Evil Out of Onzar Part 3

"All very true," said Thane, "but it still doesn't explain a thing to me. About your place in this or Candar's."

Reine hardly noticed the interruption. He went on, professorially.

"The solution has always seemed clear. In order to travel at will through s.p.a.ce, at faster-than-light speeds all we needed to do was to create our own Field with its own warp-line. If a s.h.i.+p could generate its own electro-gravitic warp it would be able to travel in almost unlimited directions with no time lapse except for pauses at each warp-line crossed. The power factors were such that an entirely new principle of operation was needed. We have found it in the so-called gold catalyst principle, and we now have a practical, economical second-stage drive."

Thane frowned. "But that would seem to make Onzar less important. Why do we need to worry about them now?"

Reine was about to answer but the door opened and Pyuf was there. "How goes it, duellist?"

"It was a great fight," Thane said, "until you decided to tear up the rules. You forgot to tell me that you included 'kidnapper' in your list of trades."

Reine smiled. "That's just one of many that Pyuf forgot to mention.

Forger, propagandist, and political theorist might also have been added." He turned to Pyuf. "I've about covered the technology. Why don't you give our friend the politics?"

"Sure." Pyuf sat on the desk swinging his short legs. "First, though, I'm sorry about the duel, Thane. We had to do it."

"Reine's already a.s.sured me of that once or twice," Thane said drily.

"I would like to know, though, just how you did it."

"That's simple enough. For months now we've been using the duelling court on Kadenar as an exchange point in the underground. It's been very helpful because of the ease that duellists have in getting through customs. In your case we were lucky. Or I should say that Astrid was quick and intelligent enough to take advantage of a fortunate situation. A few words from her were enough to instigate the Onzarian officer to challenge you. Remember that Onzarians have a tradition of duelling, and you had insulted him. Furthermore, he was still confused from the stoltz artillery."

"Clear enough. But may I ask why you bothered to let the duel go on at all? Why not just take me when we got to the court?"

"We wanted to explain your disappearance. At the same time that you were unconscious, your opponent and the other junior officer were also out. With a touch of post-hypnotic suggestion, they were both quite convinced that the Third Officer had won the duel and that you were dead. We had no trouble getting your 'corpse' back through customs and to Onzar."

"Probably," Thane said, "you had a purpose for all this. Before we go any further, let's have it."

"If you were an agent of Candar we would have eliminated you," Pyuf said. "You had already learned too much, and you had shown that you were a dangerous man. If you were a Liaison agent, it was still necessary for you to 'die.' At the moment, it's imperative that no word of our activity gets to the Allied Systems. And, if we can convince you, we badly need your help."

"It'll take some convincing from what's happened up to now. But go ahead."

"Ever wonder," Pyuf went on, "why the Darzent Empire hasn't attacked?

What are they waiting for? They're aggressive. They have the edge in power, with two inhabited systems to one in the A.S. Their technology matches ours and their heavily centralized dictators.h.i.+p allows them to move faster, at least at the beginning of a war."

"Well?"

"Two reasons. One, they never could be sure that we didn't have the second-stage drive. Two, they couldn't be sure of the allegiance of Onzar."

"Onzar--the whole five systems--is probably more of an armed camp than any other political ent.i.ty in the Galaxy. But that isn't the real reason for their overwhelming importance." Pyuf jumped down off the desk and flipped a switch on the far wall. The galactic map appeared, with the warp-lines superimposed in red.

Pyuf pointed with his cigarette. "Take a look at those warps. All nine of the princ.i.p.al ones, crossing the Galaxy between the Allied Systems and the Darzent Empire, pa.s.s within a pa.r.s.ec of Onzar. A faster-than-light fleet going either way _has_ to surface at the Onzar Confluence. And Candar, no matter how he sounds to you or me, is no fool. He, you can bet, has taken some long quiet looks at a map like this and he knows his position. So does Darzent. So do the people who are presumably running things in the Allied Systems."

Thane stood up. He had been off at the perimeter of the struggle, working in obscure but possibly important systems for the past three years. He hadn't been in a position to see all the factors in the struggle that was shaping up. But now at a glance he saw that Pyuf was probably right. "It makes sense," he admitted, "but what about the second-stage drive? Isn't that supposed to cut across warp-lines?

Wouldn't that reduce to zero the strategic importance of our friend, Candar?"

At this, Manning Reine broke in excitedly, "But that's just the point, Thane! Remember I mentioned there were certain limits to the second-stage drive. We can, to a large extent, manufacture our own lines. But they are never wholly independent of the existing natural lines through s.p.a.ce. Our dependence on the galactic lines varies from almost zero to almost unitary, depending on our position in s.p.a.ce. The Onzarian Confluence has much the same effect as a whirlpool.

Theoretically, we could force our way out of the whirlpool and go through the center of the Galaxy by a different route. But the energy required approaches infinity."

Thane stepped over to the map. He pointed to the Onzarian Confluence.

"O.K. There's our bottleneck. But where's the cork? Just how do you figure on stopping a fleet if it does surface at the Onzarian Confluence for two or three microseconds?"

Pyuf slapped the b.u.t.t of his cigarette across the tray on Reine's desk. "There, Agent Thane, we reach the point of the whole show. But let's get the story straight from the source." His eyes went to Reine.

Reine, pouring his second cup of coffee, looked up. "If you mean me, that's not very accurate. It's true that it was developed in my laboratory but Astrid was the one who saw the hint, originally, and did all the development. I'm not even familiar with all the details."

