VII.
Toralen Ki turned from the communicator. "Hotang," he called. "They have the answer!"
"Good. Then our time has not been wasted! For now we have the other one back."
"The technicians on Tlembo have just given me full and complete instructions on how to lower the sensitivity of the detector to a proper level."
"Not shielding?" asked Hotang Lu skeptically.
Toralen Ki laughed. "What manner of shielding would stop the suppressor wave? Nothing, I know. Absolutely nothing can deflect or stop it."
Toralen opened the detector case and started to fumble inside. He was not deft, and the tools from the equipment case did not fit his hand. But in an hour he had made the changes suggested by the technicians on Tlembo—but aided finally by one of Thompson's crew of technicians who went to work on the thing with dexterity but complete ignorance of its principles of operation.
Then with the one detector in operation, in Thompson's ship, the flight took off and began to take the last measures necessary to the completion of their task.
Hour after hour they went, out into the space beyond the last planet of the catmen, and out and out, running slowly so that they would neither collide with the machine nor overrun it.
It was a matter of days.
"Dead ahead," said Thompson on the communicator.
"Target?" asked Lane.
"Meteor, it looks like."
"Might be camouflage," suggested Downing. "Remember if it must be destroyed, it is a sign that those who made it knew that it would be against the wishes of somebody."
"Did either of you think that it might be a good thing?"
"You mean the machine might be benign?"
"Yes," answered Thompson.
"That's why you are going to analyze it before we destroy it," said Lane.
"Yes?"
"If we destroy it and discover it is benign, then we can reproduce it. Follow?"
"Excellent idea," said Thompson. "Kennebec thought of that?"
"Kennebec is a smart man," said Lane. "He wanted the stuff in the Little Man's ship—stuff none of us can understand yet. He agreed to come out here and blast the machine. But he considered it likely that the Little Man was making a cat's-paw out of the human race and he wanted to repair any damage done as soon as we found out we'd made a mistake."
"Did you ever think that the interval between destroying this and getting the reproduction in working order might be just time enough?" demanded Thompson.
"Yup. I've figured all of that. But I'm following orders, Billy. I'm going to wreck that thing as soon as you tell me you can reproduce it."
Downing interrupted. "You're going to do it? I am."
"Want to bet?" snapped Lane.
"Cut it," said Thompson.
"Make you a deal," said Lane, ignoring Thompson.
"Go on."
"I order you to stop it," snapped Thompson.
"Go fly a kite," growled Lane. "Look, Downing, I'll fight you for the privilege of destroying that machine."
"Deal. How?"
"When Billy has his pictures and data, we'll take off in our fleeters. The idea will be to see who can blast the thing first—no holds barred, right?"
"It's one way of finding out who's the best flier," agreed Downing.
Toralen Ki looked up at Thompson. Billy smiled. He made motions, conveyed the idea to the Little Man that Downing and Lane were going out to destroy the machine personally.
Toralen Ki fumbled for the meaning and then understood. He agreed vigorously, nodding and smiling.
"The Little Man here says to go ahead," Thompson said, into the communicator. "I'm supposed to be a buffer until this mission is complete—it will be complete when that machine is blasted. Everybody knows that you fellows are going to go rivet-cutting sooner or later—might as well have something to do it over."
"Thanks," said Downing dryly. "And the guy that loses makes a public announcement of his inferiority, see?"
"I'll be listening to you," came Lane's taunting laugh.
"What you'll be hearing is my acceptance," returned Downing.
Thompson left them quibbling and took his crew over to the meteor that carried the machine. It was a real meteor, a huge one almost a half mile in jagged diameter. A well penetrated it, sealed by huge metal doors. They breached the doors and resealed them, once they were inside, to pressurize the cavern.
Then they went to work on the huge machine.
It was bizarre. It was unreal and unearthly. Atomic generators powered it silently, pouring torrents of high power into its apparently senseless circuits. Great silvery crystals twisted and distorted slowly under piezoelectric stress, and sputtered-silver contacts carried off the impulses to other circuits.
Solid metal bars carried some sort of circulatory impulse from place to place—they were reminiscent of wave-guide plumbing but no microwave set-up could function in a system like this.
