick” over- laying it. The tone actually stops to admit the tick, or pulse, for all of one one-hun- dredth of a second. And the tick isn’t a tick at all! It’s a tiny piece of a 1000-cycle note, to be exact, five cycles. This takes (natch) five thou- sandths of a second. Then there’s a Jong pause of two and a half hundredths of a second, and the audio tone re- sumes. If you think that’s a lot to be going on within a tick of time, stick around: there’s lots more that can be packed in. 94 As quoted in the Cub Scout anecdote, the voice announce- ment is made twice during the last ten seconds of each five- minute period. You will also hear the audio tone perform- ing some Morse. This is also the time, but while the voice gives Eastern Standard time, the Morse gives Universal Time (UT) the reference of which is the zero meridian. This affords scientists and technologists and saucer- watchers a chance to make simultaneous measurements thousands of miles apart with- out calculating time zones. AND now we come to the International Geophysical Year, and a chance to shovel some more information into the tick and the toot. The IGY began in 1957, and something called International World Day Service was instituted. This IWDS notifies all inter- ested parties that some signif- icant geophysical event is taking place — a big magnetic storm, an outstanding auroral display, or a significant in- crease in cosmic ray activity. The alert is broadcast first by WWV at 1604.5 UT, and by WWVH at 1714.4 UT. (How’d you like to arrange to meet your girl at seventeen-four- teen and four tenths?) The code for an alert, in slow Morse, is AGI AAAA. Now, if the event turns out to be of really great importance, so that observers and experi- menters should really get to by Theodore Sturgeon

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work on it, a Special World Interval is declared. The code for this is AGI followed by three extra-long dashes. And now we come to 1961, when WWV seems to have sworn off all the crude stuff and decided to really hone it fine. First of all they brought the stability to one part in 1010, which was called one part in ten billion when you were a kid. Then they retarded (as of Jan. 1, 1961) the whole sched- ule by 5 microseconds, to bring it into line with other standardized frequency broad- casting stations throughout the world. Then, without dropping anything, they grafted on a time signal which will, if you like, and if you know how to grab it, in- form you what second of what minute of what hour of what day of the year you are listen- ing to. It will do this six hun- dred times every hour. And this is the “jingle bells” my youngster mentioned. It oc- curs for a solid minute im- mediately following the cessa- tion of the audio tone, ten times during the hour. The in- formation is in a binary code, and transmits 36 “bits” within 100 pulses within 1 second. In binary numbers, which you will recall are all l’s and 0’s, it gives first the number of the second, then what minute we’re in, then the number of the hour (UT), then the num- ber (total) of the day since the year began. The transmis- UNCLE SAM’S TIME MACHINE sion also contains the binary technicalities of 10-per-second index markers and a one-per- second reference marker. The whole message is made of thin slices of a 100-cycle tone. The 0 pulse is 2 cycles of the tone, and the 1 pulse is 6 cycles of the tone. This affords 36 bits in a second, and, take my word for it as I take BuStandard’s, there are four bits left over. They are trying to figure out what to do with these. Maybe they’ll add the number of the year (like 62) or perhaps the station identification. Or may- be some micromadison-avenue minibrain will figure out how to make a millibuck selling it as commercial spots. And now we come to Bu- Standard’s one-word punch- line— the end of one of the re- ports they sent me about WWV (which started in 1923 establishing frequency stand- ards accurate to about 5 parts in 100,000, and now stabilize to one part in ten billion) : “Development work is un- derway to increase (1) the ef- fectiveness of the seconds pulse, (2) power in the time pulses, (3) area served by standard frequency broad- casts and (4) accuracy.” END 1 wish to acknowledge the kindness and courtesy granted me in the preparation of this article by Mr. A. H. Morgan, Chief of the Radio Standards Service, and Mr. James F. Brockman of the Radio Stand- ards Laboratory, U.S. Dept, of Commerce, National Bureau of Standards, Boulder, Colorado. 95

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IF • Short Story It was dirty work, but it would make him a man. And kids had a right to grow up — some of them! THE RECRUIT BY BRYCE WALTON ILLUSTRATED BY SCHELING WAYNE, unseen, sneered down from the head of the stairs. The old man with his thick neck, thick cigar, evening highball, potgut and bald head without a brain in it. His slim mother with nervously polite smiles and voice fluttering, assuring the old man by her frailty that he was big in the world. They were squareheads one and all, marking moron time in a gray dream. Man, was he glad to break out. The old man said, “He’ll be okay. Let him alone.” “But he won’t eat. Just lies there all the time.” “Hell,” the old man said. “Sixteen’s a bad time. School over, waiting for the draft and all. He’s in between. It’s rough.” Mother clasped her fore- arms and shook her head once slowly. “We got to let him go, Eva. It’s a dangerous time. You got to remember about all these dangerous repressed im- pulses piling up with nowhere to go, like they say. You read the books.” “But he’s unhappy.” “Are we specialists? That’s the Youth Board’s headache, ain’t it? What do we know about adolescent trauma and like that? Now get dressed or we’ll be late.” Wayne watched the ritual, grinning. He listened to their purposeless noises, their blab- bing and yakking as if they had something to say. Blab- 96

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blab about the same old bones, and end up chewing them in the same old ways. Then they begin all over again. A freak sideshow all the way to no- where. Squareheads going around either unconscious or with eyes looking dead from the millennium in the office waiting to retire into limbo. How come he’d been stuck with parental images like that? One thing — when he was jockeying a rocket to Mars or maybe firing the pants off Asiatic reds in some steamy gone jungle paradise, he’d for- get his punkie origins in tee- veeland. But the old man was right on for once about the danger- ous repressed impulses. Wayne had heard about it often enough. Anyway there was no doubt about it when every move he made was a restrained explosion. So he’d waited in his room, and it wasn’t easy sweating it out alone waiting for the break- out call from HQ. “Well, dear, if you say so,” Mother said, with the old re- signed sigh that must make the old man feel like Super- man with a beerbelly. They heard Wayne slouch- ing loosely down the stairs and looked up. ^ “Relax,” Wayne said. “You’re not going anywhere tonight.” “What, son?” his old man said uneasily. “Sure we are. We’re going to the movies.” He could feel them watch- THE RECRUIT ing him, waiting; and yet still he didn’t answer. Somewhere out in suburban grayness a dog barked, then was silent. “Okay, go,” Wayne said. “If you wanta walk. I’m tak- ing the family boltbucket.” “But we promised the Clem- ons, dear,” his mother said. “Hell,” Wayne said, grin- ning straight into the old man. “I just got my draft call.” He saw the old man’s Adam’s apple move. “Oh, my dear boy,” Mother cried out. “So gimme the keys,” Wayne said. The old man handed the keys over. His un- derstanding smile was strained, and fear flicked in his sagging eyes. “Do be careful, dear,” his mother said. She ran toward him as he laughed and shut the door on her. He was still laughing as he whoomed the Olds between the pale dead glow of houses and roared up the ramp onto the Freeway. Ahead was the promising glit- ter of adventure-calling neon, and he looked up at the high skies of night and his eyes sailed the glaring wonders of escape. HE burned off some rubber finding a slot in the park- lot. He strode under a sign reading Public Youth Center No. 947 and walked casually to the reception desk, where a thin man with sergeant’s stripes and a pansy haircut looked out of a pile of paper- work. 97

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“Where you think you’re going, my pretty lad?” Wayne grinned down. “Higher I hope than a type- writer jockey.” “Well,” the sergeant said. “How tough we are this eve- ning. You have a pass, killer?” “Wayne Seton. Draft call.” “Oh.” The sergeant checked his name off a roster and nod- ded. He wrote on a slip of pa- per, handed the pass to Wayne. “Go to the Armory and check out whatever your lusting little heart desires. Then report to Captain Jack, room 307.” “Thanks, s a r g e dear,” Wayne said and took the ele- vator up to the Armory. A tired fat corporal with a naked head blinked up at tall Wayne. Finally he said, “So make up your mind, bud. Think you’re the only kid breaking out tonight?” “Hold your teeth, pop,” Wayne said, coolly and slowly lighting a cigarette. “I’ve de- cided.” The corporal’s little eyes studied Wayne with malicious amusement. “Take it from a vet, bud. Sooner you go the better. It’s a big city and you’re starting late. You can get a cat, not a mouse, and some babes are clever hell- cats in a dark alley.” “You must be a genius,” Wayne said. “A corporal with no hair and still a counterboy. I’m impressed. I’m all ears, Dad.” The corporal sighed wear- 98 ily. “You can get that bal- loon head ventilated, bud, and good.” Wayne’s mouth twitched. He leaned across the counter toward the shelves and racks of weapons. “I’ll remember that crack when I get my com- mission.” He blew smoke in the corporal’s face. “Bring me a Smith and Wesson .38, shoulder holster with spring- clip. And throw in a Skelly switchblade for kicks — the six-inch disguised job with the double springs.” The corporal waddled back with the revolver and the switchblade disguised in a leather comb case. He checked them on a receipt ledger, while Wayne examined the weap- ons, broke open the revolver, twirled the cylinder and pushed cartridges into the waiting chamber. He slipped the knife from the comb case, flicked open the blade and stared at its gleam in the but- tery light as his mouth went dry and the refracted incan- descence of it trickled on his brain like melted ice, exciting and scary. He removed his leather jacket. He slung the holster under his left armpit and test- ed the spring clip release sev- eral times, feeling the way the serrated butt dropped into his wet palm. He put his jacket back on and the switchblade case in his pocket. He walked toward the elevator and didn’t look back as the corporal said, by Bryce Walton

