THE ENORMOUS CREATURE ENTERED THE SMALL DOMED
enclave easily, pressing the passwords as if it had set them up,
which it had. No one was present to greet it, which mildly
irritated it, but it stalked down the entry corridor and into the
main room where it found a lone Earth-human sitting with a glass
and a bottle.
“You’re late,” the man said. “I’d
offer you some, but I know it would be a waste.”
“You should lay off that stuff,” the creature
admonished. “Those substances that dull the mind are
dangerous.”
The man chuckled. “And you should know, right? So I lay
off the drinking and the smoking and maybe an occasional pleasure
pill and I won’t die young? I’m already dead, remember?
I sure as hell do. Scared the living shit out of me, too.
Damn it, if you can’t even sin in hell then what’s the
use of living any kind of life?”
The creature let that pass. “You have been monitoring the
progress of our friends?” it asked.
“Naturally. That’s what this floating mausoleum was
designed to do, wasn’t it? After all, we
reprogrammed Star Eagle back on Earth. You know, I wonder when
Hawks is gonna think of that? He’s a pretty clever
fellow.”
“Perhaps too clever for his own survival. The real
question is what are their chances of success?
The man sighed and took another sip of his drink. “This
stuff’s good. Like the old country. Not like that synthetic
crap we’ve endured all these years. Anyway, what can I say?
We front-loaded Janipur as much as we could, even lucked out in
spotting the Indrus just ahead of the troopers and sending
it a divert message to the rest of that refugee fleet. Stroke of
luck. Makes me think even God is on our side, if I only could
figure out who God was and what He, She, or It wanted.”
“Then you rate their success as probable?”
The man shrugged. “Hey! We did all we could, but short of
going in and getting it ourselves and handing it to them on a
silver platter, there is no way in hell we can do more
now. For the first time, and not the last, they are now truly on
their own. We couldn’t interfere if we wanted to. You know
the rules that bind us. Even with everything, this one’s not
gonna be any snap, although I think they came up with some real
original touches in their planning. Now they got two ignorant girls
soon to be in very strange clothing whose only gift to the universe
is that they can pick any lock ever imagined by machine and man,
one girl who knows the route but is gonna still hav’ta learn
to be a hoofer, and one creature—whatever the hell that thing
is—against maybe sixty troops, the entire Center security
system and its personnel and computers, and a shipload more troops
lurking around under the command of a Val. How can they lose?”
“You are not amusing.”
“I do not intend to be. And if they somehow manage to pull
this one off, the next one has its own real problems, and the
third’s a dilly and a half. And we won’t mention number
four, considering even we aren’t real sure where it is, but
they got some clues and bright ideas. Did your people bring in this
Ikira girl? She’s a real asset.”
“We had no knowledge of her or her ship being involved in
this. I am pleased to hear it, though. The more they depend upon
themselves and the less they need us, the
more—comfortable—I am. This is no easy thing for any of
us, as you should know.”
“You really don’t believe they’re gonna do it,
do you?”
The creature paused a moment. “No. I cannot see how they
can, with or without our help. Each victory will make defeat more
certain down the road as Master System redoubles its
efforts.”
“Yeah, well, we know well how infallible Master Systems
is. Scratch one Val, build a pirate fleet, and maybe snatch one big
fat ring to stick in Master System’s guts.”
“Perhaps. I do not like to hear you say that. I find this
whole thing most distasteful, as you know. It is a logic loop of
gigantic proportions. If it is mad, then am I not also mad
by definition? And if I am mad, then am I abetting a mad thing by
aiding this attempt at Master System’s
destruction?”
“Beats the hell out of me, pal,” Arnold Nagy said,
lighting a cigarette.
“You are no help at all, Nagy,” the Val
responded.
The Rings of the Master
continues with Warriors of the Storm
THE ENORMOUS CREATURE ENTERED THE SMALL DOMED
enclave easily, pressing the passwords as if it had set them up,
which it had. No one was present to greet it, which mildly
irritated it, but it stalked down the entry corridor and into the
main room where it found a lone Earth-human sitting with a glass
and a bottle.
“You’re late,” the man said. “I’d
offer you some, but I know it would be a waste.”
“You should lay off that stuff,” the creature
admonished. “Those substances that dull the mind are
dangerous.”
The man chuckled. “And you should know, right? So I lay
off the drinking and the smoking and maybe an occasional pleasure
pill and I won’t die young? I’m already dead, remember?
I sure as hell do. Scared the living shit out of me, too.
Damn it, if you can’t even sin in hell then what’s the
use of living any kind of life?”
The creature let that pass. “You have been monitoring the
progress of our friends?” it asked.
“Naturally. That’s what this floating mausoleum was
designed to do, wasn’t it? After all, we
reprogrammed Star Eagle back on Earth. You know, I wonder when
Hawks is gonna think of that? He’s a pretty clever
fellow.”
“Perhaps too clever for his own survival. The real
question is what are their chances of success?
The man sighed and took another sip of his drink. “This
stuff’s good. Like the old country. Not like that synthetic
crap we’ve endured all these years. Anyway, what can I say?
We front-loaded Janipur as much as we could, even lucked out in
spotting the Indrus just ahead of the troopers and sending
it a divert message to the rest of that refugee fleet. Stroke of
luck. Makes me think even God is on our side, if I only could
figure out who God was and what He, She, or It wanted.”
“Then you rate their success as probable?”
The man shrugged. “Hey! We did all we could, but short of
going in and getting it ourselves and handing it to them on a
silver platter, there is no way in hell we can do more
now. For the first time, and not the last, they are now truly on
their own. We couldn’t interfere if we wanted to. You know
the rules that bind us. Even with everything, this one’s not
gonna be any snap, although I think they came up with some real
original touches in their planning. Now they got two ignorant girls
soon to be in very strange clothing whose only gift to the universe
is that they can pick any lock ever imagined by machine and man,
one girl who knows the route but is gonna still hav’ta learn
to be a hoofer, and one creature—whatever the hell that thing
is—against maybe sixty troops, the entire Center security
system and its personnel and computers, and a shipload more troops
lurking around under the command of a Val. How can they lose?”
“You are not amusing.”
“I do not intend to be. And if they somehow manage to pull
this one off, the next one has its own real problems, and the
third’s a dilly and a half. And we won’t mention number
four, considering even we aren’t real sure where it is, but
they got some clues and bright ideas. Did your people bring in this
Ikira girl? She’s a real asset.”
“We had no knowledge of her or her ship being involved in
this. I am pleased to hear it, though. The more they depend upon
themselves and the less they need us, the
more—comfortable—I am. This is no easy thing for any of
us, as you should know.”
“You really don’t believe they’re gonna do it,
do you?”
The creature paused a moment. “No. I cannot see how they
can, with or without our help. Each victory will make defeat more
certain down the road as Master System redoubles its
efforts.”
“Yeah, well, we know well how infallible Master Systems
is. Scratch one Val, build a pirate fleet, and maybe snatch one big
fat ring to stick in Master System’s guts.”
“Perhaps. I do not like to hear you say that. I find this
whole thing most distasteful, as you know. It is a logic loop of
gigantic proportions. If it is mad, then am I not also mad
by definition? And if I am mad, then am I abetting a mad thing by
aiding this attempt at Master System’s
destruction?”
“Beats the hell out of me, pal,” Arnold Nagy said,
lighting a cigarette.
“You are no help at all, Nagy,” the Val
responded.
The Rings of the Master
continues with Warriors of the Storm