Then, slowly, the thing appeared to have pattern. Whatever it was, the output of the slowly-distorting crystals was fed in or out of phase through filters and transmission bars to the topmost crystal. It was multi-faceted and obviously not a natural formation. It scintillated and pulsed rapidly, and the facets gleamed against the lights as the crystal throbbed in tune with the feeding currents.
"This," said Thompson, "is going to be reproduced later if for no other reason than just sheer curiosity. Whoever built it is a little ahead of our time and I want to get caught up. Benign or malignant, it must be remade and studied."
Then for hours, Thompson's technicians went over the machine with a fine-tooth comb. Pictures—tridimensional shots, moving pictures, microtime film, and hand sketches. Technicians measured potentials, made pictures of wave shapes from the oscilloscope patterns, and drew endless schematic diagrams. Metallurgists took minute samples of the metals, of the dielectrics, of the crystals themselves, cutting bits out with microscopic modine beams.
Then, as they ran out of things to measure, Thompson took one last look at it. "O.K., fellows," he said, "can you rebuild it?"
"To the last decimal place."
"It's alien," warned Thompson.
"It's still made of metal and crystal."
"O.K." He turned to Toralen Ki and made suggestive motions. He turned off the main feed line, and the atomics thrummed to a stop. Then he suggested that now it was off, why didn't they just take it back to Terra and not bother reproducing it. Toralen Ki shook his head—No. He waved Thompson to come along, and they left the machine in the meteor forever.
"I'm finished," said Thompson, "but wait before you blast. The Little Man seems to want me to confer with him for a moment."
Thompson's ship took off. Toralen Ki emerged from his stateroom with the instrument. He planted it on a table, turned it on, and strapped the plate to his forehead. He offered the other one to Thompson.
Thompson understood. He knew that the Little People had a means of mental communication that augmented their speech. He accepted the plate and strapped it on his own head.
"Now," said Toralen Ki, "I may at last converse with you and your race."
"What is the machine?" asked Thompson.
"The others—they are all right?"
Thompson nodded. "They are destroying the machine. Tell me, what is it?"
Toralen Ki nodded in agreement. "Tell them to destroy it and then to return, for I must speak with them through this, now that the machine is stopped and I may. But destroy it, for the Loard-vogh may have remote control and if they have, it may be started again at any moment."
"Before I blast any alien machine," said Thompson, "I must know what it is. You insist that it be destroyed. How do I know that the machine is not benign?"
"The machine," explained Toralen Ki, "is a device which suppresses the mental activity of all races within its field of radiation. It was built by a ruthless and predatory race to hold down the overall galactic mentality. It must be destroyed, for even though it is not running, full and complete regaining of the mental strength will not be possible until the machine is destroyed because a certain amount of residual power exists in the radiating crystal.”
Thompson smiled, nodded, and went to the communicator. "O.K., fellows, have your fun. Blast it!"
Two ships circled Thompson's craft—two tiny ships, both as fleet as a beam of light and as maneuverable as thought. They circled one another, winding away from Thompson's ship in a tight twin-corkscrew spiral.
"Twenty thousand years ago—of your years—this race planned to conquer the Galaxy. They were an old race then, a mad race, with dreams of grandeur. Their numbers were countless, for they were spreading through their own section of the Galaxy like a mobile gas.
"They struck trouble, twenty thousand years ago. They hit a race that fought them—that almost succeeded in holding them to their line. Unfortunately, they were too numerous. They won. And then they decided that it would take many thousands of years of work to conquer the Galaxy. And in those years, younger, lustier races might evolve. Races that by sheer youth and strength might outstrip them. And so they made and sent forth horde upon horde of these suppressors.
"Your race," continued Toralen Ki, "has never been able to use its full mental power. That is because of the suppressor. True, you are a long way from the suppressor, but its power is fearsome and its effect is lasting. It passed through your system thousands of years ago and it held sway over your mental ability to now.
"Your race," said Toralen Ki, "is best equipped to fight the Loard-vogh."
"I don't feel any more intelligent than I did before," objected Thompson.
"No, because you have been under the influence of the suppressor for countless generations. It has become an inherited trait. It will remain an inherited trait until the mentality of the human race is energized, or triggered by a rather powerful wave of mental energy.
