Part 1 (1/2)
Infinite Intruder.
by Alan Edward Nourse.
When Roger Strang found that someone was killing his son--killing him horribly and often--he started investigating. He wasn't prepared to find the results of another investigation--this time about his own life.
It was the second time they tried that Roger Strang realized someone was trying to kill his son.
The first time there had been no particular question. Accidents happen. Even in those days, with all the Base safety regulations and strict speed-way lane laws, young boys would occasionally try to gun their monowheels out of the slow lanes into the terribly swift traffic; when they did, accidents did occur. The first time, when they brought David home in the Base ambulance, shaken but unhurt, with the twisted smashed remains of his monowheel, Roger and Ann Strang had breathed weakly, and decided between themselves that the boy should be scolded within an inch of his young life. And the fact that David maintained tenaciously that he had never swerved from the slow monowheel lane didn't bother his parents a bit. They were acquainted with another small-boy frailty. Small boys, on occasion, are inclined to fib.
But the second time, David was not fibbing. Roger Strang _saw_ the _accident_ the second time. He saw all the circ.u.mstances involved. And he realized, with horrible clarity, that someone, somehow, was trying to kill his son.
[Ill.u.s.tration]
It had been late on a Sat.u.r.day afternoon. The free week-ends that the Barrier Base engineers had once enjoyed to take their families for picnics ”outside,” or to rest and relax, were things of the past, for the work on the Barrier was reaching a critical stage, demanding more and more of the technicians, scientists and engineers engaged in its development. Already diplomatic relations with the Eurasian Combine were becoming more and more impossible; the Barrier _had_ to be built, and quickly, or another more terrible New York City would be the result. Roger had never cleared from his mind the flaming picture of that night of horror, just five years before, when the mighty metropolis had burst into radioactive flame, to announce the beginning of the first Atomic War. The year 2078 was engraved in millions of minds as the year of the most horrible--and the shortest--war in all history, for an armistice had been signed not four days after the first bomb had been dropped. An armistice, but an uneasy peace, for neither of the great nations had really known what atomic war would be like until it had happened. And once upon them, they found that atomic war was not practical, for both mighty opponents would have been gutted in a matter of weeks. The armistice had stopped the bombs, but hostilities continued, until the combined scientific forces of one nation could succeed in preparing a defense.
That particular Sat.u.r.day afternoon had been busy in the Main Labs on the Barrier Base. The problem of erecting a continent-long electronic Barrier to cover the coast of North America was a staggering proposition. Roger Strang was nearly finished and ready for home as dusk was falling. Leaving his work at the desk, he was slipping on his jacket when David came into the lab. He was small for twelve years, with tousled sand-brown hair standing up at odd angles about a sharp, intelligent face. ”I came to get you, Daddy,” he said.
Roger smiled. ”You rode all the way down here--just to go home with me?”
”Maybe we could get some Icy-pops for supper on the way home,” David remarked innocently.
Roger grinned broadly and slapped the boy on the back. ”You'd sell your soul for an Icy-pop,” he grinned.
The corridor was dark. The man and boy walked down to the elevator, and in a moment were swis.h.i.+ng down to the dark and deserted lobby below.
David stepped first from the elevator when the men struck. One stood on either side of the door in the shadow. The boy screamed and reeled from the blow across the neck. Suddenly Roger heard the sharp pistol reports. David dropped with a groan, and Roger staggered against the wall from a powerful blow in the face. He shook his head groggily, catching a glimpse of the two men running through the door into the street below, as three or four people ran into the lobby, flushed out by the shots.
Roger shouted, pointing to the door, but the people were looking at the boy. Roger sank down beside his son, deft fingers loosening the blouse. The boy's small face was deathly white, fearful sobs choking his breath as he closed his eyes and s.h.i.+vered. Roger searched under his blouse, trying to find the bullet holes--and found to his chagrin that there weren't any bullet holes.
”Where did you feel the gun?”
David pointed vaguely at his lower ribs. ”Right there,” he said. ”It hurt when they shoved the gun at me.”
”But they couldn't have pulled the trigger, if the gun was pointed there--” He examined the unbroken skin on the boy's chest, fear tearing through his mind.
A Security man was there suddenly, asking about the accident, taking Roger's name, checking over the boy. Roger resented the tall man in the gray uniform, felt his temper rise at the slightly sarcastic tone of the questions. Finally the trooper stood up, shaking his head. ”The boy must have been mistaken,” he said. ”Kids always have wild stories to tell. Whoever it was may have been after _somebody_, but they weren't aiming for the boy.”
Roger scowled. ”This boy is no liar,” he snapped. ”I saw them shoot--”
The trooper shrugged. ”Well, he isn't hurt. Why don't you go on home?”
Roger helped the boy up, angrily. ”You're not going to do anything about this?”
”What can I do? n.o.body saw who the men were.”
Roger grabbed the boy's hand, helped him to his feet, and turned angrily to the door. In the failing light outside the improbability of the attack struck through him strongly. He turned to the boy, his face dark. ”David,” he said evenly, ”you wouldn't be making up stories about feeling that gun in your ribs, would you?”