The Galaxy Primes :: CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 8

E. E. Smith

Next morning, early, Belle tapped lightly on Garlock's door.

"Come in."

She did so. "Have you had your coffee?"

"Yes."

"So have I."

Neither Belle nor Garlock had recovered; both faces showed strain and drain.

"I think we'd better break this up," Belle said, quietly.

"Check. We'll have to, if we expect to get any work done."

Belle could not conceal her surprise.

"Oh, not for the reason you think," Garlock went on, quickly. "Your record as a man-killer is still one hundred point zero zero zero percent. I've been in love with you ever since we paired. Before that, even."

"Flapdoodle!" she snorted, inelegantly. "Why, I...."

"Keep still a minute. And I'm not going to fight with you again. Ever. I'm not going to touch you again until I can control myself a lot better than I could last night."

"Oh? That was mostly my fault, of course. But in love? Uh-uh, I've seen men in love. You aren't. I couldn't make you be, not with the best I could do. Not even in bed. You aren't, Clee—if you are, I'm an Australian bushman."

"Perhaps I'm an atypical case. I'm not raving about your perfect body—you know what that is like already. Nor about your mind, which is the only one I know of as good as my own. Maybe I'm in love with what I think you ought to be ... or what I hope you will be. Anyway, I'm in love with something connected with you—and with no other woman alive. Shall we go eat?"

"Uh-huh—let's."

They joined Lola and James at the table; and if Lola noticed anything out of the ordinary, she made no sign.

And after breakfast, in the Main—

"About three weeks, Jim, you think?" Garlock asked.

"Give or take a couple of days, yes."

"And Belle and I would just be in the way—at least until time to show Deggi about the activation ... and all those Primes to organize ... we'd better leave you here, don't you think, and get going?"

"I'll buy that. We'll finish as soon as possible."

Lola and James moved a few personal belongings planetside; Garlock and Belle shot the Pleiades across a vast gulf of space to one of the planets they had scanned so fleetingly on their preliminary survey. Its name was, both remembered, Lizoria; its two Primes were named Rezdo Semolo and Mirea Mitala—male and female, respectively.

After sending down a very brief and perfunctory request for audience—which was in effect a declaration of intent and nothing else—Garlock and Belle teleported themselves down into Semolo's office, where both Lizorian Primes were.

Both got up out of peculiar-looking chairs to face their visitors. Both were tall; both were peculiarly thin. Not the thinness of emaciation, but that of bodily structure.

"On them it looks good," Belle tight-beamed a thought to Garlock.

Both moved fast and with exquisite control; both were extraordinarily graceful. "Snaky" was Belle's thought of the woman; "sinuous" was Garlock's of the man. Both were completely hairless, of body and of head—not by nature, but via electric-shaver clipping. Both wore sandals. The man wore shorts and a shirt-like garment of nylon or its like; the woman wore just enough ribbons and bands to hold a hundred thousand credits' worth of jewels in place. She appeared to be about twenty years—Tellurian equivalent—old; he was probably twenty-three or twenty-four.

"We did not invite you in and we do not want you here," Semolo said, coldly. "So get out, both of you. If you don't, when I count three I'll throw you out, and I won't be too careful about how many of your bones I break. One.... Two...."

"Pipe down, Rezdo!" the girl exclaimed. "They have something we haven't, or they wouldn't be here. Whatever it is, we want it."

"Oh, let him try, Miss Mitala," Garlock said, through her hard-held block, in the depth of her mind. "He won't hurt us a bit and it may do him some good. While he's wasting effort I'll compare notes with my partner here, Galactic Vice-Admiral Belle Bellamy. I'm glad to see that one of you has at least a part of a brain."

"... Three!" Semolo did his best, with everything he had, without even attracting Garlock's attention. He then tried to leap at the intruder physically, despite the latter's tremendous advantage in weight and muscle, but found that he could not move.

Then, through Belle's solidly-set blocks, "How are you doing, ace? Getting anywhere?"

"My God!" came Belle's mental shriek. "What—how can—but no, you didn't give that to Fao, surely!"

"I'll say I didn't—nor to Delcamp. But you're going to need it, I'm thinking."

"But can you? Even if you would—and I'm just beginning to realize how big a man you really are—can that kind of stuff be taught? I probably haven't got the brain-cells it takes to handle it."

"I'm not sure, but I've reworked our Prime Fields into one and made a couple of other changes. Theoretically, it ought to work. Shall I come in and try it?"

