Stopping in the middle of the crowded corridor, Keith shook hands with the chunky bureaucrat and introduced Janos to him He already knew Ilona, however briefly Jo nodded to Rozmenko with ill-concealed impatience as streams of other travellers flowed around them like rushing water lapping past a rock

 

Looking almost ashamed of himself, Rozmenko said to the Stoners, "I am afraid a problem has arisen about Professor Markov's funeral."

 

"A problem?" Keith asked.

 

"It concerns his will. If you could be at my office tomorrow I will explain it to you."

 

"How long will the funeral be delayed?" Jo asked.

 

Rozmenko shrugged his shoulders. "Perhaps indefinitely. Professor Markov's body is being frozen."

 

Keith frowned at the Russian. "But Kir specifically said he didn't want to be frozen."

 

With a puzzled frown of his own, Rozmenko asked, "When did he say that?"

 

"When we visited him at the hospital, day before last."

 

Rozmenko shook his head. "In his last will and testament he--well, if you will come to my office tomorrow I will have the proper people there to explain everything to you."

 

"What time?" Jo wanted to put an end to this pointless conversation.

 

"At your convenience, of course."

 

"Ten o'clock."

 

"Very good, Madam. I will expect you at ten."

 

Jo led them away from Rozmenko, who stood uncertainly in the middle of the busy corridor, and to the Vanguard limousine waiting at curbside. They were whisked off to the corporate offices and living quarters in the heart of Moscow. On the way, Stoner asked his wife to make arrangements for clothing for his two Hungarian friends. With only a slight reluctance, Jo picked up the phone handset and called the manager of the Moscow office.

 

"What do you think the problem is with Kir's will?" Jo asked once she put the phone down.

 

"I haven't the foggiest idea. But I don't like the idea that they're freezing him. That's not what Kir wanted."

 

Realizing that Ilona and Janos had no knowledge at all of what they were talking about, Jo and her husband dropped the subject temporarily.

 

They had dinner brought in to the Vanguard conference room, on the top floor of the office building. Jo pulled the drapes back so they could see Moscow's dazzling skyline, with the river snaking through the heart of the city and the towers and turrets of the old Kremlin brilliantly lit.

 

Stubby little robots carried trays of laden dishes to the end of the long, polished conference table where the four humans sat. Silently the robots waited for further instructions, and silently they glided across the thick carpeting when given orders. They poured wine, removed plates, replaced silverware while the four people largely ignored their presence, except when they wanted something that was not at hand. Stoner found himself thinking that the robots were better than all but the very best of human waiters. The best human waiters anticipated the diner's needs. The fork was there before you realized you were going to need it. The robots had not been programmed to anticipate. But at least they're right there when you want them, he thought. Then, grinning to himself, he added, And they don't bother you with the fake-friendliness routine.

 

Ilona Lucacs grew noticeably edgier as the dinner progressed. By the time dessert was served by the silent little robots she pushed her chair back from the table and said, "I ... I don't feel very well. Please excuse me."

 

Stoner stood up. "Ilona. I had intended to help wean you gradually, but it looks as if you're going to have to make a clean break."

 

Janos stared off at the lights of the city, looking as if he wished he were someplace else. Jo watched the interplay between her husband and the Hungarian woman.

 

"Sit down, Ilona, and try to relax."

 

As if in a daze, she did as he told her.

 

"There's no physical dependence to direct brain stimulation," Stoner said softly, soothingly. "It's an emotional dependence. You don't need a machine to make you feel loved, Ilona. We love you. I love you."

 

Jo felt her teeth grating, but she said nothing. Direct brain

 

stimulation! The girl's addicted. What do they call it? A juicer, I think. Immediately Jo catalogued the fact in her mind as something that might be useful in handling this beautiful young woman

 

Ilona was shaking her head. "Words are only words, Dr. Stoner Nothing but air that drifts away and disappears."

 

He pulled his chair close to Ilona's and grasped her wrist. "Remember Hamlet's advice to his mother," he said softly.

 

Ilona blinked at him, puzzled.

 

With a smile, Stoner quoted, '"Refrain tonight, and that shall lend a kind of easiness to the next abstinence; the next more easy,- for use almost can change the stamp of nature, and either curb the devil, or throw him out with wondrous potency.'"

 

The tawny-eyed young woman smiled back at him and said sadly, "Hamlet's Ophelia went mad and committed suicide. For lack of love."

 

And her gaze drifted toward Janos, who sat red-faced and utterly uncomfortable, trying to pretend none of this was happening, trying to ignore it all or to make himself disappear altogether.

 

She loves the jerk and he doesn't even give her a goddamned smile, Jo said to herself. For the first time she felt a surge of sympathy for Ilona Lucacs.

 

They took the elevator down to the living quarters, five floors below the conference room Jo stayed beside her husband as they walked Ilona and Janos to their rooms. They were adjacent, but had no connecting door. Just as well, thought Jo.

 

"Get a good night's sleep," Stoner told Ilona. Jo knew it was a suggestion that was practically hypnotic.

 

They bid a more formal goodnight to Zoltan Janos and then made their way to the suite at the end of the corridor. In every Vanguard office complex, no matter what city in the world, Jo maintained an apartment suite that was exactly the same. Duplicates of everything, from hairbrushes to computer terminals, so that she could simply reach out her hand and find what she wanted no matter where she happened to be.

 

Now, as they prepared for bed, Stoner told her the whole story of Ilona Lucacs's addiction, of Janos's work on biochips, and President Novotny's lust for the power that nano-technology could give him.

 

"And you gave it to him?" Jo asked, sitting on the edge of the bed as she tugged off her glossy high boots.

 

From the bathroom, where he was brushing his teeth, Stoner replied, "It seemed like the logical thing to do He wanted the power, but he had no idea of what was involved."

 

"It drove him crazy?"

 

Stoner rinsed his mouth and came back into the bedroom "To outsiders it looks as if he's had a nervous breakdown Incapable of functioning. Paralyzed emotionally What's really happened is that for the first time since childhood he sees that there are other human beings on Earth He realizes that he's not alone, that he's part of the whole. He'll never be able to rule again. He'll never be able to see others as tools for his personal use and aggrandizement."

 

"You've brought him back into the human race," said Jo.

 

"Maybe We'll see. But he certainly doesn't have the personality, the mental capacity, the soul to be a great leader He was only a little shit trying to make himself bigger. Now he understands who and what he's been, and it'll be years before he learns to live with that knowledge "

 

Jo leaned back on the bed, still fully dressed except for the boots. "See why I don't want you to give me some of the aliens?"

 

He went to the bed, leaned over and kissed her lightly "You know I don't agree. The symbiotes wouldn't change you that much--except maybe to make you see things from other people's point of view, now and then. Might make you a little less ruthless." He grinned "Could be an improvement, you know "

 

She returned him a malicious smile. "I enjoy being ruthless now and then."

 

Laughing, "Better get your kicks while you can, though The game will be over soon "

 

"You're sure?"

 

-J

 

"I'm positive," he answered seriously "I don't know how it's going to end, but it's coming to a head. Soon."

 

"And then?"

 

He was silent for a long while. Finally he said, "And then we see what kind of spacecraft we've got waiting for us at Delphi."

 

In the basement of the Vanguard building a hatchet-faced man in a security guard uniform put in a call through one of the public telephones on the wall outside the men's room.

 

"Stoner is here," he said when a recorded voice answered "Came in this evening. I don't know how long he'll be here. His wife is with him."

 

GENEVA

 

"ALL RIGHT, let's go through it one more time."

 

The man was in his shirtsleeves and they were rolled up above his elbows. He had kicked off his moccasins hours earlier and now his bare feet were planted on his desk top, gnarled toes hovering over the crumbs and litter of the makeshift supper they had hastily gobbled hours earlier.

 

Three others sat around his desk in the small office- two women and a man One wall of the office was a series of twelve display screens, like a double row of windows. Each screen was crammed with data, photomicrographs, charts, brightly-colored maps, chemical equations.

 

On the wall behind the desk hung the blue and white symbol of the World Health Organization.

 

"God, I've got to get some sleep," said one of the women,

 

gray haired, matronly. "I'll never be able to keep my eyes open tomorrow morning."

 

"This morning, honey," the man behind the desk corrected. "We've got just over seven hours to get all our facts straight for the council meeting "

 

The others grumbled and muttered.

 

"Come on now, what do we know for certain?" the man behind the desk coaxed.

 

His assistant, the other male, started off "It's transmitted through water It does not appear to be an airborne virus, but that's not certain "

 

"Definitely transmitted by water, though. That much is certain," said one of the women.

 

"Sneezes?" asked the man behind the desk. "Plenty of water droplets in a sneeze."

 

"Apparently, yes," said the other woman.

 

"Christ, it must be contagious as all hell then."

 

"Worse "

 

"It attacks women preferentially," said the first woman. Grimly.

 

"Is that for sure?"

 

"Ninety percent of the cases are female. Sixty-three percent of them were pregnant. The damned bug must react to es-trogen or one of the other female hormones "

 

"Christ on a crutch!"

 

The man behind the desk pecked at his tape recorder "Action item: check estrogen levels in all male victims." To the three people in the room he added, "If they have levels of female hormones above the male norm, we'll have learned something."

 

"Something," said the first woman "But what good will it do us?"

 

The man behind the desk shrugged "You're sure about how it works?"

 

"Destroys the lining of the stomach--"

 

"The whole digestive tract, right down to the asshole."

 

"Do you have to be crude?"

 

"Sorry "

 

"It's the stomach lining that's important The virus dissolves it, and the digestive acids get into the abdominal cavity and eat away the internal organs "

 

"Excruciating pain "

 

"Victim usually dies within hours "

 

"Which doesn't leave us with much to study "

 

"Incubation time?" asked the man behind the desk "How long between the time the victim takes in the virus and it starts dissolving the stomach lining "

 

"Unknown "

 

"Can't be long, not at the rate the plague is spreading "

 

The colored maps showed a garish red where the epidemic existed Southeast Asia and most of India were in red Tendrils of red extended northward into China and west through Iran Islands of red splotched major cities across half the world Istanbul, Manila, Naples, Frankfurt, Rio, New Orleans, Miami, New York

 

"The virus likes a warm climate," said the man behind the desk

 

"Yeah, but it's spreading into the temperate zones," tht other male replied

 

"Damn "

 

"Vectors?"