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“Good luck, tiger." Captain Jack moved mas- sively. The big stone-walled office, alive with stuffed lion and tiger and gunracks, seemed to grow smaller. Captain Jack crossed black- booted legs and whacked a cane at the floor. It had a head shaped like a grinning bear. Wayne felt the assured smile die on his face. Some- thing seemed to shrink him. If he didn’t watch himself he’d begin feeling like a pea among bowling balls. Contemptuously amused lit- tle eyes glittered at Wayne from a shaggy head. Shoul- ders hunched like stuffed sea- bags. “Wayne Seton,” said Cap- tain Jack as if he were dis- cussing something in a bug collection. “Well, well, you’re really fired up aren’t you? Really going out to eat ’em. Right, punk?” “Yes, sir,” Wayne said. He ran wet hands down the sides of his chinos. His legs seemed sheathed in lead as he bit inwardly at shrinking fear the way a dog snaps at a wound. You big overblown son, he thought, I’ll show you but good who is a punk. They made a guy wait and sweat until he screamed. They kept a guy on the fire until desire leaped in him, ran and billowed and roared until his brain was filled with it. But that wasn’t enough. If this THE RECRUIT muscle-bound creep was such a big boy, what was he doing holding down a desk? “Well, this is it, punk. You go the distance or start a but- terfly collection.” The cane darted up. A blade snicked from the end and stopped an inch from Wayne’s nose. He jerked up a shaky hand involuntarily and clamped a knuckle-ridged gag to his gasping mouth. Captain Jack chuckled. “All right, superboy.” He handed Wayne his passcard. “Cur- few’s off, punk, for 6 hours. You got 6 hours to make out.” “Yes, sir.” “Your beast is primed and waiting at the Four Aces Club on the West Side. Know where that is, punk?” “No, sir, but I’ll find it fast.” “Sure you will, punk,” smiled Captain Jack. “She’ll be wearing yellow slacks and a red shirt. Black hair, a cute trick. She’s with a hefty psy- cho who eats punks for break- fast. He’s butchered five peo- ple. They’re both on top of the Undesirable list, Seton. They got to go and they’re your key to the stars.” “Yes, sir,” Wayne said. “So run along and make out, punk,” grinned Captain Jack. Acopcar stopped Wayne as he started over the bridge, out of bright respectable neon into the murky westside slum over the river. 99

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Wayne waved the pass card, signed by Captain Jack, under the cop’s quivering nose. The cop shivered and stepped back and waved him on. The Olds roared over the bridge as the night’s rain blew away. The air through the open window was chill and damp coming from Slumville, but Wayne felt a cold that wasn’t of the night or the wind. He turned off into a rat’s warren of the inferiors. Lights turned pale, secretive and sparse, the uncared-for streets became rough with pitted potholes, narrow and winding and hu- mid with wet unpleasant smells. Wayne’s fearful exhil- aration increased as he cruised with bated breath through the dark mazes of streets and rickety tenements crawling with the shadows of mysterious promise. He found the alley, dark, a gloom-dripping tunnel. He drove cautiously into it and rolled along, watching. His belly ached with expectancy as he spotted the sick-looking dab of neon wanly sparkling. FOUR ACES CLUB He parked across the al- ley. He got out and stood in shadows, digging the sultry beat of a combo, the wild pulse of drums and spinning brass filtering through win- dows painted black. He breathed deep, started over, ducked back. A stewbum weaved out of a bank of gar- bage cans, humming to him- 100 self, pulling at a rainsoaked shirt clinging to a pale stick body. He reminded Wayne of a slim grub balanced on one end. The stewbum stumbled. His bearded face in dim breaking moonlight had a dirty, green- ish tinge as he sensed Wayne there. He turned in a gro- tesque uncoordinated jiggling and his eyes were wide with terror and doom. “I gotta hide, kid. They’re on me.” Wayne’s chest rose and his hands curled. The bum’s fingers drew at the air like white talons. “Help me, kid.” He turned with a scratchy cry and retreated before the sudden blast of headlights from a Cad bulleting into the alley. The Cad rushed past Wayne and he felt the engine- hot fumes against his legs. Tires squealed. The Cad stopped and a teener in black jacket jumped out and crouched as he began stalking the old rummy. “This is him! This is him all right,” the teener yelled, and one hand came up swing- ing a baseball bat. A head bobbed out of the Cad window and giggled. The fumble-footed rummy tried to run and plopped on wet pavement. The teener moved in, while a faint odor of burnt rubber hovered in the air as the Cad cruised in a slow follow-up. Wayne*s breath quickened by Bryce Walton

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as he watched, feeling some- how blank wonder at finding himself there, free and break- ing out at last with no cur- few and no law but his own. He felt as though he couldn’t stop anything. Living seemed directionless, but he still would go with it regardless, until something dropped off or blew to hell like a hot light- bulb. He held his breath, wait- ing. His body was tensed and rigid as he moved in spirit with the hunting teener, an omniscient shadow with a hunting license and a ghetto jungle twenty miles deep. The crawling stewbum screamed as the baseball bat whacked. The teener laughed. Wayne wanted to shout. He opened his mouth, but the yell clogged up somewhere, so that he remained soundless yet with his mouth still open as he heard the payoff thuds where the useless wino curled up with stick arms over his rheumy face. The teener laughed, tossed the bat away and began jump- ing up and down with his hobnailed, mail-order air force boots. Then he ran into the Cad. A hootch bottle soared out, made a brittle tink-tink of falling glass. “Go, man!” The Cad wooshed by. It made a sort of hollow suck- ing noise as it bounced over the old man twice. Then the finlights diminished like bright wind-blown sparks. Wayne walked over and THE RECRUIT sneered down at the human garbage lying in scummed rain pools. The smell of raw violence, the scent of blood, made his heart thump like a trapped rubber ball in a cage. He hurried into the Four Aces, drawn by an exhilarat- ing vision. . .and pursued by the hollow haunting fears of his own desires. HE walked through the wavering haze of smoke and liquored dizziness and stood until his eyes learned the dark. He spotted her red shirt and yellow legs over in the corner above a murky lighted table. He walked toward her, watching her little subhuman pixie face lift. The eyes wid- ened with exciting terror, turned even paler behind a red slash of sensuous mouth. Briefed and waiting, primed and eager for running, she recognized her pursuer at once. He sat at a table near her, watching and grinning and seeing her squirm. She sat in that slightly baffled, fearful and uncom- prehending attitude of being motionless, as though they were all actors performing in a weirdo drama being staged in that smoky thick-aired dive. Wayne smiled with wry superiority at the redheaded psycho in a dirty T-shirt, a big bruiser with a gorilla face. He was tussling his mouse heavy. 101

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"What’s yours, teener?” the slug-faced waiter asked. "Bring me a Crusher, bud- dyroo,” Wayne said, and flashed his pass card. "Sure, teener.” Red nuzzled the mouse’s neck and made drooly noises. Wayne watched and fed on the promising terror and help- lessness of her hunted face. She sat rigid, eyes fixed on Wayne like balls of frozen glass. Red looked up and stared straight at Wayne with eyes like black buttons imbedded in the waxlike skin of his face. Then he grinned all on one side. One huge hand scratched across the wet table top like a furious cat’s. Wayne returned the chal- lenging move but felt a nerv- ous twitch jerk at his lips. A numbness covered his brain like a film as he concentrated on staring down Red the psy- cho. But Red kept looking, his eyes bright but dead. Then he began struggling it up again with the scared little mouse. The waiter sat the Crusher down. Wayne signed a chit; tonight he was in the pay of the state. “What else, teener?” "One thing. Fade.” "Sure, teener,” the waiter said, his breathy words drip- ping like syrup. Wayne drank. Liquored heat dripped into his stomach. Fire tickled his veins, became hot wire twisting in his head. 102 He drank again and forced out a shaky breath. The jazz beat thumped fast and muted brass moaned. Drumpulse, stabbing trumpet raped the air. Tension mounted as Wayne watched her pale throat convulsing, the white eyelids fluttering. Red fingered at her legs and salivated at her throat, glanc- ing now and then at Wayne, baiting him good. "Okay, you creep,” Wayne said. He stood up and started through the haze. The psycho leaped and a table crashed. Wayne’s .38 dropped from its spring-clip holster and the blast filled the room. The psycho screamed and stumbled toward the door holding some- thing in. The mouse darted by, eluded Wayne’s grasp and was out the door. Wayne went out after her in a laughing frenzy of re- lease. He felt the cold strange breath of moist air on his sweating skin as he sprinted down the alley into a wind full of blowing wet. He ran laughing under the crazy starlight and glimpsed her now and then, fading in and out of shadows, jumping, crawling, running with the life-or-death animation of a wild deer. Up and down alleys, a rat’s maze. A rabbit run. Across vacant lots. Through shattered tenement ruins. Over a fence. There she was, falling, slid- ing down a brick shute. He gained. He moved up. by Bryce Walton