"Don't be an idiot, darling. Of course!"

As impersonally as a surgeon exploring an organ, Garlock went into Belle's mind. "Tune to the field ... that's it—fine! Then—I'll do it real slow, and watch me close—you do like so ... get it?"

"Uh-huh!" Belle breathed, excitedly. "Got it!"

"Then this ... and this ... and there you are. You can try it on me, if you like."

"Uh-uh. No sale. I don't need practice and I'd like to preserve the beautiful illusion that maybe I could crack your shield if I wanted to. I'll work on Miss Snake-Hips here, the serpentine charmer—but say, I'll bet there's a bone in it. You can block it, can't you?"

"Yes. It goes like this." He showed her. "It takes full mastery of the Prime Field, but you've got that."

"Oh, wonderful! Thanks, Clee darling. But do you mean to actually say I can now completely block you or any other Prime out?"

"You're going too far, ace. Me, yes—but don't forget that there very well may be people—or things—as far ahead of us as we are ahead of pointer pups."

"Huh! Balloon-juice and prop-wash! I just know, Clee, that you're the absolute tops of the whole, entire, macrocosmic universe."

"Well, we can dream, of course." Garlock withdrew his mind from Belle's and turned his attention to the now quiet Semolo. "Well, my over-confident and contumacious young squirt; are you done horsing around or do you want to keep it up until you addle completely what few brains you have?"

The Lizorian made no reply; but merely glared.

"The trouble with you half-baked, juvenile—I almost added 'delinquent' to that, and perhaps I should have—Primes is that you know too damned much that isn't true. As an old Tellurian saying hath it, 'you're altogether too big for your britches.'

"Thus, simply because you have lived a few years on one single planet and haven't encountered anyone able to stand up to you, you've sold yourself on the idea that there's nobody, anywhere, who can. You're wrong—you couldn't be more so if you had an army to help you.

"What, actually, have you done? What, actually, have you got? Practically nothing. You haven't even started a starship; you've scarcely started making plans. You realize dimly that the theory is not in any of the books, that you'll have to slug it out for yourself, but that is work. So you're still just posing and throwing your weight around.

"As a matter of fact, you're merely a drop in a lake. There are thousands of millions of planets, and thousands of millions of Prime Operators. Most of them are probably a lot stronger than you are; many of them may be stronger than my partner and I are. I am not at all certain that you will pass even the first screening; but since you are without question a Prime Operator, I will deliver the message we came to deliver. Miss Mitala, do you want to listen or shall we drive it into you, too?"

"I want to listen to anyone or anything who has a working starship and who can do what you have just done."

"Very well," and Garlock told the general-distribution version of the story of the Galactic Service.

"Quite interesting," Semolo said loftily, at its end. "Whether or not I would be interested depends, of course, on whether there's a position high enough for...."

"I doubt very much if there's one low enough," Garlock cut in sharply. "However, since it's part of my job, I'll get in touch with you later. Okay, Belle."

And in the Main—"What a jerk!" Belle exclaimed. "What a half-cooked, half-digested pill! I simply marvel at your forbearance, Clee. You should have turned him inside out and hung him up to dry—especially behind the ears!" Then, suddenly, she giggled. "But do you know what I did?"

"I can guess. A couple of shots in the arm?"

"Uh-huh. Next time he pitches into her she'll slap his ears right off. Oh, brother!"

"Check and double-check. But let's hop to Number Two.... Here it is."

"Oh, yes," came a smooth, clear, diamond-sharp thought in reply to Garlock's introductory call. "This world, as you have perceived, is Falne. I am indeed Baver 14WD27, my companion Prime is indeed Glarre 12WD91. You are, we perceive, Bearers of the Truth; of great skill and of high advancement. Your visit here will, I am sure, be of immense benefit to us and possibly, I hope, of some small benefit to you. We will both be delighted to have you both 'port yourselves to us at once."

The Tellurians did so—and in the very instant of appearance Garlock was met by a blast of force the like of which he had never even imagined. The two Falnian Primes, capable operators both, had built up their highest possible potentials and had launched both terrific bolts without any hint of warning.

Belle's mind, however, was already fused with Garlock's. Their combined blocks were instantaneous in action; their counter-thrust was nearly so. Both Falnians staggered backward until they were stopped by the room's wall.