 

"Commercial air traffic," said the younger woman

 

"Are you sure "

 

She tapped at the remote control unit in her hand and one of the display screens showed a world map with a speeded-up presentation of where the disease had first been reported and how it had spread The tendrils of red followed world air routes

 

"Wonderful," groaned the man behind the desk "If we want to stop the spread of the plague we've got to shut down all the goddamned commercial air carriers "

 

"Fat chance "

 

"The virus rides the airlines Damn That makes it tough "

 

"Are we certain it's a virus " The others turned toward the

 

gray-haired woman "I mean, we haven't isolated it, whatever it is We're just assuming it's a virus "

 

"You think it might be a microbe' A bacterium' That would be good news "

 

"Too good to be true Whatever it is filters right through everything we've used to find it "

 

"Chemical analyses'"

 

"Inconclusive I think whatever the bug is, it dissolves itself when the stomach acids come pouring out "

 

"That doesn't make sense If it kamikazes inside its victim, then how the hell does it spread to other victims'"

 

"It's transmitted before it attacks the mucous layer, maybe'"

 

They all fell silent until the man behind the desk said grimly, "Seems to me what we don't know about this bug outweighs what we do know by about a hundred to one "

 

"But is it really a bug'"

 

"Huh'"

 

"I mean, maybe it's a chemical agent of some kind "

 

"A pollutant'"

 

"Or a biological warfare agent that's gotten out of hand "

 

"Jesus H You-Know-Whoi"

 

CHAPTER 20

 

FEODOR Rozmenko looked clearly unhappy He had ushered Stoner and Jo into the office that had been Markov's, telling them that it was larger and more comfortable than his own cubbyhole

 

Jo had insisted that Keith put on a real suit for this meeting He had acquiesced, but wore a golden turtleneck shirt

 

beneath the sky-blue jacket she had picked from the stocked wardrobe in the Vanguard apartment Jo was in a tan military-style hip length jacket, with epaulets and leather buttons, cinched by a wide leather belt The skirt came almost to her knee, a length that was demure enough for a businesswoman while still showing her long legs to good effect

 

Two men were already in Markov's old office, waiting They shot to their feet as Rozmenko brought the Stoners in and introduced them The leaner of the pair was a lawyer, the other an official from the Soviet space agency

 

Cunouser and cunouser, thought Stoner as he held a chair for his wife and then sat in the one next to hers Rozmenko took the chair that had been placed beside Markov's desk The desk itself remained unoccupied, its worn old leather chair empty

 

Jo remembered this office and how that chair would creak when Kinll rocked in it Kir always made the same joke "I hope that creaking is the chair, and not me "

 

Rozmenko coughed politely, his way of bringing the meeting to order "Professor Markov left part of his last will and testament on videotape Our legal counsel," he nodded toward the gaunt, dark-suited lawyer, "has examined the tape and assures us that it is a valid and legal will "

 

The lawyer nodded gravely

 

"With your permission, Dr and Mrs Stoner, I will now play the tape "

 

Stoner could feel Jo's tension And his own I'm just coming to terms with the idea that Kir is dead, and now I'm going to see him alive, hear him speaking His star brother smiled within him Life and death are not so simple, after all, are they?

 

The TV was built into the panelled wall above the narrow table that held Kinll's samovar Rozmenko touched two buttons on the desktop keyboard with his stubby finger, and the screen flickered with colors

 

Markov's face appeared, his cheeks hollow and dark, his straggly little beard snow white, his soulful eyes looking somewhere off camera

 

"It is working " he asked in Russian "Good Good "

 

Markov looked straight into the camera, clasped his hands on his desk and hunched forward slightly With a smile he said in English

 

"My darling Jo, beautiful lady who fills my dreams And you too, Keith, my old and dear friend It must seem strange to be watching this tape, since I will have to be dead before you can see it It seems strange to me' Like speaking from the grave "

 

Stoner glanced at fo She was rigidly controlling herself, her face showing no emotion whatever But he could sense the feelings that were simmering beneath her outer show of composure

 

"I have written out my last will and testament, so the lawyers can handle it in their usual way But there is one request--request, not bequest, kindly notice--that concerns both of you " Markov smiled like a little boy who knew he was asking for more than he deserved

 

"I have decided to have my body sent out to the stars, just the way our alien visitor did "

 

Stoner felt utterly surprised Kir refused to be frozen when it could have helped him But he had already made up his mind to send his dead body out to the stars

 

His star brother said, The man was ready for death, he had given up his will to live

 

"I know it's not much of a body," Markov was saying "I haven't taken particularly good care of it, all these years But I want to give it as a gift to some other race of intelligent creatures I want to tell them that they are not alone, and that the universe is not a hostile arena of aggressive species

 

"Jo, Keith, obviously I need your help to do this The Soviet space agency can build a vehicle and put it on a rocket that will fling me clear of the solar system But it seems to me that the alien starship had some form of guidance system that led it to worlds where life might exist Can you duplicate that guidance system for my sarcophagus I do not want to be set blindly adrift--I would like to know that I am sailing in a direction

 

that might do some good, even if it is thousands of years from now

 

"Will you do this for me? It is the last request I will ever make of you I love you both. Be happy together. Good-bye from your devoted friend."

 

The screen went blank.

 

Before Stoner could take a breath, the space agency official leaned forward in his chair and asked, "Does such a guidance system actually exist?"

 

Stoner studied the man's face. There was awestruck curiosity there. And a remorseless drive to learn the secrets of the stars It reminded Stoner of the old days, back when they had first detected the approaching alien starship, how the Russians and Americans--and all the others--had played their power games back and forth. It reminded him of how he himself had been back then, inhumanly relentless, driven to make contact with the alien visitor no matter what the cost.

 

"The guidance system was destroyed fifteen years ago," Stoner answered, "by a man who was terrified at the thought of meeting alien intelligences "

 

"My first husband," Jo confirmed. "He went insane."

 

The Russians looked back and forth among themselves.

 

"Dr Stoner," asked the space agency official, "are you certain . . '"

 

Keith smiled, mainly because the man assumed that he should be asking his questions of another man He doesn't realize that Jo's the one with the clout. Or, even if he does know it consciously, he automatically downgrades her and speaks to me.

 

Aloud, Stoner said, "Please don't worry about it. Vanguard Industries will duplicate the guidance system for you. It's the least we can do for our dear friend Professor Markov."

 

Jo put on a sweet smile also, adding, "And we will sell it to you at cost."

 

Operating a maintenance tractor is simple, Paulmo Al-varado kept repeating to himself. His boss had given him a quick orientation ride and then expected him to be able to handle the huge machine by himself.

 

To a considerable degree the boss had been right. Sitting high up in the tractor's cab, surrounded by display screens and light-keyed controls, Paulino felt as if he were driving a hypersonic rocketplane rather than a massive tractor lumbering along the Mare Imbnum.

 

The so-called Sea of Clouds was a rolling plain of dust-covered rock, without a drop of water or a molecule of air, nothing but barren bleak rock stretching to a horizon that seemed dangerously, dizzymgly close. The undulating plain was pockmarked by millions of craters, some of them so big that they could swallow up the tractor and a dozen more, most as small as the poke of a fingertip. Beyond the knife-sharp line of the horizon hung the stars and the blackness of eternity.

 

It scared Paulino to be out here. Especially alone. The cabin was shielded and he was bundled into a cumbersome pressure suit, but still he felt the hard radiation streaming in from space, felt utterly naked and exposed to the meteoroids that could hit with the power of a hypervelocity bullet

 

Unconsciously he pressed a gloved hand against the thigh pocket that held his diminishing supply of Moondust pills. What would my boss do if he knew what I'm carrying? Paulino was afraid of the little man's wrath Better to try the pills on some of the other workers and keep the rat-faced boss out of it.

 

Out on the endless plain other tractors were placidly inching along, unmanned, automated. They scooped in the top layer of dust from the rocky ground at their front ends and deposited little squares of solar cells from their rear ends, turning the native lunar dust into glittering patches of energy farms that transformed sunlight into the electricity that powered the base at Archimedes. To Paulino they looked like enormous mechanical cows quietly grazing across the dusty plain

 

His job was to repair malfunctions on the automated tractors. He received a list of malfunctioning machines each morning, rode out to each one guided by its individual radio

 

beacon, and did not start back for home until he had completed repairs on the entire list.

 

Vanguard Industries' official work regulations stated that no one was required to remain on the surface, out in the open, for more than four hours at a time. Radiation badges were to be turned in to the health and safety department at the end of each four-hour stint. Paulino's boss, however, made it abundantly clear that "you stay out 'til you've finished the whole fuckin' list." And the radiation badges were turned in to him, not the safety people, at the end of the long day.

 

It had been a very long day. Repair jobs looked easy in the garage: just check the tractor's diagnostic display, take out the malfunctioning module and put in a fresh one. But doing such work from inside a pressure suit, with thick gloves and the limited vision that even the cleanest bubble helmet yields--that was another matter. And then there was the dust. It clung to everything with electrostatic tenacity. Paulino spent as much time wiping dust from his visor and gloves as he did actually making repairs.

 

Now he was heading out for the farthest tractor, which had decided to stop dead for a few hours earlier. The job was not on his morning's list; the boss had radioed the extra task to him.

 

"You're practically there already, just a half hour away. No sense comin' in and then drivin' all that distance tomorrow."

 

Paulino was too new to the job to realize that he could have argued back enough to get the boss to throw in a small bonus for the extra assignment. He sighed and, rather than risking the wrath of the little rat-faced man, pecked out the dead tractor's location coordinates on his navigational keyboard and turned his own machine in its direction.

 

He never found it. His tractor lumbered along, up and down the gently rolling plain, turning slowly to avoid troublesome craters, heading farther and farther away from home base. Even the highest radio mast atop the ringwall mountains of Archimedes receded below his horizon, and his only link with the base was by satellite relay.

 

Paulino tuned in to a powerful radio station broadcasting Andean jazz from somewhere in Latin America, leaned back in his seat and waited for the dead tractor to come into view. He could feel his own machine jouncing and wobbling as it trundled along, but even if the radio had been off he could not have heard any squeaks or mechanical groans in the soundless vacuum of the Moon.

 

Very carefully he took out the box of pills and shook one into his gloved hand. There was a capsule dispenser built into his helmet, originally designed so that workers could take energy tablets or even medicines while still inside their pressure suits. Paulino giggled to himself as he tongued up the Moon-dust pill and then, with a turn of his head, sucked on the water nipple.

 

All the comforts of home, he told himself as the Moondust spread its warming confidence through his body.

 

The first sign of trouble came when the navigational display showed that he was not heading in the correct direction to reach the malfunctioning tractor. Paulino took no alarm, he merely corrected his machine's heading. But within five minutes the nav display started blinking and beeping again. More annoyed than frightened, Paulino again reset the coordinates. Then the status board suddenly showed a glaring red warning light. Pauline's heart clutched within his chest. He touched the screen and its pictograph showed that something was wrong with the left rear wheel.

 

Paulino stopped the tractor and hopped down to the surface, falling with dreamlike slowness in the light lunar gravity. Clouds of dust stirred when his boots hit the ground. He nearly toppled over, but steadied himself with a hand on the tractor's massive flank.

 

The wheel was coated heavily with dust. The electrostatic cleaner was apparently not working and the dust was starting to jam the axle bearing so that the wheel could not turn at the same speed as the others. Paulino realized that this was why he was drifting off course; the tractor was pulling to the left instead of going straight ahead.