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His labored breath pumped more fire. And her scream was a rejuvenation hypo in his blood. SHE quivered above him on the stoop, panting, her eyes afire with terror. “You, baby,” Wayne gasped. “I gotcha.” She backed into darkness, up there against the sagging tenement wall, her arms out and poised like crippled wings. Wayne crept up. She gave a squeaking sob, turned, ran. Wayne leaped into gloom. Wood cracked. He clambered over rotten lumber. The door- way sagged and he hesitated in the musty dark. A few feet away was the sound of loose trickling plaster, a whimper- ing whine. “No use running,” Wayne said. “Go loose. Give, baby. Give now.” She scurried up sagging stairs. Wayne laughed and dug up after her, feeling his way through debris. Dim moon- light filtered through a sag- ging stairway from a shat- tered skylight three floors up. The mouse’s shadow float- ed ahead. He started up. The entire stair structure canted sicken- ingly. A railing ripped and he nearly went with it back down to the first floor. He heard a scream as rotten boards crumbled and dust ex- ploded from cracks. A rat ran past Wayne and fell into space. He burst into the third- 104 floor hallway and saw her half-falling through a door under the jagged skylight. Wayne took his time. He knew how she felt waiting in there, listening to his creep- ing, implacable footfalls. Then he yelled and slammed open the door. Dust and stench, filth so awful it made nothing of the dust. In the corner he saw something hardly to be called a bed. More like a nest. A dirty, lumpy pile of torn mat- tress, felt, excelsior, shredded newspapers and rags. It seemed to crawl a little under the moon-streaming skylight. She crouched in the corner panting. He took his time moving in. He snickered as he flashed the switchblade and circled it like a serpent’s tongue. He watched what was left of her nerves go to pieces like rotten cloth. “Do it quick, hunter,” she whispered. “Please do it quick.” “What’s that, baby?” “I’m tired running. Kill me first. Beat me after. They won't know the difference.” “I’m gonna bruise and beat you,” he said. “Kill me first,” she begged. “I don’t want — ” She began to cry. She cried right up in his face, her wide eyes un- blinking, and her mouth open. “You got bad blood, baby,” he snarled. He laughed but it didn’t sound like him and something was wrong with his belly. It was knotting up. by Bryce Walton

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“BacL I know! So get it over with, please. Hurry, hurry.” She was small and white and quivering. She moaned but kept staring up at Jiim. He ripped off his rivet- studded belt and swung once, then groaned and shuffled away from her. He kept backing toward the door. She crawled after him, begging and clutching with both arms as she wriggled forward on her knees. “Don't run. Please. Kill me! It'll be someone else if you don't. Oh, God, I’m so tired waiting and running!” “I can't,” he said, and sick- ness soured in his throat. “Please.” “I can’t, I can't!” He turned and ran blindly, half-fell down the cracking stairs. DOCTOR Burns, head of the readjustment staff at the Youth Center, studied Wayne with abstract interest. “You enjoyed the hunt, Se- ton? You got your kicks?” “Yes, sir.” “But you couldn't execute them?” “No, sir.” “They're undesirables. In- curables. You know that, Se- ton?” “Yes, sir.” “The psycho you only wounded. He's a five-times murderer. And that girl killed her father when she was twelve. You realize there’s nothing can be done for them? THE RECRUIT That they have to be execut- ed?” “I know.” “Too bad,” the doctor said. “We all have aggressive im- pulses, primitive needs that must be expressed early, purged. There’s murder in all of us, Seton. The impulse shouldn’t be denied or sup- pressed, but educated. The state used to kill them. Isn't it better all around, Seton, for us to do it, as part of growing up? What was the matter, Seton?” “I — felt sorry for her.” “Is that all you can say about it?” “Yes, sir.” The doctor pressed a buzz- er. Two men in white coats entered. “You should have got it out of your system, Seton, but now it’s still in there. I can't turn you out and have it erupt later — and maybe shed clean innocent blood, can I?” “No, sir,” Wayne mumbled. He didn’t look up. “I'm sorry I punked out.” “Give him the treatment,” the doctor said wearily. “And send him back to his mother.” Wayne nodded and they led him away. His mind screamed still to split open some prison of bone and lay bare and breathing wide. But there was no way out for the trapped. Now he knew about the old man and his poker- playing pals. They had all punked out. Like him, END 105

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IF • Novelette Rumor said devils lived in the cave. The truth was even more appalling! ALL THAT EARTHLY REMAINS BY C. C. MACAPP ILLUSTRATED BY GAUGHAIN BREATHING a little heavi- ly in the Andean air, and still dazed at the urgency with which he had been whisked southward (via jet bomber), Dr. Luis Craig walked across packed earth to- ward a powerful-looking heli- copter which, he had just been told, was to take him on the last leg of his trip. He lis- tened tiredly to the unctuous words of his escort, a Lieu- tenant Rabar who wore the uniform of this Latin Ameri- can nation’s Air Force and who was to fly the helicopter. Shouts erupted behind them, at the edge of the field. Some- thing snarled at his left ear. The sound was familiar, though not recently so : the crack of a rifle. He hit the dirt. Another bullet came search- ing, but now the shouts got themselves organized into crisp Spanish. Sidearms and at least two automatic weap- ons blatted. There were no more rifle shots. Cautiously, he raised his head to look at the knot of uniformed men where the sniper had been. Rabar stepped forward, of- fering a hand. “Are you all right, Doctor?” Craig ignored the hand and got up without help. “Quite, thank you.” He had disliked Rabar from the moment of in- troduction ; and now it was in his mind that Rabar had stepped carefully away from him before the first bullet came.

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As casually as he could, he walked to the aluminum lad- der hung upon the helicop- ter’s side and hauled himself up. He stopped in the hatch, dignity forgotten, startled at the disparity of the three men already in the ship. IRECTLY across the cab- in sat a gaunt scarecrow of a man in a black priest’s hassock. An oxygen mask dan- gled on his thin chest, sug- gesting a bloated crucifix. The long, swarthy face was pockmarked, dour and without animation at the moment, ex- cept for fierce black eyes that burned steadily into Craig’s own. Craig thought of a con- dor, perched near some nearly r*cady meal. He was immedi- ately ashamed of the thought. Forward of the priest sat a brown Indian. His face mir- rored dignified resignation to being carried in this hellish contraption to horrible death, or worse. Occupying the only seat on the hatch side was a tautly uniformed man who eyed Craig coldly. The priest spoke. His voice was deep and gently strong, caressing the Spanish sylla- bles like a great soft bell. “We are abject, Doctor. We had tried very hard... but there are fanatics.” “Eh?” said Craig. “Oh. Well, I am unhurt, as you can »» see. “For which, thanks to the Almighty. Our humblest apol- ALL THAT EARTHLY REMAINS ogies. You speak Spanish ex- ceptionally well, Doctor." Wondering if there were a question behind the compli- ment, Craig said, “My mother was Mexican.” He did not think it necessary to add that he’d grown up near the border, and had once spent two years as an exchange Professor of Physics at the Mexican uni- versity. The priest nodded once. “I see. It was thoughtful of your government to choose you. And more than kind of you to come. But, forgive me; the shooting has made me forget my manners. This — ” indicat- ing the uniformed man — “is General Noriega.” He laid a hand on the shoulder of the Indian. “And this one prefers to answer to the name Dien- tes.” Craig looked at the brown face with interest. Archeology was one of his hobbies, and in this part of the world... ‘Dientes’ was Spanish for ‘teeth,’ he mused. Abruptly, under his gaze, the immobile face split into a wide nervous smile revealing the source of the nickname. They were large, even and very white. “And I,” the priest was say- ing, “am called Father Bru- lieres. Won’t you seat your- self?” Craig tensed in surprise. The name Brulieres had been very much in the news of late. A priest by that name had led the movement which put the present government in power 107