"Ah, yes," Garlock said, then. "You are indeed, in a small and feeble way, Seekers after the Truth; of which we are indeed Bearers. Lesser Bearers, perhaps, but still Bearers. You will indeed profit greatly from our visit. You err, however, in thinking that we may in any respect profit from you. You have nothing whatever that we have not had for long. Now let us, if you please, take a few seconds of time to get acquainted, each with the other."

"That, indeed, is the logical and seemly thing to do." Both Falnians straightened up and stepped forward; neither arrogantly nor apologetically, but simply as though nothing at all out of the ordinary had taken place.

Each pair studied the other. Physically, the two pairs were surprisingly alike. Baver was almost as big as Garlock; almost as heavily muscled. Glarre could have been cast in Belle's own mold.

With that, however, all resemblance ceased.

Both Falnians were naked. The man wore only a belt and pouch in lieu of pockets; the woman only a leather carryall slung from one shoulder—big enough, Garlock thought, to hold a week's supplies for an Explorer Scout.

His hair was thick, bushy, unkempt; sun-bleached to a nondescript blend of pale colors. Hers—long, heavy, meticulously middle-parted and dressed—was a startling two-tone job. To the right of the part it was a searingly brilliant red; to the left, an equally brilliant royal blue.

His skin was deeply tanned. The color of hers was completely masked by a bizarrely spectacular overlay of designs done in semi-indelible, multi-colored dyes.

"Ah, you are worthy indeed of receiving an increment of Truth. Hear, then, the message we bring," and again Garlock told the story.

"We thank you, sir and madam, from our hearts. We will accept with joy your help in finishing our ship; we will do all that in us lies to further the cause of the Galactic Service. Until a day, then?"

"Until a day." Then, to Belle, "Okay, ace. Ready? Go!"

And up in the Main—"Sweet Sin!" Belle exclaimed. "What a pair they turned out to be! Clee, that simply scared me witless."

"You can play that in spades." Garlock jammed his hands into his pockets and prowled about the room, his face a black scowl of concentration.

Until, finally, he pulled himself out of the brown study and said: "I've been trying to think if there's any other thing, however slight, that I have and you haven't. There isn't. You've got it all. You're just as fast as I am, just as sharp and as accurate—and, since we now draw on the same field, just as strong."

"Why Clee! You're worrying about me? You've done altogether too much for me, already."

"Anything I can do, I've got to do ... well, shall we go?"

"We shall."

They visited four more planets that day. And after supper that night, standing in the corridor between their doors, Belle began to soften her shield, as though to send a thought. Almost instantly, however, she changed her mind and snapped it back to full on.

"Good night, Clee," she said.

"Good night, Belle," and each went into his own room.

The next day they worked nine planets, and the day after that they worked ten. They ate supper in friendly fashion; then strolled together across the Main, to a davenport.

"It's funny," Belle said thoughtfully, "having this tremendous ship all to ourselves. To have a private conference right out here in the Main ... or is it?"

He triggered the shields, she watched him do it. "It is now," he assured her.

"Prime-proof? Not ordinary Gunther blocks?"

"Uh-huh. Two hundred kilovolts and four hundred kilogunts. Backed by all the force of the Prime and Op fields and the full power of the engines. I told you I'd made some changes in the set-up."

"Private enough, I guess ... what a mess those Primes are! And we'll have to make the rounds twice more—when we alert 'em and when we pick 'em up."

"Not necessarily. This new set-up ought to give us a galaxy-wide reach. Let's try Semolo, on Lizoria, shall we?"

"Uh-huh—Let's."

"Tune in, then ace."

"Ace, darling?"

"Ace, Darling?"

"Darling. You said you weren't going to fight with me any more. Okay—I'm not going to try any more to lick you until after I've licked myself. I'm tuned—you may fire when ready, Gridley."

They fired—and hit the mark dead center. Top-lofty and arrogant and belligerent as ever, the Lizorian Prime took the call. "I thought all the time you wanted something. Well, I neither want nor need...."

"Cut it, you unlicked cub, until you can begin to use that half-liter of golop you call a brain," Garlock said, harshly. "We're just trying out a new ultra-communicator. Thanks for your help."

On the fourth day they worked eleven planets; the fifth day saw the forty-sixth planet done and the immediate job finished. All during supper, it was very evident that Belle had something on her mind.

After eating, she went out into the Main and slumped down on a davenport. Garlock followed her. A cigarette leaped out of a closed box and into place between her lips. It came alight. She smoked it slowly, without relish; almost as though she did not know that she was smoking.