 

It was not something he could repair He climbed back into the cab, radioed Archimedes, and told them his situation

 

"Come back in," his boss's voice replied, filled with disgust "That tractor you're m's worth a million and a quarter Get it back here in one piece "

 

Pauhno turned around and headed for home, wondering if the wheel would hold up long enough to get there, with all the constant course corrections he would have to make to compensate for its drift

 

"You were pretty damned generous with Vanguard Industries' proprietary information," Jo huffed

 

Sitting beside her in the narrow cabin of the scramjet, Stoner smiled placatmgly "Vanguard would have to share the information sooner or later, it's part of the agreement the corporation made with the Russians twenty years ago, when you worked together to rescue the starship And me "

 

The plane was speeding back to Hawaii, bearing Ilona Lu-cacs and Zoltan Janos as well as Jo and Stoner The two scientists had docilely allowed themselves to be bundled aboard Stoner knew they could not return to Hungary without being swallowed alive by the government's security police, who would want to know exactly what had happened to President Novotny Their only refuge was with Stoner, who assured them that he would straighten everything out--and even cooperate with them in their research, eventually

 

Ilona seemed dazed without her pleasure machine, as if she were stumbling through the hours with no purpose, no goal, no plan to her existence Janos stayed next to her, but kept his eyes on Stoner Under the pretext of phoning his parents in Budapest he had managed to get off a hurried message to Hong Kong The reply he had received was even briefer "Stay with Stoner "

 

For long moments a silence stretched between Stoner and his wife The howl of the plane's powerful engines was muffled by heavy acoustical insulation but Stoner could sense the fury blazing within them, feel the heat and thrust as they shrieked through the cold darkness of the high stratosphere

 

"Can you really duplicate the starship's guidance system'" Jo asked

 

Stoner tapped his temple "Whatever was in that ship is up here "

 

"But will you be able to get it out of him'"

 

Smiling, "We're brothers, Jo More than brothers, really, but that's the closest word in our language to express it When we set the design parameters for the ship we're building at Delphi base, the guidance system was part of the design It's being incubated now, most likely "

 

Jo stared into his eyes "Sometimes when you first woke from the freezing you were so different--almost inhuman But then

 

"It's the real me, Jo Keith Stoner, the same man I always was Except that I have a star brother within me But that doesn't change the original me "

 

"Oh no?" Jo glanced up at Ilona and Janos, sitting forward of them in the plane's cabin like a pair of bewildered school-children

 

"I can do things that no one could do before," Stoner admitted "But that doesn't change my personality I'm still me and nobody else "

 

"Plus your friend "

 

"My brother "

 

"You could rule the world, Keith If you wanted to "

 

For a moment he did not answer Then, "No one should rule the world No one person, no one group, no one nation The human race has got to be able to rule itself Otherwise all you get is a tyrant who'd be in constant fear of rebellion Con stant bloodshed Constant pain "

 

"And you think people like Nkona and de Sagres can bring the world to that condition'"

 

"They're doing it, Jo Slowly, but they're moving us in the proper direction If they're not stopped, men and women like that will help the human race to take the next step forward "

 

Jo stared into his eyes, as if trying to see who was truly there

 

"The step up to nanotechnology--it's a test, Jo A test

 

Other races on other worlds have tried it and failed. Wiped themselves out. Overpopulated to the point of total ecological collapse. Destroyed themselves in wars. We've got to make sure that the human race discovers nanotechnology in the right way and develops it wisely, usefully. Not for power. Not for weapons. Humanely. Then we'll be ready to meet the other races that have succeeded, that have passed this test and become truly intelligent, truly adult."

 

She leaned her head on the padded chair back. "Keith-- don't you ever get tired of it? The struggle? It's been fifteen years, for god's sake! When do we rest, when do we get to enjoy life?"

 

Reaching out, Stoner touched her chin lightly and turned her face toward his. He kissed her.

 

"With the power comes the responsibility, Jo. I can't stop, not until it's finished."

 

Jo sighed. "The Red Shoes," she said.

 

Grinning, Stoner said, "Well, at least that's better than Macbeth."

 

Li-Po Hsen could see that Vie Tomasso was almost breathless. "Yes, yes, they'll be here in another hour and a half!"

 

Hsen was sitting up tensely in the comfortable lounge chair on his rooftop patio. The magnificent harbor of Hong Kong was spread out for his view, busy with boats and barges that practically covered the crescent of water from one shore to the other. Beyond lay the crowded white skyscrapers of Kowloon and the softly blue mountains of China itself. The woman who had been pouring tea for him had backed away, startled, when Hsen had bolted upright in the chair.

 

"You told me they would be in Moscow for at least another day!" he said to the image on the phone screen, his voice murderously cold.

 

"They changed their plans." Tomasso looked thoroughly frightened. "They'll be landing at Hilo and coming up to the house. I just got the word. I'm taking all kinds of chances calling you like this!"

 

Hsen forced himself to regain his inner calm. He closed his eyes for a moment, then said softly, "You have done well. Now go about your regular business as usual. Do not contact me unless they change their plans once again."

 

Tomasso nodded eagerly and cut the connection.

 

Before the screen went totally dark Hsen was tapping out the number of his security chief. When her sallow face appeared on the screen he swiftly told her that Stoner and his wife would be at their home within two hours.

 

"Is your team prepared to strike?" Hsen asked.

 

"Within six hours," she replied.

 

"Then strike! Now!"

 

"It will be done."

 

BOOK IV

 

"Nay," responded the Khan, "to crush your enemies, to see them fall at your feet--to take their horses and goods and hear the lamentation of their women. That is best."

 

CHAPTER 21

 

IT was just after midnight. Jo and Stoner slept together in their own bed for the first time in days, warm and moist from making love. Above them moonlit clouds scudded past the bright twinkling stars.

 

Outside the house, microscopically small diode lasers swept their invisible beams across the grounds. Heat and motion detectors watched patiently from every corner of the sprawling buildings. Two armed watchmen slowly padded back and forth along special walkways cunningly built into the roof to look as if they had been part of the architect's original line.

 

Half a mile down the only road leading to the house, dozens more Vanguard employees slept in a gate house that was part fortress, part armory, and part command center. Three security personnel--two of them women--sat by the fifteen display screens that monitored every square inch of the grounds and the house's exterior. They stayed alert because they never knew when one of their superiors would suddenly pop in to the monitoring center to check up on them. Once in a while Ms. Camerata herself showed up. God help the person who looked drowsy.

 

There was no other access to the house except that one road past the gate house. Like a medieval castle, the house was built on a bluff by the sea, protected on three sides by steep cliffs that plunged down to heavy pounding surf. Still, there were sensors planted in the cliff walls. And antipersonnel mines.

 

Stoner awoke. Ever since he had acquired his star brother he had needed but little sleep. He inhaled the fragrance of the flowers in their room, and the musky lingering odor of their

 

lovemaking. Jo slept on her side, curled slightly facing him. The only time her face looks relaxed is when we're sleeping together here at home, Stoner said to himself. She feels safe here.

 

Looking up through the transparent ceiling he thought he saw a shadow flicker past. A plane, this time of night? The house was well away from the normal flight paths out of Hilo Airport, he knew. What would a plane be doing out this way?

 

But it was gone before he could really worry about it. Stoner listened to the quiet of the house. True silence simply does not exist. Even in an absolutely still room there is some sound, the faint sixty-cycle hum of electrical current, the Brownian motion of air molecules inside the ear, the creak of walls expanding in the sunlight or contracting in shadow, the skittering of a leaf blown across the roof.

 

Cathy and Rickie were in their own rooms, sleeping soundly. Stoner smiled. He and Jo had expected the kids to want to have dinner with their parents after several days' absence. But with the true indifference of youth Cathy and Rickie had preferred to eat by the pool and spend the evening swimming and watching the TV on the patio. The fact that their parents were home was reassuring enough to them; they did not want to sit through a stuffy adult dinner.

 

Ilona Lucacs was sleeping fitfully, Stoner sensed. Although she claimed that direct brain stimulation produced no physical effects, she had been as irritable and shaky as any junkie facing withdrawal. Stoner had tried to reassure her emotionally and had even asked Jo point-blank to help make the Hungarian woman feel at ease. But still Ilona tossed on her bed in the guest wing; perhaps she was not in pain, but she desperately missed the electrical ecstasy that she had become accustomed to.

 

Zoltan Janos was sleeping poorly too. Stoner could feel the nervous fear emanating from him. He was just beginning to realize that his career, his entire life, had suddenly veered off in an entirely unexpected direction. One minute he's running a high-powered research operation for the president of his

 

country, the next he's a fugitive fleeing halfway across the world. And he's trying to keep all that fear and frustration and anger inside himself, afraid to show his feelings to anyone, distrustful of everyone.

 

Or is it fear and frustration? Stoner asked himself. He had come along to Hawaii easily enough. Perhaps too easily. Ilona seemed confused, frightened, but Janos . . .

 

Suddenly Stoner's point of view shifted. In his mind's eye he saw the house from the outside, from above, as if he were flying. The dark bulk of the roof line against the even darker edge of the cliff and the frothing luminescent surf far below. As if gliding through the soft night air in a parasail . . .

 

Another shadow flickered across the transparent ceiling. Stoner sat up in the bed, suddenly tense. Too big to be a bird and too low to be a plane.

 

The softest padding sound of feet racing across the roof. The white-hot agony of a man stabbed to death!

 

"Jo, get up, we ..."

 

Every alarm in the house shrilled and all the outside lights came on. Stoner dived for the jeans he had tossed onto the chair near the bed.

 

"Stay here," he told Jo.

 

She had already hit the special alarm button built into the ornately carved head of their bed, sending a priority alarm to the gate house down the road. And then dashed for her robe.

 

"The children!" Jo yelped.

 

"I'll take care of them," Stoner shouted from the door. But she was running behind him, down the hall toward the rooms where Cathy and Rickie's rooms were.

 

Glancing out the sliding glass door halfway down the hall, Stoner saw six or seven men in dead black skintight jumpsuits disentangling themselves from the shrouds of para-sails. That was the plane I thought I saw, his mind raced. It dropped an assault team on the house.

 

The children's bedrooms were at the far end of the hall. Before he could reach them, the door to Rickie's room burst

 

open and a pair of black-suited men stepped through, levelling snub-nosed submachine guns at Stoner's gut

 

"Stay behind me," he snapped to Jo

 

"Put your hands up," said one of the men, his voice muffled by a gas mask with big square goggles that made him look somehow like a prehistoric beast Behind him Stoner saw two more intruders yanking a still half asleep Rickie out into the hall The boy wore only a pair of ragged flowered shorts

 

"Rickie " Jo screamed, lunging for her son

 

But Stoner held her back as the first intruder cocked his submachine gun at her Stoner sensed that the men were keyed to the snapping point

 

"You don't want to hurt anyone," Stoner said, as calmly as he could "And you certainly don't want the boy "

 

Further down the hall he saw another quartet of gun-bearing intruders hustling Cathy out into the hallway She was wide-eyed with terror, clutching the flimsy tee shirt she used as a nightgown with white-knuckled hands

 

"It's all right, Cathy," Stoner called to her "Don't be afraid "

 

"You come with us " snapped the man pointing the gun at Stoner from inside his gas mask His voice sounded hollow, high-pitched, very dangerous

 

They half-pushed, half-carried the youngsters out through the sliding doors onto the patio by the swimming pool, Stoner and Jo following as the gunmen directed them The alarms were still hooting and screeching, Stoner knew that in another minute dozens of Vanguard security guards would come barrelling up to the house and a fire fight would erupt

 

Out in the glaring lights on the patio he saw the body of one of the security guards who had been patrolling the roof And more of the black-suited intruders clustered around a large bag of equipment that had been para-dropped with them

 

For an instant he wondered where the two Hungarians were, then he saw them being led at gunpoint out onto the far end of the patio Nunzio and the other house servants were nowhere in sight

 

Stoner said to the nearest gunman, "It's me you want, not the others, isn't it?"