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— and was still reputedly, the man who actually ran it. Craig realized he was still perched awkwardly halfway into the cabin. Mumbling something, he squeezed his bulky mountain gear through the hatch and took the empty seat beside the priest. RABAR came in, closing the hatch behind him, and went forward to the pilot’s seat. He glanced around at his passengers. It seemed to Craig that he was more interested in faces than in the condition of seat belts. Rabar worked at switches and buttons. Engines coughed, then roared. From overhead came the rising “whoosh” of the vanes. The craft shivered and lifted. They went on oxygen at once, and Craig, under the eyes of the other passengers, was glad to put the breather over at least part of his face. Imitating the others he pulled down the earflaps of his hel- met. It seemed to have built- in radio, as he could hear Rabar advising them to strap in. A moment later, clearing his throat, he discovered that his breather contained a mike. He was surprised at such ad- vanced electronics here. They were quickly closed in by mighty cliffs. Below them, a river tumbled wildly. Where it could find root-holds, fan- tastic greenery burgeoned, but it did little to disguise the menacing rock. The cabin’s 108 plastic windows gave all too clear a view. Turning from the window beside him, Craig found his eyes wandering to the insig- nia pinned to the priest’s has- sock. Of elegantly wrought gold, it was the same emblem he’d noticed on buildings, ve- hicles and other government property here. It looked like a set of football goalposts with the uprights moved in close together, leaving the crossbar extending to the sides. The priest caught his look and gave him what might be intended for a smile. “You wonder about our emblem? It represents the Church and State standing — what is the expression in your own lan- guage?— ‘four-square’ togeth- er.” “Oh.” Craig realized that the symbol was simply a cross with two posts instead of onS. He felt a little annoyed. His own government had told him enough to make him eager to come on this job, but they’d also warned him emphatically not to discuss politics or re- ligion. He supposed the Unit- ed States needed friends wherever they could be found, but a dictatorship wasn’t his notion of a good alternative to Bolshevism. He realized that the warn- ing had point. He didn’t know how ruthless these people might be, but the shooting back at the airfield hadn’t been any game of marbles. For that matter, the whole coun- by C. C. MacApp

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try, or what he’d seen of it, had an armed-camp air. He decided the thing to do was to concentrate on the sci- entific reason for his visit, and now was as good a time to start as any. He leaned toward Brulieres, then realized that wasn’t necessary. “Er — are you at liberty to tell me any- thing about the explosion?” Brulieres eyed him for a moment, and again there v/as the hint of a smile. “We could hardly be secretive with you, Doctor. You are the expert. How much were you told?” “Just that there’d been a nuclear explosion of unknown origin. They said there was something spectacular about it.” “Spectacular? Si! Your gov- ernment was gracious enough to accept our request for tech- nical help without demanding details. Security is very diffi- cult, as you comprehend.” Brulieres looked absent for a moment. “The explosion oc- curred at a spot famous in pre-Christian legends, which is why friend Dientes accom- panies us. He is considered experto ” The intense eyes turned upon the Indian, with a hint of mischief. “Not that he fails to be a good Christian as well.” The Indian crossed himself nervously. “The explosion,” Brulieres went on, “seems to have un- covered some very ancient tunnels. We wish to explore them, but we felt we needed a ALL THAT EARTHLY REMAINS nuclear physicist along. Es- pecially since there appears the possibility that the ex- plosion originated from the tunnels.” Craig heard Noriega clear his throat. Brulieres glanced at Noriega. “It has also been suggested,” the priest said, “that the uncovering of the tunnels is coincidental, and that the explosion was of for- eign origin.” Craig thought that over, and was annoyed. “That does not seem likely,” he said, a lit- tle stiffly. “Nobody is tossing live warheads around.” Noriega spoke for the first time. His voice was crisp and rather high. “You can perhaps speak for your own nation, Doctor Craig; but others too possess missiles.” Brulieres interposed, “You no doubt know, Doctor, that a communist putsch very nearly took over this country. The present government has been compelled to very strict meas- ures against a further attempt. Therefore we are not popular with the communist nations.” Craig waved a hand impa- tiently. “Yes, I know that, but. . .” He realized he was be- ing careless. “I only wish to approach my investigation with an open mind. You say the tunnels were ancient? In- can, perhaps?” Brulieres shook his head slowly. “They were hardly ca- pable of anything on this scale. One cannot speak so surely of those who preceded 109

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the Incas in this place.” Craig pondered, and felt his pulse move faster. “How much have you learned so far?” “What can be seen from the air. We will be the first to land, if you decide it is safe.” II THEY rose with the can- yon, and its upper ram- parts began to display patches of snow. Ahead loomed solid whiteness. They strained up- ward and emerged over a snowfield glaring white in the sun, its jagged peaks casting crisp blue shadows. The cop- ter’s own shadow danced along beneath them like a crazy gnat. They aimed for a cluster of five or six peaks dominating everything else. D i e n t e s, twisting nervously in his seat, mumbled something about “puesto de los demo ni os .” They flew between two of the peaks and were in a basin formed by the roughly circu- lar cluster. Zero ground of the explo- sion was as obvious as an ugly dark blotch on white cloth. Snow had been melted away from an oblong area on the inner slope of one peak, leav- ing naked rock. Craig stared at what lay revealed. A plateau was carved out of the mountainside, so flat and so precisely oval that there wasn’t an instant’s doubt that it was artificial. The uphill wall was vertical, following exactly the curve of the el- lipse. The wall was in shadow, but Craig could make out the five black tunnel mouths, all of a shape and evenly spaced. He let out his breath in a grunt as he remembered that this was a blast area and that they were getting close. Hast- ily, he unhooded one of the in- struments, his fingers awk- ward with excitement. He watched the dial. No serious radiation yet. Rabar looked at him, and he nodded his head to indicate they could go clos- er. The radiation increased a little but was still mild. He pondered. The blast had been very clean, and of a low order, melting the snow without even scarring the rock. Ap- parently it had occurred not far above the surface and over the center of the plateau. He didn’t know of any existing warheads that fit the explo- sion, nor could he believe that either intent or coincidence had placed the blast so exact- ]y- The copter was hovering now, the other passengers watching him silently. He met Rabar’s eyes, and glanced away, uncomfortable. If the priest’s eyes reminded him of a vulture’s, then Rabar’s made him think of a wolf’s. They had an odd yellowish tinge, and were at one time alert and devoid of expression. Craig couldn’t know where the man fit into things, but he didn’t by C. C. MacApp 110

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ring true as a simple pilot. Craig needed no diagrams drawn for him, so far as his own position went. In the first place, the opposition might assassinate him simply to embarrass the government. On the - other hand, if he seemed to stand in the way of Noriega’s project of making political capital of the explo- sion, and if Noriega represent- ed a strong faction in the gov- ernment, that faction might think it worth while to let something happen to him and blame it on the communists. But the hottest potato of all would be whatever he learned at the spot of the explosion. He could imagine all sorts of fabulous things. So would others, and some of them would go to considerable lengths to know. AN instrument, dangled at the end of a line, showed no bad radiation, so Craig said they could land. When he stood on the pla- teau the tunnel mouths seemed like converging black stares. Nevertheless he itched to explore. Impatiently, he led the unloading and stack- ing of his equipment. When that was done the group stood for a minute, evi- dently all feeling the awe Craig did. Dientes was first to break the silence, muttering something under his breath. Brulieres fixed the Indian with a look that was not en- tirely severe. “Christian pray- ALL THAT EARTHLY REMAINS ers, hi jo, if you please.” He turned to Craig. “What can be learned where we stand?” “I should be able to deter- mine the type of explosion. I will have to take rock sam- ples, and set up some appa- ratus.” “How long will that re- quire?” “Less than an hour, with luck.” Brulieres was thoughtful for a while. “In that case, I believe we shall begin recon- noitering the tunnels while you work. But first, let us hear from our expert in dem- onology.” Dientes squirmed guiltily in his mountain clothing. “I know only what the old tales say, Padre.” “Tell us, if you please. We will decide later whether you have been guilty of paganis - mo .” “Si, Padre. This place is the home of the Fire Devils. There is no question of the fact. It is precisely as described when I was a small boy sitting at the feet of los viejos .” “Well, then. What manner of devils were they?” “Creatures of fire, Padre, such that the eye could not be- hold without being blinded. Brighter than the sun.” “Did they make war upon your people?” “Those who approached this place were punished with spears of fire. It is told that in ancient times, they were of- ten seen flying through the 111