"Might as well get it out of your system, Belle," Garlock said aloud. "What are you thinking about at the moment?"

Belle exhaled; the half-smoked butt vanished. "At the moment I was thinking about Gunther blocks. Specifically, their total inability to cope with that new Prime probe of yours." She stared at him, narrow-eyed. "It goes through them just like nothing at all." She paused; eyed him questioningly.

"No comment."

"And yet you gave it to me. Freely, of your own accord. Even before I needed it. Why?"

"Still no comment."

"You'd better comment, Buster, before I blow my top."

"There is such a thing as urbanity."

"I've heard of it, yes; even though you never did believe I ever had any. You talk a good game of urbanity, but your brand of it would never carry you that far...."

She paused. He remained silent. She went on.

"Of course, it does put a lot of pressure on me to develop myself."

"I'm glad you used the word 'develop' instead of 'treat.'"

"Oh, sometimes—at rare intervals—I'm not exactly dumb. But you knew—you must have known—what a horrible risk you took in making me as tremendously powerful as you are."

"Some, perhaps, but very definitely less risky than not doing it."

"Getting information out of you is harder than pulling teeth. Clee Garlock, I want you to tell me why!"

"Very well." Garlock's jaw set. "You've had it in mind all along that this is some kind of a lark; that you and I are Gunther Tops of the universe. Or did that belief weaken a bit when we met Baver 14WD27?"

"Well, perhaps—a little. However, the probability is becoming greater with every planet we visit. After all, some race has to be tops. Why shouldn't it be us?"

"What a logic—excuse me, skip it...."

"Oh, you really meant it when you said you weren't going to fight with me any more?"

"I'm going to try not to. Now, remembering that I don't consider your premise valid, just suppose that when we visit some planet some day, you get your mind burned out and I don't—solely because I had something I could have given you and wouldn't. What then?"

"Oh. I thought that was what you ... but suppose I can't...."

"We won't suppose anything of the kind. But that wasn't all that was on your mind. Nor most."

"How true. Those Primes. The women. Honestly, Clee, I never saw—never imagined—such a bunch of exhibitionistic, obstreperous, obnoxious, swell-headed, hussies in my whole life. And every day it was borne in on me more and more that I was—am—exactly like the rest of them."

Garlock was wise enough to say nothing, and Belle went on: "I've been talking a good game of licking myself, but this time I'm going to do it."

She jumped up and doubled her fists. "If you can do it, I can," she declared. "Like the ancient ballad—'Anything you can do I can do better.'" She tried to be jaunty, but the jauntiness did not ring quite true.

"That's an unfortunate quotation, I'm afraid. The trouble is, I haven't."

"Huh? Don't be an idiot, Clee. You certainly have—what else do you suppose put me so far down into the dumps?"

"In that case, you certainly will. So come on up out of the dumps."

"Wilco—and I certainly will. But for a woman who has been talking so big, I feel low in my mind. A good-night kiss, Clee, darling? Just one—and just a little one, at that?"

"Sweetheart!"

There were more than one, and none of them was little. Eventually, however, the two stood, arms still around each other, in the corridor between their doors.

"But kissing's as far as it goes, isn't it," Belle said. The remark was not a question; nor was it quite a statement.

"That's right."

"So good night, darling."

"Good night, ace."

And when they next saw each other, at the breakfast table, Belle was apparently her usual dauntless self.

"Hi, darling—sit down," she said, gaily. "Your breakfast is on the table. Bacon, eggs, toast, strawberry jam, and a liter of coffee."

"Nice! Thanks, ace."

They ate in silence for a few minutes; then her hand crept tentatively across the table. He pressed it warmly. "You look a million, Belle. Out of the dumps?"

"Pretty much—in most ways. One way, though, I'm in deeper than ever. You see, I know exactly what you did to Fao Talaho; and why neither you or anybody else could do it to me. Or if they could, what would happen if they did."

"I was hoping you would. I couldn't very well tell you, before, but...."

"Of course not. I see that."

"... the fact is that Fao, and all the others we've met, are young enough, unformed enough—plastic enough—yes, damn it, weak enough—to bend. But you are tremendously strong, and twelve Rockwell numbers harder than a diamond. You wouldn't bend. If enough stress could be applied—and that's decidedly questionable—you wouldn't bend. You'd break, and I can't figure it. You're a little older, of course, but not enough to...."

"How about the fact that I've been banging myself for eight years against Cleander Garlock, the top Prime of the universe and the hardest? That might have something to do with it, don't you think?"