He smiled apologetically to Thane. "We're talking about the Tracer. As a by-product of our main job we discovered a new way of plotting warp-lines. Instead of doing it by mathematics we found a way of plotting warps directly by instrument. Well, I was on the main line of research, and I had three times as much as I could do already. I just regarded this as a curiosity. But Astrid took it and built the Tracer."

Pyuf interrupted. He was not the man, Thane saw, who could abide technical explanations when they had a clear political implication.

"The Tracer," he said, "is the cork for your bottleneck. With the tracer, we know when any s.h.i.+p is operating on second-stage drive. With two tracers, separated on a baseline of a few million kilometers, we can plot position closely. Three tracers will pin-point them, and for a trip across the center of the Galaxy, we will know when and where they'll have to surface."

"That fits all right," Thane said, "but why tie in Onzar? Why not let the Allied Systems have the tracer?"

Pyuf shrugged impatiently. "Gentlemen, from here on, we need a drink.

The explanation is simple, limpid, computable logic. As far as we can see, it's the only course." He stared pointedly at Thane. "But it also could be construed as treason. So we'd better have a drink." He stepped to the door. "Astrid, will you bring gla.s.ses and the bottle?

We've got a bit of dialectics to dispense with."

After Astrid had handed the drinks around, Pyuf downed his. Then he went on. "First of all, Thane, don't get me wrong. Maybe I couldn't pa.s.s a security check with some of the boys in the Department of the Outside. Maybe I could, I don't know. I've never tried. But I like the Allied Systems as well as anything the Galaxy has to offer and I want to live there. But let's take a hard look at them." He stopped to pour another gla.s.s. "Within the A.S. you have the main federation, and you have a lot of loosely confederated systems. s.p.a.ce only knows what the confederations will do. We can only hope. But look at the rest of them. Every couple of years, absolute, they rear back and elect an a.s.sembly of 13,000 members, a really efficient size for a deliberative body. So that sterling group elects a senate of 300 or so, and then goes home. But it reserves a lot of rights, like declaring war. And the senate, of course, goes ahead and elects the council. Which does its best to keep things going."

"I know the system," Thane broke in. "Just what do you want to do about it?"

"I don't want to do anything about it," Pyuf looked up earnestly. "I want to prevent it from being wiped out. And right now the only way that can be done is to work outside it, rather than through it. Or do you want to hold a systems election when the Darzent fleet surfaces at Onzar Confluence?"

Manning Reine was on his feet now. "And they will, Thane, they will.

We know there have been security leaks in the development of the drive. It's just a question of time."

Thane calmly reached over and took the bottle from Pyuf. He filled his gla.s.s and looked at the bottle, then at Pyuf, Astrid, and Reine. "All right. We have our bottleneck. And we have our cork--the Onzarian fleet. Just how do you propose we shove the cork into the bottle?"

Astrid was the first to answer. "We'll take the fleet! The Onzarians are ready for freedom!" After that they were all talking. The underground had convinced the people of the truth. They were ready to rise up and throw off the yoke of Candar. There was conflict between the government and the religion. The people would not stand any further reduction in their living standards. Two-thirds of the gross product went for armaments now, and the amount was steadily increasing.

At last Thane banged the desk until they had all stopped talking. He looked at them a moment in silence. "All right. You've got your gadgets. You've got your political theory. You've even got your strategy. But there hasn't been an atom's worth of tactics in anything you've said, any of you. I think you're badly in need of some engineering for your revolution."

Astrid walked over and looked up into his eyes. "That's about the way it is, Roger. And that's why we need you so badly."

That was when they began going into details. Strength of the underground, possible allies, weaknesses of Candar.... Thane was beginning to see the picture, and the tremendous obstacles to be overcome, when a buzzer sounded and a red light over the door blinked DANGER ... DANGER ... DANGER....

IV

Pyuf ran over to a cabinet on the wall by the fire. Thane saw there were several dials and a visiscreen. As Pyuf twisted the dials he spoke rapidly over his shoulder to Thane. "We're quite isolated here.

The house belongs to the old boy you met in the lab. He's been checked for security by Candar so we figured we were safe here. There's a detection screen about a kilometer hour from the house, and we have a force screen we can use as a last resort. Of course, we'd have to abandon this place once we did use it. Candar's detectors would pick it up right away."

The visiscreen came into focus and Pyuf turned the perimeter dial till it lined up with the degree mark on the disturbance indicator. Nine figures appeared, advancing toward the house. Three were short and squat--not over a meter and a half in height. They walked with the peculiar slouch of the Darzent ent.i.ty in its humanoid phase. The other six were the Darzent robot infantry. Two and a half meters high, impervious to any hand weapon, with built-in blasters and the Darzent version of the Stoltz gun. Their s.h.i.+p was in the background. It had the outlines of an ordinary atmosphere jet of medium size, but there were alterations which made Thane suspect that it had been refitted for deep s.p.a.ce, with at least the finite drive, and probably FTL.

Thane spun around to the others. "We either put up the force screen or get out now," he said. "Unless, that is, there's some heavy artillery around the house. Nothing else will stop a Darzent Robot. And even the screen probably won't last long. That s.h.i.+p looks as though it has enough high powered stuff to breach any screen we can put up."

Astrid looked up at him. "We do have the jet, Roger. It's armed, but it will take time to get it ready for take-off."

"Let's get the force screen up now, then."