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sky, trailing long tails of white feathers. Sometimes they visited the villages, de- manding strange things and frightening the people.” “Do the stories mention these tunnels ?” “No, Padre. The Fire Devils lived beneath the snow. They were seen to vanish into it.” “Without melting it?” “They could turn off their fire, perhaps. In any event, Padre, who knows what is pos- sible with demons?” iC T know that you need and -®-will receive many hours of strict Christian instruction. How is it that men returned to tell of these things if the devils pursued them with spears of fire?” “Some escaped.” “Is it definitely told of in- dividuals who were killed?” Dientes looked thoughtful, and . disappointed. “I do not recall the names of any who were slain.” “Bah. Why have there been no reports in recent years?” Dientes shrugged. “Quien sake? Perhaps the arrival of the true religion has driven away the devils.” “Perhaps,” said Brulieres, the corners of his mouth lift- ing slightly. He turned toward the tunnels. “I think, General, that I will ask you and the lieutenant to explore a little way into one of the tunnels. Come out at once if you see anything that might be dan- gerous.” Craig opened his mouth to protest, but held back the words. He did ache to get into the tunnels, but he wasn’t a free agent here. He watched as the two uniformed men disap- peared into the middle tunnch Their flashlights were quickly lost as they rounded some turn in the tunnel. Brulieres said to Dientes, “The doctor and I must take some samples of the rock. Will you be good enough to remain here and guard the helicop- ter?” He laid his hand on the Indian’s shoulder. “I see that you are not comfortable in your helmet. You may remove it if you wish. We will call to you if we need you.” Craig realized Brulieres wanted to talk to him alone. He went with the priest. The Indian squatted, apparently quite comfortable without his oxygen. “He is used to high altitudes,” Brulieres re- marked. “You or I could hard- ly remain conscious here. I wished to talk to you, Doctor.” “About what, Padre?” Craig felt a little awkward with the title. “About certain things in our country of which you do not approve.” Craig hesitated. “I... am here on a scientific mission.” “Nevertheless, you have ideas in the field of politics? I hope we can be frank with each other.” “Well... I have no inten- tion of being critical. As you know, we — that is, in the by C. C. MacApp 112

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United States the Church is separate from the govern- ment:” The corners of Brulieres’ mouth quirked. “What you mean, perhaps, is that you do not understand how the Church can support a totali- tarian government. Oh, do not protest; the facts are obvious. We have been called worse names than ‘totalitarian/ You do not think it right that the Church should take up actual arms.” “I — yes. Since you put it into words. We have a differ- ent concept of religion.’, THE priest nodded slowly. “Si. Once I visited your land. In a way, I envied the priests there. Here, we have had more to contend with than the christening of fat babies and listening to trifling sins of appetite. We are in the front line of battle.” Craig said stiffly, “Do you mean a spiritual battle, or an ideological one?” This time Brulieres nearly smiled. “Are you so certain, then, that they are not the same battle?” Damn it, thought Craig, I know better than to argue with a priest. He did not an- swer for a minute. Brulieres said gently, “Please forgive me if I am too direct. You do not believe that Evil is a real force?” Craig could not meet the penetrating eyes. The old doubt edged into his mind: what if he’s right and I am wrong? What if there is a personal God? He pushed the thought away, telling himself as he always did that it was just the exposure he’d suf- fered before he was old enough to think for himself. He said, “I’m a scientist, Pa- dre.” “But not, unless I misjudge you, an atheist?” “I call myself an agnostic, if you must classify me. I rec- ognize the possibility of some force behind life and mind. I do not believe in a God who is a man with a beard. Nor do I believe in a Devil with hooves and horns.” Brulieres nodded again,* “We are not so far apart as you may suppose, Doctor. My- self, I have always thought that one who claimed perfect^ faith without the trace of a doubt, was either an idiot or a liar. God surely has his rea- sons for not removing all doubt. In any case I wish to make my position clear to you. It was not happily that I took up what weapons were at hand. Had I the choice, I would choose quite different- ly.” He eyed Craig directly for a moment. “The battle is very real and very clear to me, Doctor. I have done what I must. I hope you will be- lieve that.” Craig’s skeptical mind told him that this was just a play for a good press when Craig got home. His emotions though, by C. C. MacApp 114

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wouldn’t go along. They cried out that he was looking upon sincerity. Ill THE first tests confirmed what Craig had already presumed ; that the explosion had been absolutely clean. What radiation existed had originated from molecules in the rock itself or in the vapor- ized snow. There was no way of guess- ing at the type of blast; he only knew that mass had been transformed virtually one hundred per cent into energy in a very short period of time. No process Craig knew even approached it. He stared again at the tun- nel mouths. He was sure now that something had come out of them, risen about seven hundred feet above the pla- teau and released the blast. He trembled with eagerness to get inside, danger or no. He had turned impatiently to Brulieres, when some- where deep in the tunnels, shouting broke out. Two pistol shots echoed hollowly. There was a clatter of run- ning footsteps. Craig found his right hand fumbling at his hip, and felt foolish. He hadn’t carried a sidearm since Korea. Lieutenant Rabar burst the tunnel, stumbling in the sunlight, his face contorted. He ran straight across the plateau and threw himself ALL THAT EARTHLY REMAINS over the edge. Dientes, who had jumped to his feet, was only a step behind him. Craig, eyes fastened on the tunnel, realized vaguely that the two must have landed in deep snow, since there was no sound of their falling. A glow appeared in the tun- nel. Craig fought the panic that seized him ; stood his ground and was aware of Bru- lieres beside him. The glow brightened. Its source came into sight-^- a ball of dazzling brilliance, oval and about the size of a man’s torso. It emerged into sunlight and Craig saw that it was solid. It looked like in- candescent metal, but he somehow felt that it wasn’t hot. It seemed to move at will and to hover without support. It acted alive. It moved a little way toward Craig and Brulieres, then stopped. A tentative rumble came from it, like the begin- ning of thunder. Something like a tentacle lifted, clutch- ing an object that resembled a flashlight. A blinding lance of heat shot from the object and struck the rock a few yards in front of the two men. A sound came from the rock like ice pressed upon a hot stove. Smoke puffed upward. The beam lasted only an instant, but it left a long curved scar in the rock. The thing rumbled again, and flashed so brightly Craig threw an arm over his eyes, and heard his own voice cry 115

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out wordlessly. His legs tensed to run, but something about the behavior of the thing held him where he was. It seemed unsure of itself, and not really threatening. When he looked up again, it was moving laterally and up the face of the wall. He saw the flashlight-like object on the ground where it had evi- dently been dropped. THE oval thing, no longer glowing, lifted fast to- ward the mountain top. He saw that it was metal, not rusted or corroded but dull with age, and he saw the tv/o ragged holes near the middle of it. He strained his eyes for more detail but it grew tiny in the distance and he saw no joints and no protuberances other than the one tentacle. He lost it in the shadows of the mountain’s brow, then saw it flash momentarily in the sun as it curved up and over. After a moment he turned dazedly toward Brulieres. But before he could say anything there was a sun-dimming flash of light from beyond the mountain. The ground danced. Sound, echoing from the oth- er peaks and battering its way through the solid rock of the mountain, beat about them like monstrous punishing wings. As the vast thunder dwin- dled away, Craig, squinting, saw a tenuous, rapidly dim- ming mushroom cloud tower above the peak. He flinched, but knew that this would be another clean explosion. Most of the cloud was steam. He was sure they were seeing a re-enactment of the blast which had cleared this pla- teau. His mind worked in simple patterns: the thing was de- stroyed ; it had dropped its weapon. He started toward the tun- nel mouth, but he had hesitat- ed too long. Brulieres, moving very agilely, was ahead of him. The priest picked up the weapon and turned toward Craig. Craig, still befuddled, wondered mildly at his own detached state of mind: is he going to kill me; I’d love to get that weapon home to the labs ; so that’s how he keeps warm. (The latter in reference to the heavy underwear he’d glimpsed beneath the priest’s cassock as the padre bent over). But Brulieres’ voice was mild. “Please forgive me for taking possession of this, Doctor. Later, I hope, you will be able to examine it; but I must think first of my own responsibilities.” He looked at the thing briefly, started to stow it in some fold of his gown, then hesitated. As if unable to resist the tempta- tion, he aimed it at the rock wall and put his thumb on something. The incandescence squirted out. The rock cried out and yielded up a curl of smoke. 116 by C. C. MacApp