 

The gunman nodded slowly

 

"So let them go and I'll go with you "

 

"Your family comes along," the gunman said in his muffled voice

 

"That's not really necessary," Stoner said, taking a step toward the man "You don't even need the guns I'm willing to come along with you There's no need to threaten anyone "

 

The submachine gun wavered in his grip

 

"You're afraid that the security guards will be here before you're ready to leave and you'll have a fight on your hands," Stoner said softly, calmly, soothingly "That won't happen I'll go with you voluntarily "

 

He was close enough to reach the man's gun Inside him, Stoner's mind was racing If I can get to the others who're holding Rickie and Cathy I can talk our way out of this before the security team starts shooting up everything

 

"Why don't you tell your men to hand the children over to their mother Everybody will be a lot safer that way "

 

The man slowly nodded It was impossible to see his expression inside the gas mask, but he turned almost like an automaton and gestured to the intruders holding Rickie and Cathy with one hand, his other hand holding the submachine gun pointed down to the ground

 

Jo, meanwhile, was in a frenzy of shock, rage, and terror In the pocket of her robe was a slim metallic rod that controlled the household robots She watched in horror as Keith spoke gently to the bastards who had grabbed her children Cathy looked so terrified, her face white as death Rickie looked scared too but Cathy must feel naked and totally helpless in the clutches of strange horrible men, Jo knew

 

There were eight household robots programmed to do cleaning chores and serve at table With extensible arms operated by tiny but powerful servomotors they could even be used as lifeguards, capable of reaching into any spot in the pool and hauling out even a two-hundred-pound swimmer

 

They also had built into their domed heads small but powerful lasers that could spit out pulses of light with the energy of a high-velocity bullet

 

While Keith talked, Jo acted They're not going to steal my babies' I'll kill them' All of them'

 

With her forefinger and thumb Jo manipulated the slipnng control of the robot command rod The eight squat machines trundled out onto the patio from both ends, their metal skins glinting in the powerful security lights

 

"You are surrounded," said a preprogrammed voice tape "A security team will arrive momentarily Give yourselves up now "

 

The man that Stoner had been talking to jerked around, his gun snapping toward the nearest robot One of the other intruders laughed shakily

 

Jo pressed the tip of the control rod Each robot selected a target and fired Eight of the intruders spasmed and smashed to the ground as pulses of laser light hit their heads and shattered bone and brain

 

Before Stoner could move, all the other intruders blasted away at the robots Who fired back at the intruders

 

Jo felt herself flung to the ground Keith had knocked her down and now he was dashing toward the men holding their children

 

The one that Keith had been talking to dropped to one knee and pointed his submachine gun at Cathy One of the men who had been holding her was already sprawled on the ground, the other had turned to fire at the robots approaching him

 

"I'll kill her " the intruder screamed

 

Jo hesitated half a heartbeat, then turned off the robots Too late Three separate laser beams smashed the man's head to pulp His spine arched and his throat poured out a bloody shriek His hands twitched and the submachine gun fired a burst that flung Cathy completely off her feet and sent her reeling, tottering over the edge of the swimming pool and into the water

 

Jo screamed and raced to the pool

 

Stoner raised his hands high "Come on, you stupid bastards'" he shouted "You want me, come on and take me before we all get killed "

 

The remaining intruders rushed to Stoner and pushed him

 

toward the lumpy bag of equipment that still lay in the far corner of the patio The robots stood inert, half of them torn apart by bullets, their innards flickering and hissing faintly with electrical sparks

 

Jo stared down into the lighted pool where her daughter floated face down, her hair spreading on the bloody water, her body torn nearly in half

 

"Cathyi" she screamed "Cathy'"

 

She felt Rickie's arms slide around her waist and the two of them collapsed sobbing at the edge of the pool

 

Stoner watched, his msides frozen by his star brother, his mind numb with shock, as the intruders strapped a personal rocket unit on his back In the distance, despite the horror that was trying to overwhelm him, Stoner heard the sounds of approaching cars The security team was racing up the road

 

Too late The intruders roared off on their backpack rockets, controlling Stoner's backpack remotely As in a nightmare, Stoner saw the brilliantly-lit blood-soaked patio receding, racing away from him, bodies sprawled helter skelter like toys thrown away by a careless child, his daughter's body floating in the reddening pool, his wife and son clinging to each other in helpless grief

 

CHAPTER 22

 

THE control board of Paulmo's tractor glared with red lights, but when the oxygen supply hit the critical level a soft female voice purred in his helmet earphones, "Only one hour's worth of oxygen remaining "

 

He did not think he could be more frightened than he already was, but Paulmo tensed at the words so hard that he

 

felt his teeth grinding together painfully. There was an emergency tank of oxygen on the tractor, of course, but at best that held another two hours of breathable oxy and he had been tooling around out here on Mare Imbrium for at least eight hours.

 

No way to get back safely, and for some reason the radio was no longer working. He felt strong and alert, thanks to the Moondust, but he could not raise the base back at Archimedes, could not even hear a homing beacon. The radio had gone completely dead.

 

In misery he trundled along in the massive tractor's cab, totally lost, the fear of death crawling up his spine like a loathsome poisonous insect's larva, the kind that wormed its way inside your skull and slowly, agonizingly ate your brains away.

 

The dusty desert of stone stretched away to the frighteningly close horizon no matter which way he looked. Not a sign of human habitation, not a landmark nor a signpost. Nothing but craters and rocks. He could not even see the Earth in the black sky. Completely alone. Paulino would have welcomed the vicious snarling of his boss; he prayed to hear the nasty little man's voice excoriating him as a fool and idiot.

 

But his radio yielded nothing but a crackling hissing sound with an oddly whining note running up and down the scale like a tin whistle on a roller coaster. The noise made him shudder like fingernails on a blackboard, but he dared not turn off the radio. He glanced down at the control panel and saw that the emergency transmitter was still on, beaming out its plea for help.

 

Rescue me! Paulino prayed to the stars that looked down at him. Save me! Don't let me die!

 

His vision blurred with tears as he thought about the church in his village, so far away. How he had prayed to the Virgin and the saints when he had been a child. They never answered him. Not once. Never did they grant his simple requests. What makes you think anyone is going to save your miserable life now? he asked himself.

 

"You in the tractor, identify yourself."

 

The voice cut through the whining static in his earphones like the clarion call of an angel. The breath caught in Paulino's throat. He was so excited he could not speak.

 

"Identify yourself or you will trigger automatic defenses that could destroy your vehicle."

 

Gulping down tears and fright, Paulino stuttered, "I'm lost . . . from Archimedes . . . Paulino Alvarado is my name . . . please ... I need help."

 

"Stop your tractor immediately," commanded the radio voice. "Two vehicles will come out to inspect you. You have entered a security zone without authorization. You are in big trouble, buddy."

 

Paulino laughed. He threw his head back inside his fogged, dust-caked helmet and laughed uproariously.

 

Hanging in the harness of the backpack rocket, Stoner saw the lights of home dwindle in the distance. Looking up he could see the remaining intruders as shadowy silhouettes against the moonlit sky. Deep inside his brain he wanted to lash out at these murderers, kill and maim them the way they had slaughtered his daughter. Blood for blood, the ancient voice spoke to him. Kill them all, as painfully as possible.

 

But his star brother's voice interrupted the primeval urge to vengeance. Who are these men? Who sent them? Where do they intend to take us, and why? A cool, calculating voice. Tranquilizing. And steel-hard in its control over Stoner's body. He felt a glacial calm creep along his seething veins, cold ice replacing blazing rage. His heartbeat slowed, his breathing deepened and became more regular. The glands within him slowed their secretions of danger-generated hormones.

 

Leave me alone! he screamed silently at the alien presence.

 

So you can kill them? What will that gain?

 

I want to destroy them!

 

They're mercenaries. You know that. Professional killers. What they did they did for money. And no one would have been harmed if the robots hadn't attacked them.

 

They killed Cathy

 

Who sent them? That's the important question. Who sent them and why?

 

Stoner saw the sense of it, and as his star brother soothed the animal fury within him, he realized that it was important--vital--to let these mercenary thugs take him to whoever had hired them. Yes, he finally told his star brother, I understand. I even agree, damn it.

 

The backpack rockets had only a few miles' range. As they flew out over the dark ocean, the rocket thrusters bellowing painfully in Stoner's ears, he spotted a tiny square of light bobbing in the distance. Sure enough, his captors headed toward it, remotely maneuvering the steering gimbals of Stoner's backpack to follow them.

 

It was a sizable raft tethered between a pair of trimarans, sleek triple-hulled boats shaped like jet airplanes. Two of the mercenaries landed expertly on the raft, then Stoner felt himself dropping down toward it.

 

He flexed his knees as the rocket gave a final roar of thrust and cut off about ten feet above the deck. Stoner hit the yielding spongy plastic with his bare feet, then roiled forward. The two men already there caught him in their arms.

 

They stripped the pack from his shoulders, then began to pull off their own gas masks and backpacks as the others dropped down, one by one, until eight of them stood clustered on the pitching, heaving raft.

 

"Is that all?" came a voice from one of the trimarans.

 

"That's all," said the last mercenary to land. Shrugging out of his shoulder harness he strode over to Stoner.

 

"Twelve men killed," he snarled "For you." And he swung a punch at Stoner's face with all his weight behind it

 

He was a big man, slightly taller than Stoner and thick in the chest and shoulders. His face was lost in the moonlit shadows, but his eyes blazed with the fury of a man who had missed death by inches and had to work off the fear and hatred boiling inside him

 

Stoner's old black-belt training returned to him unbidden.

 

He blocked the punch with his left forearm and rammed his right fist into the man's solar plexus, stepping into the thrust with every ounce of his own raging blood lust The man was lifted off his feet and before he even started to fall Stoner's left hit the carotid artery in his neck like a knife edge He crumpled to the plastic surface of the raft and did not move.

 

"And you bastards killed my daughter" Stoner said as half a dozen guns pointed at him

 

"Dr. Stoner " the voice from the trimaran called urgently. "We did not want to shed any blood I do not want to use any further force on you, but we will if you make it necessary."

 

Again Stoner felt the icy fingers of calm prickle along his nervous system

 

"It won't be necessary," he said "Unless I have to defend myself."

 

"Bring him in here," the voice commanded, "then drag your incapacitated friend to your own boat and get the hell out of here."

 

A pair of mercenaries escorted Stoner across the bobbing raft and onto the trimaran's nearer hull. Another man, shorter, wearing a sailor's pullover shirt and shorts, took him by the arm and led him across the curving wing to the central hull Inside, only red night lights were on Silently the man led Stoner to a small cabin and locked him in it.

 

Stoner peered out the cabin's tiny porthole, much too small for a man to crawl through, he saw So he watched as the mercenaries quickly folded up the raft, four of them plunging into the water to do the job, then stowed it aboard their trimaran They scrambled up into the boat and it pulled away, heading swiftly toward the distant Makapuu Head, as nearly as Stoner could determine.

 

Then the engine of his trimaran rumbled to life and he felt the boat bite into the waves It swung around and headed straight out to sea

 

Just as Stoner was turning away from the porthole, the other trimaran exploded into a red ball of flame, searing his eyes as a clap of thunder blasted across the open water

 

J

 

Squeezing the burning after-image away, Stoner looked out the porthole again and saw nothing but bits of burning wreckage tracing fiery arcs across the dark sky.

