Part 62 (1/2)
The controller interrupted again: ”I repeat, you have given me almost all that I expected to receive. The first item I still want here is the destruction of all life within the Fortress. The second is information. Most of the information I sought here I have obtained, but a few data remain. To gain them I intend to observe your reaction when you learn the truth.”
This time Roquelaure paused for a longer time before he spoke. ”If you are bargaining for more-”
”The time for bargaining is past. I will now disclose the truth to you, that I may observe your reactions to it. The life-unit Prince Harivarman was calculating in error during its dealings with me. Yet it was closer to the truth than you have realized. A very important experiment has indeed been in progress here, concerning the means by which a dangerous opponent can be controlled, perhaps rendered totally harmless and ineffective, by nothing more than transmitted information. A control code, as you have termed it. I was able to convince the life-unit Harivarman that he was conducting such an experiment upon me.”
”I know that. All according to our agreement. I-”
”Even as I convinced you that you were bargaining successfully with me.”
There was silence. To that statement Prime Minister Roquelaure appeared to have no answer at all.
”The truth,” said the controller, ”is that I am the experimenter. You, like the life-unit Harivarman, are a subject. From the beginning I have been testing you and your fellow life-units. We that you call berserkers have long sought a control code for the life-units that call themselves humanity, particularly the more prominent leaders among them. It has been an exceedingly difficult search, and I must compute that the results so far are still uncertain. It is doubtful that any perfectly reliable code exists or can as yet be devised for the control of units of such complexity.
”Nevertheless, much information of great importance has been gained. What does a human life-unit seek that I can offer it? With a very high degree of probability, it seeks power over other life-units of the human type. Also, the motive called revenge must be cla.s.sed among the most powerful inducements.
Also greed, the affinity for wealth as measured in your systems of finance. Using the proper codes of information, I have been able to control you both.
”You, life-unit Roquelaure, have been a very valuable subject.”
The prime minister was only a second, perhaps two seconds, of fast movement away from being inside his fighter with the hatch slammed closed behind him. But he did not move. He whispered something.
Beatrix was unable to make it out; perhaps the berserker heard it and recorded it as information for study.
Around her in the room from which she watched, the feverish maneuvering of equipment was going on, still in a strained effort to maintain silence. The clang of tools or weapons, the tread of feet, might come traveling through the fabric of the airless outer Fortress corridors to alert the keen senses of the berserker to their presence. She yearned to grab the Superior General and make him tell her what was going on-but she did not dare distract him now.
The people who were making the effort with the gun and with the communications equipment did not appear to need her help. This is my job just now, she thought, looking at the screen. I am a witness.
The controller went on: ”My purpose from the beginning of this experiment, from the first indirect bargaining between your emissaries and mine, has been to measure what temptations of power may best serve as a control code for the badlife. To gain such information, the sacrifice of a number of machines, the tolerance of the continuance of many lives, has been very much worthwhile. Now I wish to observe your reaction to this information. Express your reaction to me.”
Roquelaure did not speak or move, and in a moment the berserker spoke again: ”It is very probable that you are the final fully aware human victim-that the remaining human life-units here on the Fortress will still be without understanding of the situation when I destroy them. And I have already observed the truth-reaction of the unit designated Prince Harivarman.”
At last the prime minister had found words. ”A control code. I see. All right, maybe you were playing that sort of a game. If so, you've won. But there's no reason why we can't conclude a bargain now. Now that you've studied our reactions. And I could still go through with-”
The berserker had evidently heard enough from its last subject. The screen flared brightly, almost dazzlingly in Beatrix's face. At the same instant light flared in from the corridor, leaping from a distance to wash around the newly positioned heavy gun. At the same instant the communication channel went silent.
But the small screen cleared again, almost at once, to show the berserker turning quickly. At last, in the flare of its own weapon, it had sensed the watchers' presence down the corridor.
It turned with weapon hatches opened, just in time to take the full charge of Colonel Phocion's cannon on the front surface of its upper body. When the small screen had cleared again, there were nothing but fragments of berserker to be seen.
The men around the communication connection were thrown into frenzied activity, but not yet of jubilation. At least radio silence could now be broken. ”Get the gun in here again! They might come this way. We don't want to block the corridor.”
They?thought Beatrix. The SG had her by the arm again, a lighter grip this time. His voice came clearly to her over the standard channel. ”We've been working with the Prince for a couple of days now, ever since I got here; tell you the details later. We've just duplicated one of the controller's signals to its troops-we hope-and transmitted it from a hundred places within the Fortress. If all goes well, they're going to be heading for their lander, and-get it in here!” This last was directed at his troops, who were once more in a frenzied scramble, this time to get the gun turned again and drawn back into the room with them.
It crowded the dozen people in, backing them against the walls at back and sides.
And then the waiting resumed. Presently, at a gesture from a Templar at the communicator, radio silence was reimposed.
And then Beatrix was distracted, to her vast relief, by the entrance of her husband, Lescar's figure beside him. Even in the darkness she could be sure at first look that it was the Prince. She knew his movements, his size, his . . . for minutes she did not worry particularly about what might be going on outside.
The Prince and the SG exchanged firm handgrips. Then all were quiet again, waiting. Bea could feel her husband's armored hand resting on her suited shoulder.
At last there came a faint sound from outside the room, that of an impact made faintly audible in vacuum by its pa.s.sage through beams and frame and floor and boots and bones. And only seconds later there began a ma.s.sive but almost silent pa.s.sage through the corridor outside. It was a parade of sizable machines, gliding through near-weightlessness in darkness, heard only through their occasional contact with the framework of the Fortress.
At last the parade had pa.s.sed. Colonel Phocion turned on his remote video gear again, and drew in a signal from the proper pickups. The fourteen people huddled in silence were able to watch the approximately forty berserkers enter their lander and reembark, gliding off silently into s.p.a.ce.
”The outer Fortress defenses are all yours, Commander,” said Phocion's voice. And Anne Blenheim's face appeared briefly on the small screen, acknowledging.
The Lady Beatrix heard the Superior General giving orders to the gunnery officers of his two s.h.i.+ps.
And then the night of the universe outside the Fortress was lit by t.i.tans' flares and forges. Seconds later there came sound again, the wavefronts of blasted particles. .h.i.tting the outer surface of the Fortress hard enough to awaken roaring resonance in stone and metal, sending an uproar rolling and rumbling on toward the far interior.