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Brulieres turned the thing off at once and turned back to Craig with an expression half guilty, half delighted, like a child with a forbidden toy. Then he sighed and put the weapon away. Craig had observed what de- tails he could. The thing was an inch or a little more in di- ameter, perhaps ten inches long. All except one tip was dull and apparently knurled to give a good grip. The tip looked like quartz or some crystal, translucent except the end, which was darkly transparent when not emitting the beam. The trigger was ap- parently a spot of different color on the body, over which the thumb could be pressed. Craig thought of the energy stored in that slender cylin- der, the necessary insulation, the efficiency of whatever system was used to direct and control the beam. He felt a chill shiver of awe. Then an- other thought struck him and he looked wide-eyed at Bru- lieres. “A flaming sword 1” Brulieres gave him a quick glance, and nodded. ‘‘Primi- tives might describe it so.” RABAR climbed back into sight at the edge of the plateau, looking pale. A mo- ment later Dientes poked his head into view. ‘‘Where is the general?” Brulieres demanded. “Muerto,” said Fabar shaki- ly, “in the tunnel. The crea- ture killed him.” The priest’s face twitched. “Who shot at it?” “The general, Padre. He had the only gun.” Brulieres sighed. “Then that is why he is dead. The creature would not have harmed him.” Craig had the same idea. It had used the weapon more as if in bluff, and had apparent- ly carefully gone beyond the mountain to die. He wondered if the two bullet-holes had killed it. But how many more of the creatures (or machines) wait- ed in the turmels? He looked at Brulieres. “Are we going in?” “By all means. Unless we are s t o p p e d.” The priest looked thoughtful. “They may be coming out of hibernation or something like it. Can you tell how old this plateau is?” “Not without taking sam- ples to a geological labora- tory. Perhaps not even then, with accuracy. But I would say, some thousands of years.” Rabar was not happy at re- entering the tunnel, but set his jaw and came. Craig stood aside to let the lieutenant go ahead of him. Rabar hesitat- ed, then stepped by. Dientes, crossing himself and mutter- ing, evidently preferred com- ing a'ong to being left alone outside. He followed Craig. Brulieres swept his flash- light along the tunnel walls, revealing a turn ahead. They rounded it. After a little way it seemed to Craig that the ALL THAT EARTHLY REMAINS 117

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flashlight dimmed. Then he realized that there was other light in the tunnel ; the arched ceiling was aglow. It got brighter and Brulieres turned off his flashlight. “Evidently,” he said, “we are expected. Have you no- ticed the air?” Craig had not, but he did now; it was warm and the pressure was higher than out- side. “One moment,” he said, puzzled. He went back to the mouth of the tunnel. As he stepped outside, he felt a gen- tle resistance as if some force were pushing him into the tunnel. He re-entered, and felt warmth radiating from the ceiling. He rejoined the oth- ers. THE floor of the tunnel sloped up gently for a while, then leveled, then turned downward. The walls were vertical and perfect, with a smooth glazed look. The ceiling curved from wall to wall in a perfect arc. There was room for two men to walk side by side by crowding. Craig walked a little behind Dientes. Soon he took off his oxygen mask and breathed normally. He would have liked to re- move his jacket, but there were too many things in the pockets to spill out. He had counted one hun- dred seven paces when the tunnel turned again. It was just beyond the turn that they found Noriega’s body, 118 The tunnel branched here; or at least, a narrower tunnel angled up and off from each side. These tunnels were dark, and, Craig found, cold and with low air pressure. The same mild resistance guarded their mouths. The General lay sprawled loosely just inside the right-hand branch, his head and torso in shadow. He looked simply and peacefully dead. “Will you lend me a hand, Lieutenant?” Brulieres said. The two of them dragged Noriega into the light. Craig could see no burns nor any other kind of wound except an abrasion on one cheek which might have re- sulted from a fall. He started to ask Rabar exactly what had happened, but checked him- self. Better not appear sus- picious. He wondered what had hap- pened to the general’s pistol, and began to look around for it. But again Brulieres was ahead of him. The priest was eighteen or twenty yards far- ther into the tunnel, picking up something. It was the pis- tol. It went into the cloak as the heat-weapon had. Craig was watching Rabar and he thought the man looked disconcerted. Craig thought, How’s this for a theory: Rabar killed Noriega, took his pistol and started up the tunnel. Maybe he just wanted to learn for himself what was in the mountain, or maybe he planned to murder by C. C. MacApp

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the rest of the party and make it look like an accident. He met the glowing creature, panicked, put two bullets into it, then dropped the gun and ran. Craig wondered if the priest shared his doubts about Ra- bar; but if he did, he didn't show it. The priest was al- ready starting on. Craig lost count of his steps, but judged they'd gone over a quarter of a mile when the tunnel took a final right- angle turn and opened into a great high-domed chamber. IV IMMEDIATELY all ques- tion as to the nature of this place vanished. It could only be a military base. There's something recogniz- able about weapons, Craig mused, no matter how unfa- miliar. Here were gathered great vehicles of war, bris- tling with the outsize cousins of the heat-tube Brulieres car- ried and with a myriad oth- er menacing shapes. Yawn- ing black tunnels led away at angles — probably, Craig thought, to hidden exits. Re- pair machines, some with their work partly finished, were scattered everywhere, silent and with a long-unused air about them. Nearly all of the aerial dreadnaughts (Craig was sure they were that) showed terrible wounds. The group stared about the chamber in silent awe. ALL THAT EARTHLY REMAINS At one place, beneath a trio of round tunnels that aimed steeply upward, was what Craig took to be the main launching area, with ramps for loading. . .what? The lit- ter showed clearly where great ships had rested, and that the departure had been hasty. Craig drew in deep trembling breaths and imag- ined the vast alien argosies lifting upon their mysterious legs of force. He could see the avarice in Rabar’s eyes, and edged clos- er to the lieutenant. He wasn't going to let the man overpow- er Brulieres and take the weapons, nor was he going to let him pick up any that might be lying around. Not that Brulieres was being care- less. Craig noticed that he kept his distance from every- body, and did not turn his back for long. They must have stared at the alien machines for quite a while before the priest's deep voice echoed in the chamber. “Come. Another tunnel beck- ons." Craig looked where the priest pointed. He saw a tun- nel like the one they’d left, about a quarter of the way around the chamber. It glowed with light. All the rest were dark. He looked again at Bru- lieres, and was startled at the man's face. It wore a look of glory. Craig shivered. Why, he thought, the man thinks God arranged this for him. 119

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Apparently someone was ar- ranging things, unless the tun- nels and the lights were com- pletely robotic. Craig, ignor- ing the edge of panic that cut at him, followed the priest to- ward the entrance to the light- ed tunnel. It was short, with two bends in it (probably, Craig thought, to contain possible explo- sions). It opened into a small- er, lower-ceilinged chamber which had evidently been an assembly hall for troops, or possibly a mess hall. Dark openings led off it which might lead to barracks. In the far end, a single tunnel glowed with light. They entered that tunnel, which was another short one, and found that they were in- deed in the living quarters. These, if the analogies ap- plied, had been the officers’. There was a small assembly hall, and upon one wall of that were the pictures. TTHE lighting was arranged to fall mostly upon that side of the chamber. The rock had been smoothed to take the murals. The first glimpse shook Craig so that he walked mechanically toward that wall, momentarily forgetting his companions. A part of his mind admired the basic technique. Outlines in low relief had been cut into the rock, details delicately etched in and colors brought up, apparently, bv altering the composition of the rock itself. 120 As for the style it was some- where between realism and impressionism. Craig was no expert, but he thought the hand was defter, the view- point more penetrating, than any he’d ever seen. The slight alien air only increased the charm of the work. Whatever sort of beings the aliens had been, they hadn’t been an unfeeling race. Emo- tion leaped from every line of the murals. The first few told concise- ly of the establishment on Earth of this outpost, of the local defeat and abandonment. There were some heroic scenes there, but Craig hur- ried through them, drawn to the next series of paintings, yet unwilling to turn his eyes to them. They were Biblical and as stunningly familiar as if he’d lived with them all his life. Feeling churned at his in- sides again. One of the first immortal- ized Noah, or whoever had been the actual hero of the first version of the Flood story. The painting of the sea and the dark doomsday clouds over it was so real that Craig took a step backward. Moun- tainous wave masses were bat- tered white by an incredible rain. Heaved aslant, decks tumbling water, dwarfed by the seas, was the wooden ship. A few half-drowned domestic animals stared in terror, lashed to their pens on deck. The bearded man who stood by C. C. MacApp

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on wide-planted giant’s legs, rope-like fingers gripping a tiller that strained to escape, was bedraggled but staunch and muscled to meet the sea. A woman clung to one arm. She had been painted not deli- cately, but with a strong beau- ty that spoke in thunder of the artist’s piercing compas- sion. There was the crossing of the Red Sea, and the painting showed clearly how some force held aside the water. The artist had evidently been fascinated by the still-pud- dled seabottom. There were more, but Craig passed them, drawn like a fish on a line to the painting of the man on the cross. The body, more cruelly punished than the Bible recorded, strained in an agony that com- municated itself to Craig’s own. The face, twisted with pain, sagging with exhaustion, the torured soft brown eyes, held no bitterness, no accusa- tion. The accusation was the painting itself. The bitterness and rage (and remorse?) was the painter’s own. CRAIG, frightened and mis- erable, looked at the oth- ers. Dientes showed only awe and humility. Rabar was hold- ing himself tautly, but terror showed in his eyes. Brulieres shook with overflowing emo- tions, his face mirroring wor- ship, glory, worry and doubt. He met Craig’s eyes. His voice ALL THAT EARTHLY REMAINS higher-pitched and cracked with feeling, he said, “Have you noticed — this?” He was standing before a vertical slab of rough stone which had obviously been used to close up a tunnel. The sealing had been done with melted rock, roughly, leaving a groove around the edge. The job suggested haste. Craig’s insides writhed at what might lie behind the slab. He gripped himself, walked over beside the priest. He could make out only a few of the characters of the inscrip- tion burned into the slab. He heard his own voice asking, as if from far away, “Do... you read Hebrew?” Brulieres let out a trem- bling sigh. “With difficulty.” He moved slowly closer to the slab, put his fingers to the in- scription like a blind man feeling for Braille. Craig saw that his eyes were full of tears. The thin lips mumbled inaudibly. After a long time Brulieres quit reading and stood there, unmoving. Then he started to speak. His voice was lifeless now, a low uncaring mono- tone. “Scholars will translate it better, but here is the gist of it.” TO THE DESCEND- ANTS OF THOSE WITH WHOSE DESTI- NY I HAVE BRIEFLY MEDDLED: WHEN YOU READ THIS, YOU WILL HAVE A T- 121

