Part 21 (1/2)
”Broken?” the psychotherapist demanded in a worried voice.
”No. Dislocated. He looks like he's been hit by a sledge hammer, wherever he is now, whatever's happening. This E.C.R. is the d.a.m.ndest thing.”
Temple's still form shuddered convulsively. He began to gasp and cough, obviously fighting for breath. An ugly blue swelling had by now lumped the base of his jaw.
”What's happening?” demanded the psychotherapist.
”I can't be sure,” said the doctor, shaking his head. ”He seems to have difficulty in breathing ... it's as if he were--drowning.”
”Bad. Anything we can do?”
”No. We wait until this particular sequence ends.” The doctor examined Temple again. ”If it doesn't end soon, this man will die of asphyxiation.”
”Call it off,” the psychotherapist pleaded. ”If he dies now Earth will be represented by Russia. Call it off!”
Someone entered the room. ”_I_ have the authority,” he said, selecting a hypodermic from the doctor's rack and piercing the skin of Temple's forearm with it. ”This first test has gone far enough. The Russian entry is clearly the winner, but Temple must live if he is to compete in another.”
The wracking convulsions which shook Temple's body subsided. He ceased his choking, began to breathe regularly. With grim swiftness, the doctor went to work on Temple's dislocated jaw while the man who had stopped the contest rendered artificial respiration.
The man was Alaric Arkalion.
The Comrade Doctor was exultant. ”Jupiter training, comrade, has given us a victory.”
”How can you be sure?”
”Our entrant is unharmed, the contest has been called. Wait ... she is coming to.”
Sophia stretched, rubbed her bruised knees, sat up.
”What happened, Comrade?” the doctor demanded.
”My knees ache,” said Sophia, rubbing them some more. ”I--I killed him, I think. Strange, I never dreamed it would be that real.”
”In a sense, it _was_ real. If you killed the American, he will stay dead.”
”Nothing mattered but that world we were in, a fantastic place. Now I remember everything, all the things I couldn't remember then.”
”But your--ah, dream--what happened?”
Sophia rubbed her bruised knees a third time, ruefully. ”I knocked him unconscious with these. I forced his head under water and drowned him.
But--before I could be sure I finished the job--I came back.... Funny that I should want to kill him without compunction, without reason.”
Sophia frowned, sat up. ”I don't think I want anymore of this.”
The doctor surveyed her coldly. ”This is your task on the Stalintrek.
This you will do.”
”I killed him without a thought.”