"The Loard-vogh will enslave the Galaxy if they are not stopped. Our original home was overrun three thousand years ago, and fourteen times they have caught up with us. Again, Tlembo is being attacked, or perhaps it has not started yet. Fourteen planets named Tlembo lie in our history, and fourteen times have we combed the Galaxy waiting and seeking a race with the proper mental power and technical ability. It would have been useless to energize your minds a thousand years ago, Solarian, for you had not the technical skill to accept it. The shock would have made you all mad. You believe me of superior intellect and knowledge because I have been able to make this machine. I am acknowledged the highest intellect among the Tlembans. I intend to sacrifice my intellect for humanity. The energizing will destroy me."
The meter in Lane's ship read forty. Forty miles per second. Dead ahead was the lacery of the star field, clustered around the tininess of black that was the meteor of the machine. Somewhere in the invisibility of space was Stellor Downing, coming this way.
He knew, because his detector said so.
This was not only a test of operator's skill, but of technical superiority, too. Detectors were not calibrated to the last foot of distance, and he who had the best capability in the art of tuning a detector knew better where the other man was at any time.
But it was also necessary to judge your opponent's error. For a single error would destroy both.
Downing's ship came. It was there and it was gone. Missed by a matter of feet.
And yet not a bead of sweat came. Neither had given ground. Lane grinned inwardly as his ship slowed for the turn. Dead ahead was the sealed door to the machine. He touched the button on his drive-rod, and the dymodine flared forth, boring down the shaft and driving great scintillating clouds of super-heated gases up from the bowels of the meteor. The machine was blasted.
"You stinking opportunist," snarled Downing.
"Mad?"
"That was—"
"One step ahead of you."
"You haven't won—"
"Only succeeded. Now we can fight this out for good. Really want to play, Stellor?"
"I'll run you right into that hole in the meteor," snarled Downing.
The two tiny ships approached on a converging course. Collision course, it was, and somewhere far ahead there was the meteor again. Downing was on the spaceward side, and edging sidewise into Lane's course. Lane was pinched between meteor and Downing; edging outward into Stellor's course and calculated to miss the meteor by several yards—if he did not give.
At fifty miles per second they rocketed forward, approaching one another, and telling each other what was going to happen next.
The communicator in Thompson's ship told the story. Thompson heard it, and Toralen Ki understood it from Thompson's mind.
"They—Stop them!"
"I cannot," replied Thompson, with a smile.
"You must. They are necessary to our plan."
"Plan?"
"I am going to give up my intellect. Lane and Downing are emotional and psychological opposites. In one great burst of mental energy, my intellect will be expended. The shock wave from my mind will energize their minds. Their intellects will merge, making them emotional twins and psychological equals, each with the double power gained by joining with the other. They must willingly submit to this mental combining, for then the wave of energy from their minds in twin transfer will awaken every human in the Solar sector of the Galaxy."
"You're asking them to give up their identities."
"I am. And they must."
"They will never do it."
"You are stalling for time. Order them to cease. If either of them is killed, our plan may fail completely. Both of them are of the highest order of intellect—and of opposite psychology. That is necessary—order them to stop—immediately!"
Thompson laughed.
"I am willing to die for civilization. They should—" Toralen Ki looked at Thompson, and his eyes widened in wonder, fear, and finally horror.
"You are under control—the Loard-vogh!"
Thompson smiled affably. "The Terran known as Billy Thompson left this body when the machine was blasted," he said. "Previously I could but urge and draw him into agreement with me. And you, Toralen Ki, are also necessary to the plan."
Thompson's one hundred and eighty pounds of fine body came forward. Thirty-seven pounds of Little Man shrank back in fear. Not fear of life—but fear for civilization.
And as Thompson's body reached for Toralen Ki, the radiation alarm blared. It registered; dymodines had been fired and simultaneous hits had been made.
Toralen Ki's free hand snapped the power of the telementor over full. Physical weakling though he was, he was aided mentally by the power in the mental transfer machine. He invaded Thompson's mind and fought the Loard-vogh intelligence that he found there.
Waves of mental energy spewed forth, and Hotang Lu came running to aid his friend. Stricken rigid, Thompson almost ceased to breathe; his heart faltered. For Toralen Ki and the alien Loard-vogh were using all of Billy Thompson's mind against each other, trying to drive the other out, calling upon more and more, even to the point of short-circuiting some of the voluntary sectors. It was battle, silent and fierce.
And the waves of mental energy spread in a vast radiation pattern as Toralen Ki and the Loard-vogh fought for the possession of Billy Thompson's mind and body.