 

The mercenaries' reward, he realized Whoever hired them doesn't want any witnesses Then he thought, more grimly, And how much cheaper to buy a few pounds of explosives, rather than paying the men you hired

 

He watched as the trimaran put distance between itself and the pitiful few scraps of burning wreckage floating on the dark swells

 

"Enjoy your reward," he muttered into the darkness "You bastards earned it "

 

In the dawn's first light Jo looked out across the patio with sleepless red-rimmed eyes A team of robots and humans were busily cleaning up the blood stains and repairing the bullet-smashed windows. She still wore the same robe she had hastily pulled on when the attack had started It was smeared with Cathy's blood

 

It had taken hours and a strong sedative to get Rickie to sleep Half a dozen doctors were in the house now She had refused to talk to any of them, especially the psychiatrist who offered to set up a counseling session for her. It had taken all her self-control to refrain from throwing the heaviest vase she could lift at the man He was trying to be helpful, she knew, but she did not need counseling

 

She needed vengeance. The fury that soared within her was like a volcano's lava. The longer she kept it bottled up inside the hotter it became. It would erupt, but only when she was ready to allow it to. And when it did, that lava-hot hatred would burn and roast the bastards who had killed her baby Not one of them would be left alive Not a single one.

 

She had spent hours with the Hilo police and several agents from the FBI Reluctantly she allowed them to take away four of the dead intruders' bodies, the others had already been spirited away by her own corporate security people

 

Rickie was sleeping at last and Cathy's body had been sent to the Vanguard labs nearby

 

"I want tissue samples taken and cloning procedures to be started immediately," she had told the aides and assistants who clustered around her in the house's living room.

 

"And the other bodies?"

 

"Find out everything you can from them. I want to know where they came from and who they are. I want to find where they've taken my husband and how we can get him back from them. And above all I want to find out who hired them."

 

But she knew who had hired them, knew it without being told, knew it as surely as if the man himself had confessed it to her.

 

Once the living room had been cleared of everyone else and Jo was alone with Vie Tomasso, she said, "It was Hsen, wasn't it?"

 

Tomasso nodded numbly. "Honest to god, Jo, I had no idea he would spring this ..."

 

Until that moment it had never occurred to Jo that Tomasso could have been playing a double game. She looked at him with fresh eyes. There was perspiration beading his upper lip despite the coolness of the morning. His eyes met hers only momentarily, then slid away evasively.

 

"Go to Hsen," she said, her voice hoarse from crying, "and tell him what happened here."

 

"He'll know by now."

 

"I want you to tell him. From me. Tell him that his people murdered my daughter."

 

Tomasso blinked several times. "What else?"

 

"That's all. Just tell him that."

 

"Nothing else? You don't want to ask him about getting your husband back?"

 

"It won't be necessary to say anything else. He'll know what the rest of the message is."

 

Tomasso got uncertainly to his feet, then rushed out of the living room as if glad to get away from her.

 

Jo sat alone on the sumptuous sweeping couch that curved around the circular green marble coffee table. Alone. Husband kidnapped. Daughter murdered. Son in a drugged sleep. Assistants fluttering around the house and the office.

 

Keith can take care of himself, she thought. The attackers obviously came to kidnap him, not kill him Hsen knows Keith's the only one ever to survive cryonic suspension; the bastard wants to learn how to live forever and he thinks he can get the knowledge out of Keith.

 

Nothing can hurt Keith. He's not a human being, not the way I am. He'll twist Hsen's brain into a pretzel if they give him the chance. He'll walk away without a scratch while Cathy . . . Cathy . . .

 

She could hardly breathe. Jo wet her lips and lifted her hands to her head and held on She felt as if she would explode. Keith would try to reason with Hsen, talk to the filthy murdering sonofabitch snake Instead of killing him Keith would try to understand him and make him understand what he had done wrong.

 

Hsen's got to die The thought pounded through her blood, roared in her ears. The murdering bastard's got to die I want to hear him scream, I want to see knives slicing his guts, I want to fill the goddamned swimming pool with his blood!

 

Shaking with fury, she touched the comm button concealed in the couch's upholstery.

 

"Nunzio."

 

"Si, Signoiai"

 

"Please come to the living room, I have a task for you," she said in Italian.

 

"Right away, Signora "

 

Nunzio had been devastated because the intruders had gassed him and the other servants in their sleep and he had been totally unable to do a thing to prevent the tragedy that took place He felt like a useless old man, Jo knew, instead of a ruthlessly loyal bodyguard.

 

Now Jo would tell him how he could redeem himself By killing Li-Po Hsen. No matter how long it took, no matter how much it cost No matter if Nunzio had to go back to the village of his birth in Calabria and hire every male relative of his line. The only purpose of Nunzio's existence, from this morning onward, would be to kill Hsen

 

And Tomasso? She would deal with Vie herself, she decided When he returned from Hong Kong. She would get the truth out of him and then make him pay for his part in murdering her daughter Make him pay with interest

 

Jo wanted to smile but found that she could not. In the silence of the living room she could hear, through the broken windows, the sound of the swimming pool's pumps still working to filter Cathy's blood out of the water

 

The intelligence chief had never seen her master look surprised before. Or frightened.

 

"Killed her daughter " Hsen shot to his feet, eyes blazing, fists clenched

 

She bowed her head and said nothing.

 

Hsen paced to the broad windows of his spacious office and stared out for many minutes at the busy harbor As usual, he wore a loose short-sleeved shirt and comfortable dark slacks He clasped his hands behind his back, his wiry frame wound tight with tension.

 

Finally he turned back to the woman who directed his intelligence operations "What kind of bunglers did you hire? What kind of fools would make such a shambles of everything?"

 

In a very quiet voice, she replied, "It was accidental More than half the force was killed by the so-called household robots They were equipped with laser weapons that we did not expect "

 

"The robots were not included in Tomasso's report on the house's defenses "

 

"No, sir. Obviously he did not know about them "

 

"Obviously " Hsen paced nervously to his desk, flipped open a gold oblong box and put a cigarette to his lips with trembling fingers. He picked up the gold lighter and touched it to the cigarette's tip, then suddenly whirled and threw it across the big room It banged into a bronze statue of a warrior on horseback with a loud clang.

 

"Sir," said the intelligence chief, "I should remind you that

 

the mission achieved its major objective We have the man Stoner "

 

"Yes, and you have Jo Camerata swearing vengeance against me with all her Italian blood "

 

"She has no evidence that you "

 

"She knows " Hsen shouted

 

The woman backed a few steps toward the door Hsen puffed furiously on his cigarette Even from the distance between them the intelligence chief could smell the acrid fumes of old-fashioned tobacco There was a cloying odor too the tobacco was laced with something, perhaps an opium derivative

 

Hsen pointed a bony finger at her "Prepare to evacuate my personal staff to the lunar retreat But it must be done in absolute secrecy I don't want that woman to know where I am'"

 

"Sir, you are scheduled to attend the meeting of the International Investment Authority on Sunday, in Sydney "

 

"I will attend by hologram "

 

"Sir, there is a two-second time lag in communications from the Moon She will immediately know where you are "

 

Hsen snorted smoke through his nostrils "Yes, yes, I hadn't thought of that " He sat at the swivel chair and drummed his fingers on the desk top "Very well, I will move to our center in Xm)iang From there I will proceed to the lunar retreat as soon as the IIA meeting concludes "

 

The woman hesitated, then asked, "Do you think that she will attend the meeting?"

 

Hsen nodded nervously "She will attend it, all right Probably by holo, but she will be there I have no doubt of it "

 

CHAPTER 23

 

SITTING at the head of the gleaming long, broad conference table, Cliff Baker called the meeting to order All thirty members of the International Investment Agency were in attendance, although more than half of them were holographic images that sparkled and wavered slightly, looking almost like ghosts rather than live solid human beings

 

The sweeping windows that lined one side of the conference room showed the towers of Sydney's business and financial district The beautiful harbor was hidden behind their glass and steel facades On the far side of the room stood an elaborate sideboard of finger foods on silver trays and beverages ranging from iced tea and cola to Scotch whisky and chilled vodka

 

Maybe we should have set up some photographs of food and booze, Baker thought with an inner grin To take care of the hologrammers

 

But he kept his face serious as he tapped the immaculate table top with his writing stylus The men and women present in person quickly stopped their muttered conversations and looked toward him The holograms also sat up straighter and looked ready for business

 

"There's only one item on the agenda," Baker started, without preamble "You all know what it is this plague that's spreading throughout lower Asia and the western Pacific "

 

"It has also hit cities in Europe and North America," said the woman who represented Scandia Banking

 

"And Africa, I am sad to announce " The man from the Central African Confederation said in a heavy deep voice He was Nkona's personal emissary, a terrorist as a youth until

 

that Great Soul captured him with his vision of a peaceful, prosperous, united Africa.

 

"Africa too?"

 

The black man nodded and folded his hands prayerfully on the table top. He was of powerful build, and in his white tribal robe the darkness of his skin radiated strength and endurance.

 

"Within the past few days the plague had leaped across the Sahara and is spreading through Chad, Zaire, Uganda, and even as far as Namibia."

 

"Good lord!"

 

"It hasn't hit Latin America?"

 

"Not yet," said the Argentinean physician who represented that continent's environmental movement.

 

"They call it the Horror," the slim, delicately beautiful woman from Hanoi said. She reminded Baker of An Linh Laguerre, the woman he had lost because of Stoner and his bitch of a wife.

 

"It is a horror," the Argentinean agreed. "I have seen the clinical reports. It must be like the tortures of hell."

 

What do you know about the pains of hell? Baker snarled inwardly. What do any of you know about pain? Maybe when this bug hits you, then you'll know what I had to go through. Maybe then--but then it'll be too late for you, won't it?

 

"The question is," he said aloud, "what can be done to stop it? And what should we be doing to help?"

 

The Filipino representative, also a physician, said, "Every medical service in every affected nation urgently requires our help. They need more hospital beds, more clinical facilities, supplies, personnel . . . everything."

 

"In other words," said the hologrammic image of Li-Po Hsen, "they need more money."

 

"Exactly."

 

"But we have already invested billions in medical research and services," said Wilhelm Kruppmann. The burly Swiss banker was also a hologram image.

 

"That was before this plague started," Baker pointed out.

 

"How many times can you draw water from the well before it runs dry?" Kruppmann rumbled.

 

"How important is it to stay alive?" Baker shot back, his lips curling slightly in a smile that might have been a sneer.

 

Jo Camerata sat in the small office she maintained at her home and watched the byplay on a flat video screen. She had been up most of the night with Rickie, who still screamed with nightmares whenever he tried to sleep. Her attempts to find Keith had so far been fruitless, but it had only been a few days since Hsen had kidnapped him. Only a few days since Cathy had been murdered.

 

She pecked at the keyboard on her desk and the screen zoomed in to a closeup of Hsen. A hologram, of course. Jo had half of Vanguard Industries' electronics experts at work tracking the signals that produced Hsen's three-dimensional image for the meeting. She wanted to know where the head of Pacific Commerce actually was.

 

Wherever you are, she said silently to Hsen's image, I'll find you. There's no place on Earth you can hide from me.

 

After three days of being a virtual prisoner, Paulino had learned only two things about the people who had rescued him from his errant tractor: they were employees of Vanguard Industries, and this place where they were holding him was some sort of secret base called Delphi.

 

It was almost entirely underground, of course. A satellite scanning the Mare Imbrium's surface would see only a pair of well-disguised entry ports, domes no larger than telephone booths and covered with rubble from the lunar soil. Even a man on foot could pass within a few dozen meters of the entrances and not realize that they were anything more than medium-sized hillocks.

 

"You've posed us quite a problem, son," said the grizzled, square-jawed older man who seemed to head the facility. Like everyone else in the base, he wore coveralls of faded blue with a stylized V emblazoned on the chest above his name tag, which read MATTHEWS.