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TAINED A TECHNOL- OGY OF YOUR OWN WHICH WILL BE ABLE TO MAKE USE OF THE DEVICES LEFT HERE. ASIDE FROM THEM I LEAVE YOU MY GOOD WISH- ES, MY APOLOGIES, AND MY LOVE. WHEN MY RACE ABANDONED THIS PLACE I HID FROM THEM AND STAYED BEHIND BECAUSE I HAD FALLEN IN LOVE WITH YOUR PLANET AND YOUR RACE. I HAVE TRIED TO HELP YOU. I AM NOT SURE I HAVE DONE WELL. LOOK UPON MY RE- MAINS IF YOU WILL. Craig gripped the priest’s arm, heard his own words tumbling out: “It proves nothing, Padre! There can still be a God!” He found that he meant it desperately. The priest turned, stared at him, then looked faintly amused. “Conviction? Now? You are a more fortunate man than I.” “No, Padre! Your work! Religion is deeper than...” Brulieres’ eyes flashed with some of their old vitality. “My work? This is the God in whose name I have schemed and, Heaven help me, killed.” Slowly, mechanically, Bru- lieres drew the heat-weapon from his garments. He aimed it at the groove around the slab and thumbed the trigger. The rock skirled, and ran to solidify in waxlike lumps. The smoke was acrid in Craig’s nostrils. When the slab was mostly cut around, some inner seal gave way and air sucked loud- ly into the crack. With a wrenching sound, the slab tore loose. It tilted under some power of its own, and lowered itself to the floor. Lights, harshly angled and dramatic, flashed on in the small room beyond. It was bare except for the stone plat- form on he floor, and what rested upon it. Mechanically, Craig stepped in and moved aside to make room for the others. Brulieres went to the opposite side of the platform and Dientes crouched beside him. Rabar stood hesitantly in the door- way. THE creature was larger than a man and like noth- ing earthly; many-limbed, built as if for a higher grav- ity. There was no apparent de- composition or dessication. The atmosphere of the cham- ber had evidently been chosen to preserve. There was still a pungent, half-unpleasant smell, being rapidly drawn away through ducts in the ceiling. There was a face of a sort, and two closed eyes. The face was rec- ognizably strong. The thing might have been called ugly, 122 by C. C. MacApp

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but Craig found a handsome- ness about it too. He recog- nized the drama with which the body was arranged and lighted, and somehow for this last small vanity he loved the creature even more. Dientes clutched at the priest’s robe. “It is a lie, Padre!” And, as the priest re- mained silent, Dientes turned desperate eyes to Craig. “Mother of God! Will no one say it is a lie?” Craig felt emotionally de- pleted. Inside him were a sick regret and a hollowness where something had died, but cold reason remained. If there is no God, he thought, we’re just in- telligent animals, and we’re free to live by our wits. If there is no God, then there is no Devil either. He pondered that. . .and de- cided with grim amusement ★★★★★★★★ that there was Devil enough. And, in any event, there were needs and desires, friends and enemies. He stepped swiftly around the alien and took the heat-weap- on from the priest’s limp fin- gers. He turned toward Rabar, who was (beyond any worth- while doubt) an enemy, and who was standing in the door- way with an annoying mock- ery in his eyes. Of course he’s happy, Craig thought; he’s a Bolshevik agent and an athe- ist. There’ll be damned little religion anywhere, now. He raised the weapon calm- ly, every nerve and muscle alert, like an animal ready for action. He watched the tri- umph fade from Rabar’s eyes. As his thumb felt unhesitat- ingly for the trigger, he watched the growth of fear. END Coming in the great September issue of IF — THE WINNING OF THE MOON by Kris Neville CULTURAL EXCHANGE A new Relief novelette by Keith Laumer Gripping cover novelette — THE SNOWBANK ORBIT by Fritz Leiber plus many other novelettes and short stories, features by Theo- dore Sturgeon, etc. There's plenty of great science-fiction read- ing coming in the next issue of IF — on sale July 12th — so ask your newsdealer to reserve your copy now! ALL THAT EARTHLY REMAINS 123

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IF • Short Story BY ROBERT SCOTT A Bad Town For Spacemen There was a reason why the city acted the way it did . . . and we were the reason! T stepped back out of the gut- ■“•ter and watched the tight clot of men disappear around the corner. They hadn’t really been menacing, just had made it obvious they weren’t going to break up. And that I had better get out of their way. I got. We were well trained. The neon of the bar across the street flickered redly on my uniform. I watched the slush trickle off my boots for a while, then made up my mind and headed into the bar. It was a mistake. New York had always been considered safe for us. Of course there were many parts of the country that were abso- lutely forbidden “for your own good” and others that were “highly dangerous” or at 124 least “doubtful.” But New York had always been a haven. The stares there had even been admiring sometimes, especial- ly in the beginning. But things had changed. I had realized that about half an hour after touchdown, when we were being herded through Health Check, Baggage Check, Security Check... you know the lot. Before, there had been friendly questions, genuine interest in the Mars colony, speculations about the second expedition to Venus, even a joke or two. This time the examiners’ only interest seemed to be in fouling us up as much as possible. And when we finally got through the rat race. New York was bleak. I should have stayed with

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the rest, I guess, and of course a public bar was the last place any smart spaceboy would have gone to. But I had some nice memories of bars, mem- ories from the early days. The whole room went silent, as though a tube had blown, when I shoved through the door. I got over to an empty table as quickly as I could and inspected the list of drinks on the dispenser. This one had a lot of big nickel handles stick- ing up over the drink names and the whole job was shaped like one of those beer kegs you used to see pictures of. What I mean is, this was an authentic bar. Phony as hell. FROM the way this sounds, you can guess the kind of mood I’d gotten in. The noise had picked up again right af- ter I sat down and some of the drunker drunks were knock- ing the usual words around, in loud whispers and with lots of glances at me. One of the pro- girls (her hair was green and her blouse covered her breasts — another change while I was out) gave me a big wink and then jabbed the man next to her and squawked with laugh- ter. I fed a bill into the change machine at the table and then dribbled several coins (prices had gone up too) into the dis- penser. I guess I must have had sev- eral, because after a while I began to feel cheerful. The noise that was coming out of the box in the corner started to sound like music, and I got to tapping and rocking. And smiling, I guess. And that’s what triggered it. People had been coming and going, but mainly coming. And the crowd at the bar had been getting louder, and one guy there had been getting louder than the rest. All of a sudden, he slammed down his glass and headed for my table. He orbited around it for a while, staring at me, and then settled jerkily down in the chair across from me. “Why all the hilarity, space- boy? Feeling proud of your- self?” He looked pretty wobbly and pretty soft and pretty old. And very angry. But I was kind of wobbly myself by that time. And anyway there are strict rules about us and vio- lence. Very strict. So I just tried to make the smile bigger and said, “I’m just feeling good. We had a good run and we brought in some nice stuff.” “Nice stuff,” he said, kind of mincing. “Buddy, do you know what you can do with your sandgems and your wind- stones?” “We brought back some oth- er things too. There was a good bit of uranium and — ” “We don’t need it!” He was getting purple. “We don’t need anything from you.” “And maybe we don’t need you.” I was getting sort of A BAD TOWN FOR SPACEMEN 125