Garlock said, "Indefensible conclusions drawn from insufficient data. That's just what I've been talking about. No matter how we got the way we are, though, the fact is that you and I have got to fight our own battles and bury our own dead."

"Check. Like having a baby, but worse. There's nothing anybody else can do—even you—except maybe hold my hand, like now."

"That's about it. But speaking of holding hands, would it help if we paired again?"

Belle studied the question for two full minutes; her fine eyes clouded. "No," she said, finally. "I would enjoy it too much, and you'd ... well, you wouldn't...."

"Huh?" he demanded.

"Oh, physically, of course; but that isn't enough, or good enough, now. You see, I know what your personal code is. It's unbelievable, almost—I never heard of one like it, except maybe a priest or two—but I admire you tremendously for it. You would never, willingly, pair with a woman you really loved. That was why you were so glad to break ours off. You can't deny it."

"I won't try to deny it. But you can't bluff me, Belle, so please quit trying. Basically, your code is the same as mine. Why else did you initiate our break?"

Belle's block went solid, and Garlock said hastily, aloud, "Excuse it, please. Cancel. I've just said, and know as an empirical fact, that you've got to do the job alone—but I can't seem to help putting my big, flat foot in it by blundering in anyway. Let's get to work, shall we?"

"What at? Interview the Primes, I'd say—tell them to hold themselves in readiness to attend...."

"On very short notice...."

"Yes. To attend the big meeting on Tellus. We'll have to make a schedule. It shouldn't be held until after Fao and Deggi get their ship built—it can't be held, of course, until after you and Jim are out of SSE. Have you got that figured out yet?"

"Pretty much." He told her his plan.

Belle giggled, then burst into laughter. "So I'm in it, too? Wonderful!"

"You have to be. If we make him mad enough, he'll fire you, too."

"Without hiring me first? He couldn't."

"He could, very easily. He doesn't know one-tenth of one percent of his people. If we work it right he'll assume that you're one of us wage-slaves, too. Lola, too, for that matter."

"Careful, Clee. You and I think this is funny, but Lola wouldn't. She'd be shocked to her sweet little core, and she'd louse up the whole deal. So be very sure she doesn't get in on it."

"I guess you're right ... well, shall we go out and insult our touchy young friend Semolo? Ready.... Go!"

"Oh, it's you again. I tell you...." the Lizorian began.

"You will tell me nothing. You will listen. Link your mind to Mitala's," and the linked Tellurian minds enforced the order. "In about two weeks the Primes of many worlds will meet in person on Tellus. Arrange your affairs so that on ten minutes' notice you both can leave Lizoria for Tellus aboard our starship, the Pleiades. That is all."

"He'll come, too," Belle chortled. "He'll writhe and scream, but he'll come."

"You couldn't keep him away," Garlock agreed.

On the next planet, Falne, the procedure was a little different. The information was the same, but—"One word of warning," Garlock added. "It is to be a meeting of minds; not a contest to set up a pecking-order. If you try any such business you will be disciplined; sharply and in public."

"Suppose that, under such conditions, we refuse to attend the meeting?"

"That is your right. There is no coercion whatever. Whether or not you come will depend upon whether or not you two are in reality Seekers after Truth. Until a day."

And so it went. Planet after planet. On not one of those worlds had any Prime changed his thinking. Not one was really interested in the Galactic Service as an instrument for the good of all mankind. There were almost as many attitudes as there were Primes; but all were essentially self-centered and selfish.

"That tears it, Belle—busts it wide open. I can—I mean we together can do either job. That is, either be top boss and run the thing or put in full time beating some sense into those hard skulls. We can't do both."

"On paper, we should," Belle said, thoughtfully. "You're Galactic Admiral; I'm your Vice. One job apiece. But we're not going to be separated. Besides...."

"Two (minds) (brains) are much better than one," both said, except for one word, in unison.

Belle laughed. "That settles that. The Garlock-Bellamy fusion is Galactic Admiral—so we need a good Vice. Who? Deggi and Fao? They're cooperative and idealistic enough, but.... Oh, I don't know exactly what it is they lack. Do you?"

"No; I can't put it into words or thoughts. Probably the concept is too new for pigeon-holing. It isn't exactly strength or hardness or toughness or resilience or brisance—maybe a combination of all five. What we need is a pair like us but better."

"There aren't any."