 

"We've sent your tractor out on a course that will take it into a main traffic region Somebody' pick it up They'll probably think you're dead, although they might send a ballistic rocket this way to survey the area and try to find your body "

 

"Why cannot you return me back to Archimedes'" Paulmo asked in his hesitant English

 

Matthews made a sour face "Goddam' security regulations Nobody's supposed to know we're here If it'd been up to me we would of just let you trundle on by, you'd never have known we're here " He shook his head "But I've got a gung-ho smartass of a security chief here who believes everything they wrote down in the regs So you were stopped and detained, as per regulation XYZ or whatever "

 

Bewildered, barely comprehending what the man was telling him, Paulmo asked, "What do you plan to to do with me?"

 

"Damned if I know," Matthews replied "Just your bad luck, kid You stumbled into our area while we were testing an electromagnetic system that must've screwed up your navigational beam Now I'm stuck with you until some genius further up the chain of command figures out what to do "

 

So for several days Paulmo was free to wander around the underground base It was small, there were no more than fifty men and women at work in it Most of them were older than Paulmo, in their thirties and forties They all wore blue coveralls, Paulmo's pumpkin orange seemed glaringly out of place They seemed to be scientists of one sort or another, and almost all of them were from North America or Western Europe Not an oriental or Latin American in the place, nor any Africans--although several of the Yankees were black

 

He thought about offering some of his Moondust for sale, but hesitated His supply of pills was dwindling, and these people looked like the type who would flush them down a toilet and turn him into the police So he kept the pills to himself and tried to ration himself to one per day Unsuccessfully

 

They let him wander freely through the narrow tunnels and wmdowless chambers of the base, knowing that even with a pressure suit he was not going to walk hundreds of kilometers back to Archimedes And there seemed to be no ground vehicles in Delphi If there were any, they were locked away where Paulmo could not find them

 

The people were friendly, but guarded They gave him a room to himself, a narrow little cell that held a comfortable bed, a TV, and little else They provided him with coveralls and toiletries He ate with the others in the base's only galley Men and women talked with him freely enough, although they never discussed their work The TV picked up programs from all over Earth, Paulmo did not lack for entertainment

 

He began to think that being officially dead was perhaps not so bad a thing If these Vanguard people could provide him with a new identity and a solid job, perhaps he could truly begin life anew Perhaps even get away from the Moon-dust He sought out Matthews and broached the idea to him--without mentioning his addiction

 

The older man grinned through his two-day stubble "Like the old videos where the FBI protects a witness against the Mafia, huh?"

 

Paulmo did not understand

 

"Might be a good idea," Matthews said "I'll buck it upstairs and see what they think about it "

 

That confused Paulmo even further Upstairs was nothing but the barren surface of Mare Imbrium

 

There were parts of the base that were locked, where Paulmo was not allowed He guessed that they might be hiding their tractors in there As one day slid into another, Paulmo began to think that if he could get away and find his way back to Archimedes, the information about this secret base might be worth something to his employers Not as good as starting a whole new life under a new identity, but it would be a backup in case Matthews decided to make Paulmo truly dead and solve his problem that way

 

It was a simple matter to walk past the locked doors often

 

enough to watch people tap out the security code on the electronic lock They were careless, not suspicious Paulmo memorized the combination soon enough The base worked on Greenwich time, with only one shift Everyone slept during the "night" hours Paulmo never saw any guards, who needed them, this far out in the lunar wilderness

 

So one night when everyone was asleep he slipped out of his room and walked softly to the nearest of the locked doors Pecking out the memorized combination he held his breath for an instant

 

The door slid open The lights inside turned on as Paulmo stepped through And lurched against the wall in sudden terror

 

He found himself high on the open grillwork of a catwalk that circled an immense circular chamber The floor was fifty meters below and for an instant Paulmo felt so giddy he had to grasp the steel handrail with both hands

 

The huge chamber contained a giant circular vat filled with a bubbling, frothing liquid It gurgled and simmered like a titanic brew being slowly boiled It must have been as high as the spires of a cathedral, at least Waves of sultry heat flowed from it A plume of steam rose from its top and was sucked away by vents set into the ceiling high above Paulmo did not know if the sweat that poured from him was from sudden fear or the heat that made this vast chamber feel like the inside of an oven

 

The vat was transparent, or almost so Squinting against the mist that shrouded its curving flank, Paulmo tried to make out what was inside the seething circular tank There were vague shapes in there, a glint of something, a graceful curve perhaps But it was obscured by the steam and the bubbling ferment within the tank itself

 

Paulmo unconsciously leaned forward against the rail, peering intently into the giant vat It was like trying to see a glass sculpture inside a fish tank, only worse, more difficult

 

A hand grabbed his shoulder Paulmo felt his bladder give way

 

Burning with fear and shame he turned to see Matthews appraising him grimly

 

"You could've fallen over the damned railing, you were leaning over so hard Don't you know curiosity killed the cat?"

 

"I I

 

Matthews seemed more disappointed than angry "Just because we don't have armed guards patrolling the tunnels doesn't mean there aren't electronic alarm systems in place You woke me out of a sound sleep, son "

 

Still Pauhno could find no words

 

"You've just made everything a helluva lot more difficult," Matthews said, leading him back into the tunnel As he carefully shut the steel door and re-set the electronic lock, he muttered, "We sure as hell can't let you loose now "

 

"Wh what is that thing in there'"

 

With a shrug of his square shoulders Matthews answered, "Beats the hell out of me, kid Nobody here knows what it's supposed to be "

 

For a week Stoner let them test him

 

The trimaran made rendezvous slightly before dawn with a jet seaplane His captors bundled Stoner into a wmdowless cabin and the plane flew for many hours Stoner had the feeling they were flying roughly southwest, but other than that he had no idea of where they were going There were fresh jeans in the cabin, socks, shorts, a pullover shirt, and a pair of deck shoes All in the right sizes

 

They've planned everything down to the last detail, he thought grimly The image of Cathy's bloody body floating in the swimming pool flashed into his mind again, and again his star brother instantly clamped down on the visceral emotions that would have made Stoner scream with rage and guilt

 

They came for me, he said to himself Cathy's dead because they wanted me

 

It is not your fault, his star brother soothed There was nothing you could do

 

I could tear this plane apart I could kill everyone aboard

 

To what purpose' What good is an animal's vengeance, especially when it's directed at hirelings rather than those responsible for the crime'

 

Stoner knew his star brother was right But that did not erase the cold fury that even his alien symbiotes could not reach

 

When the plane touched down in the water once more a new group of men and women entered his cabin, fitted a heavy black hood over his head, and guided him from the bobbing plane to a creaking pier and then onto solid ground They bundled him into a van of some kind and then drove for hours The brief moment he had in the sun felt hot and humid, the inside of the van was air-conditioned heavily enough to chill him

 

When they took the hood off he was in a small windowless room that contained a narrow bunk, a wall covered with electronic monitoring equipment, and the tables, counters, glassware, and shining bright metalwork of a small but complete medical laboratory

 

He almost laughed It was nearly the same as the room he had awakened in fifteen years earlier I'm a guinea pig again, he thought And a prisoner

 

There were four men and two women, Stoner saw, all wearing starched white uniforms Physicians, nurses, orderlies They avoided looking directly at him They did not speak a word to him Stoner thought about talking to them, influencing them to let him go or at least tell him where they were His star brother asked silently why he did not do so You could walk out of here and get them to fly you back home

 

No, Stoner decided I want to know who these people work for, and why they want me so badly You were right why deal with the hirelings' It's their masters I want to get my hands on

 

The picture of Cathy came unbidden to his mind once again Even before his star brother could clamp down on the tidal wave of grief and guilt that gushed from his glands, Stoner saw his daughter ripped apart by their bullets, flung

 

into the pool, her young life torn from her by the intruding murderers

 

The lava-hot surge dwindled, ebbed, nearly disappeared altogether Stoner still saw Cathy die, still felt hatred for the men who had done it and the person who had sent them But the emotion was gone The alien presence within him damped down the inner fires almost completely Left in its place was a cold implacable determination to find who was responsible for Cathy's murder

 

The white-uniformed silent men and women left him alone in the room There was only the one door, a conventional wooden door with an electronic lock Not a star-given energy portal that could be solid wall one instant and an open doorway the next I could pick the electronic lock in a couple of seconds, Stoner knew Maybe that's what they want to see me do It looks like they want to test me

 

Instead, he kicked off his shoes and stretched out on the cot, hands behind his head, and pretended to sleep The light panels in the ceiling dimmed Yes indeed, I'm being watched and tested Angrily he asked himself, So what else is new?

 

He thought about Jo She had seen her daughter, her firstborn, slaughtered And she had to bear that grief without him Jo was tough, he knew, but could she stand up to this' He wished he could reach her, communicate with her, at least tell her that he was alive and unharmed and trying to track down the people who had killed Cathy She's strong, Stoner kept repeating to himself Jo is the strongest woman I've ever met The strongest person, man or woman She'll handle it all right She'll come through it

 

He told himself that her Italian thirst for vengeance would help to sustain her The blood is strong The age-old instincts boil to the surface and wash away all the veneer of polite civilized behavior Jo doesn't have an alien brother inside her to clamp down on the emotions and control the heat that burns through the blood She won't leave it to law and order Her daughter's been killed, she's going to move heaven and earth to find the killers God help them when she does

 

Rickie. He's the one who needs help. It's a shattering blow to a ten-year-old. Strangers breaking into his home. His sister killed before his eyes, his father abducted. The poor kid's had almost every emotional prop knocked out from under him. All he's got left is his mother. Will Jo pay enough attention to him, or will she be too busy seeking out her revenge?

 

When I get back home, Stoner promised himself, I'll keep him close to me. I've got to rebuild his feelings of security and trust. All the psychologists and neural programming in the world can't do that for him. It's up to me, I've got to make him feel safe and certain of himself again. That's more important than anything else.

 

When I get back home.

 

CHAPTER 24

 

CLIFF Baker walked along the magnificent beach and watched the surf pounding up onto the sand. Hundreds of bathers were in the sparkling blue water, diving into the waves. Half a kilometer up the beach the surfers were riding their boards on the big breakers. Further out windsurfers leaned out from their sails and cut along the swells like oversized waterbugs.

 

Once these beaches had been preyed upon by "the men in the gray suits," vicious, swift, voracious sharks that could take a man's leg with a single snap of their powerful jaws. Now a flimsy net of electrical wires protected the beaches and kept the sharks away. Hasn't been a shark attack at a protected beach since I was a teenager, Baker thought idly.

 

The sun was high and Baker's ragged cut-off shorts and flapping unbuttoned shirt were wet with perspiration. Soak some

 

of the booze out of me, he thought. On the other hand, a cold Foster's would feel very good right about now.

 

He turned around and headed back toward the beach house. One of the advantages of being chairman of the International Investment Agency: a marvelous twelve-room house on the most expensive beach in the Sydney area. Rank hath its privileges.

 

Sunday's meeting had gone exactly the way he had thought it would. The regions hardest hit by the plague needed money immediately for medical services. The ecologists and the representatives of areas not so badly threatened by the Horror wanted to spend more money on research. The bastards from the corporations, who had the goddamned money, didn't want to spend their precious loot at all.

 

They hadn't accomplished a bloody thing. They had argued and called each other names and agreed to nothing more than appointing a bloody committee to study the problem. Study it! While thousands were dying in agony every day and the plague spread across Africa and into Europe and North America.