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fired up myself. “Carversville is self-sufficient now. You can’t give us anything.” “Well, why the hell don’t you stay there? Why don’t all of you stay off Earth? There’s no place for you here.” I could have pointed out that we brought things that Earth really needed, that Mars and Venus had literally worlds of natural resources, while Earth had almost fin- ished hers. But he began to quiet down then and I began to feel the loneliness again, the sense of loss. You can’t go home again. . .that phrase kept poking around in my skull. Suddenly he sat up and looked straight at me, and his eyes really focused for the first time. “What lousy luck. What incredibly lousy luck. And how could anyone have known?” It wasn’t hard to peg what he was talking about. “It was probably good luck that the first space crew was selected the way it was,” I said. “Oth- erwise you’d have had a dead ship full of dead men and no knowing why. But that one man brought the ship back.” “Yeah, yeah. I know. And the scientists figured every- thing out. About radiation in space being lethal to almost all types of man. But there was one thing that made a man immune. One thing.” “The scientists tried to find a protective covering that would be practicable. They tried to synthesize slaves that would protect you. It wasn't our fault that they couldn’t.” “No, not your fault.” His eyes had begun to dull again. “Just a matter of enough melanin in the skin. That’s all...” Then he straightened up and slammed his fist on the table. “Damn you, did you know I was a jet pilot a long time ago? Did you know I was going to be one of the space pioneers? Open up brave new worlds for Man...” He sat there staring at me for a minute or so and the last thing he said was, “Don’t you come here again — nigger.” I got up and left the table and walked out of the bar. I wasn’t provoked. As I said be- fore, we were well trained. THE first time I realized where I was was when I bumped into the fence around the spacefield. I must have walked all the way over there from the bar. I had a memory of crumbling buildings and littered streets. Things had changed while I had been out there. They were letting the city run down. As I started to walk along the fence to the gate, I saw the ship towering against the stars. The stars and the ship. And tomorrow there would be colonists getting aboard. I stopped and looked till I knew where home was and who the real exiles were. I stopped feeling sorry for myself. And started feeling sorry for them. END 126 by Robert Scott

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HUE AND CRY The place where reader and editor meet . . • Dear Editor: The main purpose of my let- ter is to congratulate IF on its new format and story policy. But I beg to differ with Law- rence Crilly as regards to the Smith-Evans serial. (1) I real- ly believe that it was the worst SF novel I’ve ever read — at least in an SF magazine. (2) Mr. Crilly attributes this mon- strosity to the work of the Revered Ph.D. ; guess again, Lawrence! E. E. Smith couldn’t write that bad “fer love ner money.” Apart from that serial and Jim Harmon’s potboiler in the Jan. ish, IF is beginning to read like a good mag should, esp. the latest Anderson epic. Retief also outdid himself in March. I’m beginning to like this Laumer . . . T’anks also for the swell editorial in Volume 12 No. 1. I’d like to believe that my last year’s letter was the main rea- son for it. (Don’t say no!) Who in the deuce is John Pederson, Jr.? Never heard of him. But on the basis of his March cover, “that guy ain’t gonna be a nobody fer long!” Please ditch Mr. James Har- mon ; he makes a habit of pot- boilers. His The Place Where Chicago Was marred the fin- ish on an otherwise fine Feb. Galaxy. Ken Winkes Arlington, Washington * Attention, .Doc Smith — wherever in the 50 states you and your house trailer may 127

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be! How about writing in to set the record straight? — Editor. * * * Dear Publisher: The Paradise was in the moon. With one-sixth the gravity of Earth, men would never die. When Adam and Eve sinned they were sent to Earth. In six times the Moon’s gravity, they had to die. There is no other way to ex- plain the serpent’s crawling instead of moving from a standing-up position. Edmundo de la Cuera y Fourcade Mexico City, D.F. * * * Dear Editor: The fifteenth Annual West Coast Science-Fantasy Con- ference, the Westercon XV, will be held in the Hotel Alex- andria in Los Angeles on June 30th and July 1st, 1962. I would like to invite all your readers to join us in two days of exhibits, program events, parties, auctions and confabu- lations in the hotel that so well housed the Solacon. Our two-day program will center about the Saturday eve- ning banquet, featuring An- thony Boucher as Master of Ceremonies and Jack Vance as Guest of Honor. Mr. Vance is no stranger to fans, widely known as he is for such books as Big Planet , The Languages of Pao and The Dying Earth , and his most recent Galaxy appearance. The Moon Moth . $1.00 membership provides membership cards, progress reports and program book, ad- mission to all events and con- vention rates at the Alexan- dria. Send for membership or information now to: William B. Ellern, Treasurer, Wester- con XV, P O Box 54207, Ter- minal Annex, Los Angeles 54, California. Ron Ellik Los Angeles, Cal. * Okay, we will. Add one credit to Guest of Honor Vance’s long list. The Dragon Masters , a complete short novel coming up in next month’s Galaxy, and this fan’s nomination for one of the best stories of the year! — Editor * * * Dear Editor: For months everyone’s been crying about “the art” and “the cover.” The cover tells me I am buying IF SCIENCE FICTION — clearly — I don’t think I’m getting something else. Inside, I’m too fascinated to care about the “art” — and I’ve “known” all the writers for 20-30 years. Chin up ! H. J. Kitzmiller Cotati, California * * * Dear Editor : Your magazine has im- 1 28 HUE AND CRY

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proved. I get it irregularly here; however the January issue inspired me to write. I think a magazine should have a letter col. Masters of Space was very good. I only read the second part of the serial, however, since I missed the November issue. It was similar to all the other stories I had read by E. E. Smith — exciting and magni- ficent in scope. By the way, is E. E. Evans an alternative pseudonym of Smith? (Like Wyndham-Parkes ?) Brent Phillips Port-of-Spain, Trinidad * Not only is Evans not Smith’s pseudonym, but we Jon’t even think that Parkes is Wyndham’s! — Editor. |V * * * * Dear Editor: Here I am again! Since in my last letter I spent my space discussing features, I feel that I should now give my opinion on stories. First, the February Galaxy. Terrific issue! I sup- pose I’ll rate the serial high- est, since there’s something about a novel that really car- ries your interest and makes it seem all the better looking back. This especially is true of anything by Poul Ander- son, who ranks with Arthur C. Clarke in the skill of hold- ing readers’ attention — and I thank him for the fine space ballad. Second place goes to that lovely article of super- extrapolation, The Martian HUE AND CRY Stargazers. Please, more of the same. Then there was the Pohl-Kornbluth novella, a fast-moving, highly enjoyable, semi-serious comedy of errors. For a time when Earl Kemp and his ilk are complaining that there are no new ideas in sf, Galaxy and If hold an amazing number of totally new conceptions. I enjoyed the following two stories for this very reason: Shatter the Wall and The Place Where Chicago Was. Willy Ley’s ar- ticle was interesting, as usual. There were only three failures in the whole ish, each, sadly, by old pros. Edward Wellen wasn’t funny; Algis Budrys wasn’t coherent ; and Fritz Leiber was not very earth- shaking, nor was his story good enough to stand on its own. Still, Galaxy is doing very well. Now If, March 1962. The highlight was of course Kings Who Die. A good example of serious sf in If. Had Anderson given it a happy ending, he probably wouldn’t have gotten his point across. Another sur- prisingly good story was Ty- balt, which ended a bit abrupt- ly but was nicely written. Then there’s the inevitable Keith Laumer story. They’re fun, I suppose, and lot of peo- ple seem to like them, so go ahead and run them. . .as long as you limit yourselves to only one of this type of story per ish. Seven Day Terror was an amusing kid story — they’re 129

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nice to have now and then. The other three stories weren’t particularly great, but they’re chock full of new ideas and themes. Good months for both maga- zines. Paul Williams Belmont, Mass. * * * Dear Editor: I must say that I was flab- bergasted by Paul Williams’ letter in the March If. One of the best covers of the year on any sf mag was If’s September cover. Beautiful. And then came the November issue. What beauty anyone can see in ten different styles and sizes of type is beyond me. Not only that, but the art work petered out too. All you’re left with are “nothing” covers where before you had exciting, original ones. And I would lodge a stiff protest against the contents page. Why you ever changed it mystifies me completely. I would like to congratulate you, though, on the interior illos in the March issue. All of them are very, very good and a vast improvement over previous issues. (Whatever happened to Bernklau? I’d like to see him back.) Now to the stories. E Being and The Madman from Earth reflect your promise of more wonder in If. Both stories were excellent entertainment. Keith Laumer is great, his one clinker in this series being Gambler’s World. E Being was extremely original and well written — more like this. Kings Who Die was good but the writing seemed a little in- consistent. All things consid- ered, though, this story was good and it stayed interesting from beginning to end. Tybalt was fair but all the buildup just didn’t justify the ending. Dangerous Quarry was poor* It was fairly interesting at the beginning but it just didn’t say anything and was very poorly plotted. I cannot make up my mind which was worse — The Happy Homicide or Seven Day Ter- ror. These two stories repre- sent the lowest depths to which any magazine has ever sunk. Irwin Sternberg, Jr. Tucson, Arizona * Paul — meet Irwin. Irwin — meet Paul. Now you see how easy it is to put together a science-fiction magazine? All you have to do is print the kind of stories the readers write in to say they like! — Editor. * * * That’s the way the type sets for another issue. Say, you fel- lows who mention that you can’t get IF regularly on your stands — ever think of sub- scribing? That way you don’t have to worry about getting your copy; the Post Office takes care of it! — Editor. 130 HUE AND CRY

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