"Don't be too sure." Belle glanced at him in surprise and he went on: "Not that we've seen, no. But each of those worlds centers a volume of space containing thousands of planets. Including the Tellurian and the Margonian, we now have forty-eight regions defined. Let's run a very fast search-pattern of Region Forty-nine and see what we come up with."

"All right ... but suppose we do find somebody who out-Gunthers us?"

"I'd a lot rather have it that way than the way it is now. I'll do the hopping, you the checking. Here's the first one—what do you read?"

"N. G."

"And this one?"

"The same."

"And this?"

"Ditto."

Until, finally: "Clee, just how long are you going to keep this up?"

"Until we find something or run out of time for the meeting. Belle, I really want to find somebody who amounts to something."

"So do I, really, so go ahead."

But they did not run out of time. At planet number four-hundred-something, Belle suddenly emitted a shriek—vocally as well as mentally. "Clee! Hold it! Here's something, I think!"

"I'm sure there is, and I'm gladder to see you two people than can possibly be expressed."

Belle whirled; so did Garlock. A man stood in the middle of the Main; a man shaped very much like Garlock, but with long, badly-tousled hair and a bushy wilderness of fiery-red whiskers.

"Please excuse this intrusion, Admiral—or should it be plural? Improper address, I'm sure, but your joint tenure is a concept so new and so vast that I am not yet able to grasp it fully—but you are working at such high speed that I had to do something drastic. You will, I trust, remain here long enough to discuss certain matters with my wife and me?"

"We'll be very glad to."

"Thank you. I will return, then, more decorously, and bring her. One moment." He disappeared.

"Wife!" Belle exclaimed, more than half in dismay. "They must be, then...."

"Yeah." The thought of a wife did not bother Garlock at all. "Talk about power! And speed! To get all that stuff and 'port up here in the millisecond or so we had the screens open? Baby Doll, there's a guy who is what a Prime Operator ought to be!"

In less than a minute the man reappeared, accompanied by a woman who was very obviously pregnant—eight months or so. Like the man, she was dressed in tight-fitting coveralls. Her hair, however—it was a natural red, too—was cut to a uniform length of eight inches, and each hair individually stood out, perfectly straight and perfectly perpendicular to the element of the scalp from which it sprang.

"Friends Belle and Clee of Tellus, I present Therea, my wife; and Alsyne, myself; of this planet Thaker. We have numbers, too, but they are never used among friends."

Acknowledgments were made and a few minutes of conversation ensued, during which the two couples studied each other.

"This looks mighty good to me," Garlock said then. "Shall we go screens half-down, Alsyne, and cry in each other's beer?"

In thirty seconds of flashing communication each became thoroughly informed. Those minds could send, and could receive, an incredibly vast amount of information in an incredibly brief space of time.

"Your ship should work and doesn't," Garlock said. "Show me; in detail."

Alsyne showed him.

"Oh, I see. You didn't work out quite all the theory. It has to be activated. Like this...." Garlock showed Alsyne.

"I see. Thanks." Alsyne disappeared and was gone for some ten minutes. He reappeared, grinning hugely behind his flaming wilderness of beard. "It works perfectly; for which our heartfelt thanks. And now that my mind is at complete peace with the universe, we will consider the utterly fascinating subject of your proposed Galactic Service. You two Tellurians, immature although you are, have made two tremendous contributions to the advancement of the Scheme of Things—three, if you count the starship, which is comparatively unimportant—each of such import that no human mind can foresee any fraction of its consequences. First, your Prime Field, the probe and its screen...."

"Clee!" Belle drove the thought. "You didn't give him that, surely!"

"Tut-tut, my child," Therea soothed her. "You are alarming yourself about nothing."

"The only trouble with you two youngsters is that you aren't quite—very nearly, of course, but very definitely not quite—grown up." Alsyne smiled again; not only with mouth and eyes, but with his whole hairy face. "To the mature mind there is no such thing as status. Each knows what he can do best and does it as a matter of course. Rank is not necessary.

"Second, the unimaginably important contribution of the ability to combine two dissimilar but intimately compatible minds into one tremendously effective fusion. While Therea and I have had only a few moments to play with it, we realize some of its possibilities. Thus, since she is a Doctor of Humanities...."

"Oh," Belle interrupted. "That's why you knew what I was thinking about, even though I tight-beamed the thought and my screens were tight?"

"Exactly so. But to continue. With her sympathy and empathy, and my driving force and so on, the job of licking these young Primes into shape is, as your idiom has it, 'strictly our dish.' It is a truly delicious thought.