 

Baker grinned, a lopsided-smirk that was far from pleasant on his bloated reddened face. Let them argue, he told himself. Let them delay. Soon enough the Horror will start to pick them off, one by one. The women first, and then the men. They all deserve it.

 

As he trudged barefoot through the sand he wondered about Jo Camerata. She had been strangely silent at the meeting. Usually she took charge and made things come out the way she wanted them. But she had barely said two words. It was hard to tell when you were looking at holograms instead of live people, but it seemed to Baker as if Jo spent the whole damned meeting staring at Hsen instead of paying attention to the business at hand.

 

Baker shrugged off his puzzlement. He had reached his house and padded up the smooth wooden steps, heading for the kitchen fridge and a cold Foster's.

 

In another week, he thought, the first members of the IIA

 

will start to get their guts torn out by the Horror And I'll be up on the Moon, safe as houses, watching the world tear itself apart

 

The medical tests they had done on Stoner were ruthlessly thorough He thought of the stories he had heard as a youngster of the "experiments" performed by Nazi doctors in concentration camps

 

His captors were extremely wary of him No human being entered his room after the first few days Everything was done by robots under remote control Each morning began with a short cylmdncally-shaped robot carrying in a breakfast tray of )Uice, cereal, and coffee The machine was spotless and gleaming, obviously new, obviously being used for the first time

 

"Good morning Dr Stoner," the robot would say "I trust you slept well "

 

It was the robot's own voice, part of its interactive programming Immediately after breakfast another voice, human, would issue from the speakers set into the ceiling

 

"I slept about the same as usual," Stoner would reply "Where are wej What is our geographical location?"

 

"I do not have that information," the sturdy little robot would answer, with complete transistorized honesty

 

The first two days were standard medical tests Blood samples Cardiac stress testing on a treadmill carried in by another robot, a taller, many-armed machine of matte-dull carbon fiber composite skin Its long arms were of stainless steel, jointed and extensible, capable of carrying very heavy loads

 

It was the blood samples that worried Stoner He felt he could hide his star-gift abilities from his captors well enough, he had been careful not to show them anything except a normal, healthy human being But analysis of his blood would show that it was infected with myriad particles the size of viruses His star symbiotes

 

They may think that they're nothing but viruses, Stoner told himself But he doubted it That many strange particles

 

in a blood sample would set their curiosity atwitter Chemical analyses wouldn't prove much, the symbiotes were made mostly of organic elements But if they start pho-tomicrographing the particles they'll realize right away that they're something no one on Earth has seen before

 

At the end of the second day of medical tests it seemed to Stoner that the robot left the door unlocked when it rolled noiselessly out of the room Stoner sat on the edge of his cot for nearly half an hour, considering what he should do Obviously they were observing him If the door were left unlocked, it was because they wanted to see what he would do

 

There were no clocks in the room, he had no way of telling what time it was, or even if it was day or night outside Like a Las Vegas gambling casino, Stoner thought grimly With a shrug, he got up from the cot, wearing nothing but a pair of briefs, and padded to the door

 

He turned the old-fashioned knob Sure enough, the door was unlocked Hesitating only for a heartbeat, he pushed the door wide open

 

A very large robot stood immobile just beyond the arc of the door's swing Its base was a pair of heavy, tanklike treads From there it rose in a single massive column of gleaming chromed metal Four long arms were clamped to its sides, each of them ending in metal pincers The dome at the robot's top was studded with sensors that made it look more like a spider's many-eyed head than a human's

 

"You must stay inside your room," said the robot in a voice that sounded like a top sergeant growling from inside a concrete mixer

 

Stoner smiled at the machine Obviously meant to frighten people into obedience Probably built for military security or police patrol work

 

He took a step forward The robot rolled slightly toward him and raised one arm to block his path

 

"You must stay inside your room "

 

For several long moments man and machine confronted each other, motionless Stoner tried to probe the robot's com-

 

puter brain to see if he could alter its programming enough to get by, but he sensed that the computer was too simple to be influenced by outside forces. There was no way to talk it into bending to Stoner's desires, as he could do with most human beings.

 

"You must stay inside your room," the robot repeated in exactly the same tone of voice as before.

 

Stoner understood that the test had been psychological more than physical. His captors wanted to see how he would react to having his hopes raised and then dashed. Also, they were testing to see if he could somehow get past the simple-minded security robot.

 

Acknowledging defeat, Stoner retreated back inside his room. The robot shut the door. Stoner heard the lock click as distinctly as the slamming of a )ail cell's barred gate.

 

The third morning the voice from the ceiling asked, "You slept well?"

 

"Yes," Stoner lied. He had not slept at all. He did not have to. He had spent the night trying to sense the location and number of the people around him. He still had no idea of where he was. If his captors were not going to deal with him face to face, Stoner realized, he would have to go out and contact them, one way or another. And get past the security robot outside his door.

 

"No stomach cramps or other discomfort?"

 

"Should there have been?"

 

The voice did not answer. Stoner realized that they had poisoned his dinner. Not to kill him, just enough to give him obvious symptoms. His star brother had automatically neutralized the poison, broken down its complex molecular structure into simpler, harmless chemical components.

 

He wished the voice would say more to him, because it sounded oddly familiar Even through the low-fidelity ceiling speakers Stoner knew it was a man's tenor voice, not a woman's A voice that he thought he had heard before.

 

Two of the tall many-armed robots entered the room that morning.

 

"We have established a baseline of your physical profile," said the voice from the ceiling "Now we must see how far from that baseline you can be driven and still recuperate. The next few days will be rigorous, but we will try to make them as painless as possible for you."

 

In short, they tortured him.

 

They began with electric shocks. One of the robots clamped Stoner into a chair with its many arms while the other applied electrodes to various parts of his naked body. At first Stoner tried to stand the pain without help from the alien symbiotes. But they kept increasing the voltage until he was screaming and his star brother intervened to shut down the white-hot messages of agony that blazed along his nerves.

 

He sat in the chair, the stainless steel arms gripping his bare flesh, and watched the electrodes burn away his skin. Saw tendrils of smoke rising from his chest, his stomach, his thighs. Smelled the odor of his own meat roasting.

 

"Remarkable," uttered the voice from the ceiling microphones "He is able to handle intense physical pain." It was muffled, indistinct, as if the man had placed a hand over the microphone so that his victim could not hear what he said. Stoner made out the words, though, and even the slightly ragged breathing of the speaker. Was he enjoying what he watched, or did it upset him? Stoner could not tell

 

"Is this necessary " another voice asked. It was blurred even more, as if the speaker were several meters away from the microphone. "Can't you . ."

 

"It is necessary," snapped the first voice "We will proceed to the next step."

 

"Without giving him time to recuperate?"

 

Do they want me to hear what they're saying? Stoner wondered

 

"No recuperation time. Not yet. The next test is a combination of physical and psychological pain," said the man's voice. "We will see how he reacts to having his manhood threatened."

 

"But that's inhuman "

 

"We are hardly dealing with a human being here." The man's voice was cool, detached. "Don't be so sentimental. This is an experimental subject, nothing more. You must stop being so squeamish."

 

The other said nothing, but Stoner sensed a turmoil of emotions. And something more: the other person was a woman.

 

The robot held Stoner's legs apart and applied the electrodes to his penis and testicles. Stoner closed his eyes but otherwise gave no reaction. His star brother cut off all sensation, all emotion. It was like being encased in a block of ice, like being frozen again, no longer alive, inert, apart from the world of the living.

 

And his star brother told him, You know that whatever physical damage they do will be quickly repaired.

 

Sure, Stoner replied silently, his teeth clenched so hard they seemed to be fused together. Wonderful news.

 

After what seemed like hours the robots released him and rolled silently out of the room with their equipment. The voices from the ceiling fell silent. Exhausted, Stoner crawled to his cot and pretended to fall asleep.

 

They did not feed him. No robot entered with a dinner tray and the following morning there was no breakfast.

 

I've got to get out of here, he told himself in the dead of night.

 

But his star brother soothed his growing anxiety. Not yet. Wait until we can learn who they are--and who they work for.

 

So Stoner lay on the cot and waited for the next session. They know that whatever powers we have, we still need energy input. Without food we won't be able to heal our wounds.

 

We can go for several days, his star brother assured him. There is enough stored fat in the body to keep going that long without input.

 

The lock clicked and Stoner sat up on the cot. The tall many-armed robots came through the door. One of them pushed a gurney, the other a table full of electrical equipment.

 

"Today," said the voice from the ceiling, "we test the electrical patterns of your brain."

 

The robots strapped Stoner down on the gurney and attached electrodes to his head. In the weirdly distorted reflection from their stainless steel arms he saw his naked body, ugly red burn marks scattered about his chest, abdomen, groin.

 

For hours they mapped the currents flickering in his brain. His star brother remained silent as they sent tickling probes into various lobes of the brain. Stoner tried to stay completely relaxed as the electrical currents stimulated specific groups of neurons. He saw colors bursting before his eyes, heard the rushing roar of the sea, tasted bacon and then the cold metallic tang of the oxygen fed into his pressure-suit helmet. He could feel the suit encompassing him and for a fleeting moment, as in a dream that shifted like the melting scenery on a rain-streaked window pane, he was back in space helping to construct the mammoth telescope that had first detected the approaching alien starship.

 

The telescope glittered in the hard unfiltered sunlight, a gleaming spiderwork of bright metal against the cold black background of infinity. Stoner reached out to touch it.

 

And it was gone, replaced by an absurd childhood memory of trying to maintain his balance on a two-wheel bike.

 

Blinding white pain! Stoner could not breathe; he felt his heart stop, then start up again with thumping spasms that rocked his whole body.

 

"Again," he heard, as if from a trillion miles away.

 

The blast that shockwaved through his skull was beyond pain. Even his star brother was stunned momentarily, but then swiftly shut down the pain centers in his brain.

 

"There, did you see it? That blip in the EEC?"

 

Another powerful bolt of agony exploded inside Stoner's head, but this time he and the alien within him were ready. He knew exactly what they were doing to him: electrical shock treatments. Christ! Next they'll start lobotomies!

 

His star brother slowed Stoner's heartbeat and breathing rate. His whole body, rigid with the electrical shocks, spine

 

arched, fingers and toes clenched so hard that tendons were popping, it all relaxed as if Stoner had slipped off into a deep and restful sleep Or death

 

But he heard the voices from the ceiling speaker

 

"You've gone too far "

 

"Not at all Look at that EEG, have you ever seen anything like it before?"

 

No response

 

"A normal brain would show a scrambled set of jagged peaks and troughs His curves are as gentle as a sleeping baby's It's fantastic'"

 

"Hasn't he had enough for today "

 

"I want to try a couple more shocks, just to see if we can break him out of the shell he's gone into "

 

"You'll kill him'"

 

"I doubt that we could kill him if we tried "

 

"May I remind you that the purpose of these experiments is to determine why he survived cryomc immersion and thawing, not to chop him up into bloody little scraps'"

 

"Interesting choice of words, Doctor "

 

"What? Why do you say that?"

