Part 15 (1/2)
”Be happy, Veety!” ”Be happy, Agent.”
”Job transfer. Come with me and this other veety to that aircar over there.”
The Agent slipped lithely into the single front seat of the vehicle, at the controls; the two Machiners Second got into the back seat. The aircar bulleted upward, screamed across City One to Suburb Ten, and dropped vertically downward to a high-G landing on the beautifully-kept grounds of a small plastic house.
”Out,” the Agent said, and led the couple into a large, comfortably-furnished living room. ”Stand there... hold hands... V T J R S Y X-job transfer. You're eighteen today, so you stop machinering and start running a family. Permanent a.s.signment. The Company knows that you two know each other and like each other. That liking will now become love. The Company knows all.”
”The Company knows all,” the two intoned in unison, solemnly.
”Press your right thumbs here... you are mated for life. This house is yours-permanently. Four rooms and bath to start. It's expandable; one additional room per child. Here are your family coupon books; throw your single-person ones into the disposer. This special mating coupon gives you free time from now until hour seventeen, when you go to the band concert at Sh.e.l.l Nineteen. Amuse yourselves, you two.” The Agent smiled suddenly, a smile that made her hard young face human and beautiful. ”Have fun-in the bedroom, perhaps? Be happy, both of you.” The Company Agent executed a snappy about-face and strode toward the door.
”Be happy, Agent,” the newlyweds said; and, as the door closed, went into each others arms.
They amused themselves and were very happy indeed. They were still very happy while, as hour seventeen neared, they walked, arms around each other, toward Bandsh.e.l.l Nineteen. A man of their own caste, an older man, fell into step beside them.
”I'm V T B L Q Q M,” he introduced himself. ”I found out a thing after bed-hour last night that everybody has got to know...”
”Shut up!” the young man barked. ”We don't want to know one single d.a.m.n thing that we don't know already.” ”But listen!” the stranger whispered, intensely. ”This is important! The most important thing that ever happened in the World! There's a meeting tonight-I'll pick you up-but I tell you this right now. There ain't any such thing as the Company. It's just those d.a.m.n snotty Agents and they're just as human as we are; they've been suckering us all our lives. If we had the gadgetry they've got we could knock them all off and take...”
”Shut up!” the girl screamed, and sprang away from him in horror. ”You're a mal-you're unhappy-that means death!”
”Death, h.e.l.l!” came the whispered snarl. ”I got the straight dope-the real p.o.o.p-last night and I'm still alive, ain't I? We're going to get some special insulation tonight and I'm going to grab one of those high nosed b.i.t.c.hes of Agents and choke her plumb to death after I...
The man stopped whispering and screamed in utterly unbearable agony. His every muscle writhed and twisted, convulsively and impossibly. After a few seconds his body slumped bonelessly to the pavement; limp, motionless, dead.
”How terrible,” the girl remarked, in a perfectly matter-of-fact tone of voice. Then, with arms again around each other and as blissful as before, the two lovers stepped over the body and went on their interrupted way. Mals had no right whatever to live. Therefore the All-Wise, All-Powerful Company had put that mal to death. Everything was perfect, in this their perfect World.
And in one minute flat a ground-car, a light-truck type, came up beside the corpse and stopped. Two husky men, wearing the dark-gray-on-light-gray of Sanitationers Fourth, got out of it, picked the body up, and tossed it nonchalantly into the back of their truck.
Perce and Cecily Train 'ported the Explorer to a point in s.p.a.ce well outside Pluto's...o...b..t; well out of detector range of any of the strange wars.h.i.+ps englobing Earth. Aboards.h.i.+p this time, in addition to the regular complement of s.p.a.cemen and psiontists, were a couple of dozen graduates of the University, who were making the trip for advanced study.
”If any of us'd thought of it and if we'd stayed and if we'd had the techniques we've got now, we could've 'ported bombs aboard those jaspers and blown 'em clear out of the ether,” Train said, while they were getting ready to go to work.
”One ifs enough, why use three?” Deston countered. ”But I got a lot better idea than that one, especially since Bobby is just slightly allergic to killing people in job lots. We'll find out where they come from, 'port each one of 'em back to his own house, tuck him gently into his own bed and present all those nice subs.p.a.cers to Fleet Admiral Guerdon Dann, with the compliments of the University of Psionics-for a small consideration, of course.”
”Now you're chirping, birdie!” Barbara exclaimed. ”You do get an idea once in a while, don't you? That one is really a dilly. Ready, everybody? Let's go.”
They went... and they studied... and the more they studied the more baffled they became. The captains of the s.h.i.+ps were, to a man, from Tellus. They were based on Teneriffe...
Deston shot the linked minds to the planet Teneriffe. The base was there-an immense one-but that was all it was. Just a base. There were no facilities to build much of anything; to say nothing of such an immense complex as would be necessary to produce any important part of that fleet.
Few of the captains had even wondered where the war-s.h.i.+ps had been built. What difference did that make? That, or anything else pertaining to logistics or supply, was none of their business.
The Vice-Admirals and Admirals had wondered; but, since they had not been told, none of them had ever asked. Asking impertinent questions was a thing that simply was not done.