"You two, on the other hand, have much that we lack. Breadth and depth and scope of imagination and of vision; yet almost incredible will-power and stamina and resolve...."

"That's the word I was trying to think of—will-power," Belle flashed a thought at Garlock.

"... qualities virtually always mutually exclusive; but the combination of which makes your fusion uniquely qualified to lead and direct this new and magnificent movement. But Therea and I have been idle and frustrated far too long. We can be of most use, at the moment, on Margonia; working with the Fao-Deggi unit. Therefore, with renewed deep thanks, we go."

Man and wife disappeared; and, ten seconds later, the Thakern starship vanished from its world.

"Well, what do you think of that?" Belle gasped. "I was actually afraid to think, even behind a Prime screen. I don't know yet whether I want to kiss 'em or kill 'em."

"I do. That guy is really a Prime, Belle. He's older, bigger, and a lot better than I am."

"Uh-uh," she demurred, positively. "Older, yes. More mature—you baby, you!" She snickered gleefully. "If he hadn't included you in that crack I'd've stabbed him, so help me, even though it wasn't true. He said himself it's you who has got what it takes to lead and direct, not him."

"Us. We, I mean," he corrected, absently.

"Uh-huh; us-we. One, now and forever. Hot Dog! Anyway, he wants us to and we want to so everything's lovely and so let's get to work on Fatso and his Foster. I think we ought to have some fun for a change and that'll be a lot. When do we want to hit him?"

"Any day Monday through Friday. Nine-fifteen A.M. Eastern Daylight time. Plus or minus one minute."

"Nice! Catch him in flagrante delicto. Lovely—shovel on the coal, my intrepid engineer!"

On a Wednesday morning, then, at twelve minutes past nine EDT, the Pleiades hung poised, high over the Chancellery of Solar System Enterprises, Incorporated.

"Remember, Belle!" Garlock was pacing the Main. "To keep 'em staggering we'll have to land slugging and beat 'em to every punch. You did a wonderful job on her last time, and it's been eating on her ever since. She's probably been rehearsing in front of a mirror just how she's going to tear you apart next time and just how she's going to spit out the pieces. Last time, you were cold, stiff, rigidly formal, and polite. So this time it'll be me, and I'll be hot and bothered, dirty, low, coarse, lewd, and very, very rough."

Belle threw back her head and laughed. "Rough? Yes. Vicious, contemptuous, or ugly; yes. A master of fluent, biting, and pyrotechnic profanity; yes. But low or dirty or coarse or lewd, Clee? Or any one of the four, to say nothing of them all? Uh-uh. Ferber's a filthy beast, of course; but even he knows you're one of the cleanest men that ever lived. They'd know it was an act."

"Not unless I give 'em time to think—or unless you do, before he fires Jim—in which case we'll lose the game anyway. But how about you? If I can knock 'em too groggy to think, will you carry on and keep 'em that way?"

"Watch my blasts!" Belle giggled gleefully. "I never tried anything like that—any more than you have—but I'll guarantee to be just as low, dirty, coarse, lewd, and crude as you are. Probably more so, because in this particular case it'll be fun. You see, you're a man—you can't possibly despise and detest that slimy stinker either in the same way or as much as I do."

"This ought to be good. Cut the rope, Jim."

Even before the starship came to rest, Garlock drove a probe into the sanctum sanctorum of the Chancellery—an utterly unheard-of act of insolence.

"Foster! This is the Pleiades coming in. Garlock calling. Hot up the tri-di and the recorder, Toots. Put Fatso on, and snap into it.... I said shake a leg!"

"Why, I.... You...."

"Stop stuttering and come to life, you half-witted bag! Gimme Ferber and hurry it up—this ship's tricky."

"Why, you ... I never...." Ferber's outraged First Secretary could scarcely talk. "He ... he is...."

"I know, Babe, I know—I could set that to music and sing it, with gestures. 'Chancellor Ferber is in conference and cannot be disturbed,'" he mimicked, savagely. "Put him on now—but quick!"

The tri-di tank brightened up; Chancellor Ferber's image appeared. He was disheveled, surprised and angry, but Garlock gave him no chance to speak.

"Well, Fatso—at last! Where the hell have you been all morning? I want some stuff, just as fast as God will let you get it together," and he began to read off, as fast as he could talk, a long list of highly technical items.

Ferber tried for many seconds to break in, and Garlock finally allowed him to do so.

"Are you crazy, Garlock?" he shouted. "What in hell's name are you bothering me with that stuff for? You know better than that—make out your requisitions and send them through channels!"

"Channels, hell!" Garlock shouted back. "Hasn't it got through your four-inch-thick skull into your idiot's brain yet that I'm in a hurry? I don't want this stuff today; I want it day before yesterday—this damned junk-heap is apt to fall apart any minute. So quit goggling and slobbering at me, you wall-eyed, slimy, fat toad. Get that three hundred weight of suet into action. Hump yourself!"

"You ... you ... Why, I was never so insulted...."

"Insulted? You?" Garlock out-roared him. "Listen, Fatso. If I ever set out to really insult you, you'll know it—it'll blister all the paint off the walls. All I'm trying to do now is get you off that fat butt of yours and get some action."

Ferber became purple and pounded his desk in consuming anger.

Garlock yelled louder and pounded harder. "Start rounding up this stuff—but fast—or I'll come down there and take your job away from you and do it myself—and for your own greasy hide's sake you'd better believe I'm not just chomping my choppers, either."

"You'll What?" Ferber screamed. "You're fired!"

"You fire me?" Garlock mimicked the scream. "And make it stick? You'd better write that one up for the funnies. Why, you lard-brain, you couldn't fire a cap-pistol."

"Foster!" Ferber yelled. "Terminate Garlock as of now. Insubordination, and misconduct, abuse of position, incompetence, malfeasance—everything else you can think of. Blacklist him all over the System!"

At the word "fired" Belle, had leaped to her feet and had stopped laughing.

"Miss Bellamy!" Ferber snapped.

"Yes, sir?" she answered, sweetly.

"You are hereby promoted to be Head of the...."

"Oh, yeah?" Belle sneered, her voice cutting like a knife. "You unprincipled, lascivious, lecherous Hitler! Have you got the unmitigated gall to take me for a floozie? To think you can add me to your collection of bootlicking, round-heeled tramps?"

"You're fired and blacklisted too!"

"How nice! You know, I don't know of anything I'd rather have happen to me?"

"Get James on there—you, James...."

"You don't need to fire me, you fat-headed old goat," James said, contemptuously. "I've already quit—the exact second you fired Clee."

"No you didn't!" Ferber screamed. "Resignation not accepted. You're Fired! Dishonorably discharged—blacklisted everywhere—you'll never get another job—anywhere! And here's your slip, too!" Miss Foster was very fast on the machines.

James 'ported his slip up into the Pleiades, just as Garlock and Belle had done with theirs, and disappeared with it as they had; reappearing almost instantly.

"Montandon!"

"Chancellor Ferber, are you completely out of your mind? You can't discharge either Miss Bellamy or me."

"I can't?" he gloated. "Why not?"

"Because neither of us is employed. By anybody."

"That's right, Fatso," Belle said. "We just came along. Just to keep the boys company. It's lonesome, you know, 'way out in deep space."

Miss Foster ripped a half-filled-out termination form out of her machine and hurled it into a waste-basket. Ferber's jaw dropped and his eyes stared glassily, but he rallied quickly.

"I can blacklist her, though, and maybe you think I won't. Belle Bellamy will never get another job in this whole solar system as long as she lives, except through me! Maybe I'll hire her some day, for something, and maybe I won't. Are you listening, Bellamy?"

"Not only listening, I'm reveling in every word." Belle laughed derisively. "I hate to shatter such wonderful dreams—or do I? You see, the Pleiades really works, and the Galaxians own her; lock, stock, and barrel. You wouldn't have any part of her, remember? Insisted on payment for every nut, wire, and service? Now, they want to hire us four for a big operation with this starship. Since you only loaned Garlock and James to them, you might have made some legal trouble on that score, but now that you've fired them both—and in such conclusive language!—we're all set. So when you blacklist us with the Society, please let me know—I want to take a tri-di in technicolor of you doing it. How do you like them parsnips, Your Royal Fatness?"

"I'll see about that!" Ferber stormed. "We'll have an injunction out in an hour!"

"Go ahead," Garlock said, with a wide grin. "Have fun—the Galaxians have legal eagles too, you know. One thing Belle forgot. Just in case you recover consciousness some time and want to steal our termination papers back—especially Belle's; what a howler that was!—don't try it. They're in a Gunther-blocked safe."

Then, as comprehension began to dawn on Ferber's face:

"S-u-c-k-e-r," Garlock drawled.

The Pleiades disappeared.

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