The Fleet Admiral did not know; neither did the Base Commander on Teneriffe. They got their orders via nondirectional subs.p.a.ce radio from the Company of the World= World,” of course, meaning Earth. It wasn't only a company, really, it was a new government, still very QT and TS, that was going to take over Tellus and all the planets, they both supposed. They had the power to do it, so why not? To any hard-nosed man of war might is right, and if they wanted to play it cosy and call themselves The Company of the World that was all right, too.
And as for the lower echelons...
”My... G.o.d...” Cecily said slowly, aloud, into the dense silence that had lasted through a long fifteen minutes of stupefied investigation. ”The Eternal, Omniscient, Omnipotent, Omnipresent Company created the World and the People on Company-Company Day, that is-January First of the Year One. No other World nor any other People-capitalized, please note, even in thought-ever were created or ever will be. Will some or one of you nice people please tell me what in all the infinite reaches of all the incandescent and viridescent h.e.l.ls of all total s.p.a.ce we have got ourselves into now?” ”I'll never know, Curly.” Deston, who had been holding his breath for a good two minutes, let it all out at once. ”And the poor dumb meatheads believe that comet-gas with every cell of their minds... and take everything that's going on right in stride-it's all Company business and as such is naturally incomprehensible to the mind of man... 'My G.o.d!' is correct, Curly. Check.”
But look! Look in here!” Barbara put in, excitedly. ”Not the caste system-above it-Company Agents! Angels, suppose? Or something? None here with the Fleet; all back on the World. Those spotlight-jewels gorgeous! I'd love to wear one of those myself. Power packs, do you think?”
”Maybe,” Jones said. ”That's certainly something we'll have to look into. But what do we do now, Babe?”
”I know what I'm going to do-report to the boss in person-you people stay right here 'til I get back.” Deston disappeared.
Maynard was alone, so Deston 'ported himself unceremoniously into the private office. ”I don't want even Doris in on this until you let her in,” he explained, then reported everything.
As he listened, Maynard's face turned gray.
”So you see, chief,” Deston concluded, ”it's an unholy mess. What was it you said? A planet... run for years in a way that would make the robber barons of old sick at the stomach.' You said it. You certainly said it. Have you got any idea as to who could be monster enough to pull a stunt like that?”
”More than an idea, son. This explains a lot of things I've wondered about, but I couldn't let my mind run wild enough. Two of 'em are why Plastics, one of the biggest of the big, never played ball, and how they got that way. It's Plastics, and Lord Byron Punsunby is head man.”
That makes sense, so I'll do a flit...”
”Not yet... that's such a staggering thing... what year is it, of theirs?”
”Two hundred twenty six.”
”Um... um... m. Call it nine generations. At their breeding rate, with a start of only a few hundred thousand, they'll have population. The first three or four generations would know something, but by falsification of records, history, and so on... and no press... brain-was.h.i.+ng and hypnosis... it could be done. Definitely. So they've had at least five generations of... of...”
”Of serfs. A perfect serf set-up.”
”Check. And one of their castes is of top-notch engineers who don't know anything else and put everything they've got into it. And castes of scientists and so on.”
”That's right. As a 'troncist I'm here to testify that that locket is one beautiful job of work. Transmits everything except what the guy ate for breakfast, and maybe even that.”
”To Central Intelligence... each checked as frequently as desired... or even recorded... G.o.d, what a system!” Maynard shook his head. ”And those Company Agents. Special castes, too. Charged, of course. Insulated boots. Magic no end. They could even live in a charged environment.”
”Could be. I told you, it's a mell of a hess.”
”One more thing. You've never thought of the real problem here, apparently. How can we-how can anybody-rehabilitate any race that has been driven that far off coa.r.s.e?”
Deston's jaw dropped. ”Huh? Wow! It's a little soon, though isn't it, to have to think about that?”
”I'll have to think about it, I'm afraid, whether I want to or not... but that's more in my department than yours, I suppose... well, I'll let you go now. Thanks for reporting. Good luck.”
”Leek, chief. 'Bye,” and Deston 'ported himself back into the main lounge of the Explorer.
Since the Plastics Building was one of the largest office buildings on Earth, it was very easy to find; and it was even easier to find the blatantly magnificent private office of ”Lord” Byron Punsunby, the president of Plastics Incorporated. Deston got into his mind and put it through the wringer. Punsunby knew a great deal that was new. He knew all about the business end-by what devious routes the goods were smuggled into the markets of Earth, how and through what underground channels they were sold, how incredibly vast the hidden holdings of Plastics were, and how all this skullduggery had been performed-but even he did not know the general direction from Sol of Plastics' ultra-secret planet, The World, which had never been given a name.
It was and had always been Company policy that no Tellurian should know The World's coordinates. Only two living men were to know them; the Comptroller General of the World, who came to Earth to report to Punsunby after the close of business of each of The World's calendar quarters; and the captain-who was also the only navigating officer-of the one s.h.i.+p that ever made the direct run from The World to Earth and back. There were only two records of those figures in existence; one in each of the personal safe-deposit boxes of those two men.
Deston kept on reading. Yes, there were a few unscheduled vists; more than he liked of late... he didn't like to use subs.p.a.ce radio, it could be tapped... changing conditions... trouble...