 

"Because tomorrow I'm going to see if he can regenerate significant parts of his body We'll start by amputating a finger "

 

"God' You can't be serious'"

 

"Never more serious And don't try to interfere I'm in charge here, and I'm going to find out what makes that man tick if I have to take him apart like an old windup clock "

 

The words would have struck fear into Stoner's battered consciousness if his star brother had allowed a man's normal hormonal reactions Instead he lay there on the gumey perfectly still, utterly relaxed, seemingly unconscious or in a deep coma

 

But his mind was racing I know those voices' I know who they are

 

Vie Tomasso paced nervously back and forth across the length of the balcony His apartment was two floors below the penthouse of one of the tallest residential towers in Hilo

 

On a normal weekend afternoon he would have been sitting out in the sunshine, improving his tan while alternately watching the professional football games on TV and the women frolicking on the golden sandy beach in their minuscule swim suits

 

This was not a normal weekend

 

He could feel the searing heat of fo's suspicions of him Hell, even if he had been totally innocent it would be natural for her to cast a distrustful eye at the man she thought she had planted in Hsen's camp But Jo glowered at him like the burning end of a red-hot branding iron Even though she tried to control herself and not reveal her inner thoughts, the fury and suspicion that seethed within her glowed hot as hellfire

 

He had volunteered to an interrogation under truth drugs "I might remember something Hsen or his people said that my conscious mind doesn't recall," he had said to Jo She had nodded and approved the interrogation Tomasso dutifully reported to the security office and was interrogated by a team that included the physician whom he had been sleeping with for the past four months She believed that Vie truly loved her The drug she injected into his bloodstream was nothing more than a mild tranquilizer Vie passed the test easily

 

Still, the pressure was mounting Jo would not be satisfied until she found the traitors in her midst He knew that she had people backtracking every phone call he had made over the past several weeks, trying to trace every move he had made Tomasso worried about that last call he had made to Hsen, telling him that Stoner was returning early from Moscow The number he had actually called was another apartment in Hilo, a "girlfriend" who in reality was an employee of Pacific Commerce's intelligence operations The call had been relayed to Hsen in Hong Kong from her phone

 

That should be safe enough, Tomasso told himself, pacing endlessly across the balcony Safe enough

 

But Jo was like an avenging angel, fiery sword in hand, searching for dragons to slay Tomasso felt like a very small dragon, more like a defenseless lizard

 

If I run, that'll prove to her that I was in on the operation Prove to her that I've been working for Hsen.

 

Pace the length of the balcony, reach the end and turn back again.

 

But if I stay she'll grab me sooner or later. Even if she doesn't get any real evidence against me. She suspects and that'll be enough for her. She'll have her own Italian bodyguards grab me and squirt real truth serum into my veins. Or worse.

 

The far end of the balcony. Turn around and pace the other way. Ignore the beach, the sunlight and surfers and palm trees. Tomasso was looking inward, trying to discern his own future.

 

She'll make me talk and once I do I'm a dead man. But if I run to Hsen he'll figure I've outlived my usefulness to him. I'm dead either way!

 

There was only one way out, one bargaining chip remaining with which to buy his life. He had been holding it back, carefully keeping it to himself until the right moment. His ace in the hole.

 

Well, Tomasso said to himself, if you don't use it now you might not live to use it later.

 

Nodding to himself, convinced he had no other path to safety, he drove to a shopping mall in downtown Hilo and picked out a public telephone at random. Pecking out the same "girlfriend"'s number, once he connected with her answering machine he spoke the code phrase that automatically transferred his call to Hsen's office in Hong Kong.

 

Hsen was not there, said the Chinese beauty whose face appeared on the tiny phone screen She looked too perfect, too flawless, to be anything but a computer graphic.

 

"Tell Hsen that Vanguard Industries has a secret operation going on the Moon, a special base called Delphi, far out on the Mare Imbnum."

 

The simulated woman smiled blandly and waited for more information.

 

"Nobody on the board of directors knows about it,"

 

Tomasso went on, nervous, glancing out toward the balcony, as if expecting Jo herself to suddenly materialize there, desperately hoping he had not been followed by anyone. "Ms. Camerata and her husband . . . they're building a starship there. A ship that will be able to fly out of the solar system. I think they intend to send it back to the planet that the alien ship came from."

 

Lela Obin spent every night in dread Out in the forest, wrapped in her sleeping bag against the chill damp darkness, listening to the hootmgs and growls floating through the night, she slept fitfully if at all. Gradually she had grown accustomed to the natural sounds of the forest, and during the day she had come to love this emerald world with its mottled sunlight and clean sparkling streams The thick foliage of the forest closed in like a green womb, surrounding her, enfolding her in its leafy arms Each day she walked through this primeval universe, the only human being in a new Eden, alone with brilliant flashing birds and scampering chattering monkeys.

 

Yet she knew she was not really alone. Koku was shambling through the woods up ahead of her, sniffing the shrubs and pristine air, bringing scents to Lela's mind that she had never known before Seeing the green world through Koku's eyes made it a true paradise, and she began to love the forest as he did.

 

Yet the night frightened her. Not because of the cold mist that condensed dripping from every leaf. Nor because of the predators that lurked in the darkness. Those she understood and accepted. They would never attack a human. Her sleeping bag was guarded by a tiny electronic transmitter that surrounded the area out to a dozen meters with a nerve-jangling field that would frighten off even a starving jackal.

 

There were other humans out there in the trees That is what frightened Lela. There should be no one except herself in this sector of the reserve, yet she kept hearing the distant

 

faint sounds of men talking, occasional clinks of metal on metal, even a whiff of tobacco smoke now and then.

 

They were stalking her They had started by going after Koku, but now they were following Lela. They could never keep up with Koku once the gorilla was warned to stay away from them So they were following Lela. Not merely following her, either, but constantly pushing between Lela and the territory that Koku was supposed to reach. They kept far enough away so that she could not see them. But at least once each day a stray breeze carried fresh proof of their presence.

 

Or am I being paranoidJ Lela asked herself. Alone in the woods, city girl, and you see danger behind every bush. Once again she tried to radio back to headquarters, and once again she got nothing but screeching static on her hand-sized radio Interference. Was the radio being jammed? How much safer she would feel if she could talk to Professor Yeboa or the captain in charge of the reserve's rangers She longed to hear a helicopter thrumming high above, scanning the trees with its arrays of sensors

 

Koku was well ahead of her, but still far from the territory where his mates were waiting for him. It was going to be difficult enough to have the tame-born young male take up a natural life in this habitat. Worrying about poachers made matters infinitely worse.

 

After days of inner turmoil, Lela finally made up her mind. Koku could take care of himself for a day or so. She would confront the poachers and make them know that they would be apprehended and jailed if they did not leave the reserve immediately. Inwardly she was frightened that they might kill her, but she forced such fears from her conscious mind. Nothing like that had happened in years, decades. Besides, both she and Koku were being tracked by locator satellites. Her voice radio might be jammed, but the beam of her locator transmitter was on an entirely different frequency. Even if someone jammed it, the loss of signal by the satellite would itself alert headquarters and a squad of rangers would start out immediately to search for her.

 

So she took her courage in her hands that morning and doubled back along the steep ridge she had been following. The rising sun was just starting to burn off the chill gray mist. The trail along the ridge was wet, the grass slippery.

 

Koku had awakened with the sunrise. When Lela closed her eyes she could see another part of the forest, taste the delicious leaves he delicately stripped from the gahum vines around him, rejoice in the strength and freedom he felt.

 

Then she heard voices. Unmistakable. Her eyes wide open now, visions of Koku fading into the back of her mind, she ducked low and crept slowly, carefully through the thick enfolding bushes toward the sounds, as silent as she could be without stopping altogether. A tendril of smoke rose from behind the bushes off to her left. Lela's nose wrinkled at the smell of grease burning.

 

With newfound cunning she flattened herself on the damp grass and slithered around a thick clump of bush. There were four of them, two black men and two white. Just starting to break camp. One of the whites kicked loose dirt onto their small fire. They all wore khaki shirts and trousers, and each of them carried sidearms. Lela saw rifles stacked next to one of their sleeping bags. Five bags, she counted. Yet she saw only four men.

 

"What have we here?" a deep voice boomed out.

 

Lela scrambled to her feet. A big, ruddy-faced redheaded man was grinning at her, a huge rifle cradled in his bare arms.

 

The other four men dashed up to them.

 

"Well, well, well," said one of the other whites. "It's the bride of the gorilla herself!"

 

CHICAGO

 

FROM behind the roadblock, the TV news reporter quickly sprayed her hair so it would not blow untidily in the early autumn breeze.

 

It was an unusually warm October afternoon out on Interstate 80, ten miles beyond the city line The sun shone serenely out of a pale blue sky washed by a morning shower Off to the east puffy white clouds were building up by the lake shore The woods on the far side of the highway were glorious in their autumnal reds and golds

 

From the slight rise in the ground where the cameraman stood, -80 stretched out to the horizon, a snarling metallic snake filled with fuming automobiles, vans, trucks, even school buses Heat waves rose from the highway where the traffic stood tangled and stopped, glittering and growling in the sunlight A roadblock of National Guard tanks parked shoulder to shoulder across the highway, median divider and all, had stopped the vehicles desperately trying to leave Chicago National Guard soldiers in mottled camouflage uniforms, wearing their battle helmets and carrying assault rifles, were turning the cars around and heading them back toward the city

 

The TV reporter, standing just outside the mobile news van with a big numeral nine painted on its side, made a final check of her appearance in the full-length mirror that hung on the inside of the open van door, then walked quickly up to the spot where the cameraman stood

 

They made an almost laughable contrast The reporter was neatly turned out in a pale silk blouse, pleated skirt, and beige jacket--and muddy, sturdy, comfortable jogging shoes The Channel 9 pin on her jacket's lapel was actually her microphone, sensitive to a range of about three yards The cameraman wore a grease-stained sweat shirt and jeans He was bald, fat, and had tattoos on both his forearms His camera was no larger than one of his ham-sized hands Its monitoring screen was the size of a postage stamp

 

"I got all the traffic footage I need," he said Pointing toward a woman soldier bearing gold oak leaves on her shoulders, he said, "There's the major in charge of this mess She's waitm' for you to interview her "

 

The major was gray-haired and had a face as hard as armor plate She was not a happy person

 

The reporter stood before the camera and put on her professional smile "This is Becky Murtaugh on Interstate 80 about ten miles west of the city With me is Major," she peered quickly at the major's name tag, "Wallmsky of the Illinois National Guard "

 

Turning slightly, but making certain her face was still on camera, the reporter asked, "Major, how do you feel about stopping all these people who want to leave the city?"

 

The major grimaced "I feel like hell But I got my orders We're supposed to keep the city sealed off in order to stop the spread of the plague "

 

Someone started honking his car horn and almost instantly the miles-long pileup of vehicles began bleating, blaring their fear and frustration The reporter had to shout to be heard over the dm "But only five cases of the Horror have been reported in Chicago so far Why is everyone trying to run away?"

 

With a withering look, the major hollered back, "They're scared They're afraid of catching it, of course It's fatal And extremely painful There's no cure, no vaccine Nobody wants to die "

 

"But the Army has sent out orders to prevent anyone from leaving the city?"

 

"The Surgeon General, actually We're in a state of emergency The governors of every state in the Union have called out the National Guard to help control road traffic and keep order "

 

"So you're turning back the desperately frightened people who want to get away from the Horror?"

 

"That's my job We can't allow them to spread the plague into the countryside The whole nation will be affected "

 

"But can't these people find alternate roads, side roads, to get out into the countryside?"

 

"Sure they can That's what makes this job so frustrating We can't put up roadblocks across every back road in the area We don't have the manpower or the time"

 

"So that means " The reporter gasped A sudden pain in her stomach, like a hot knife twisting She recovered, know-

 

mg that the lapse could be edited out of the tape "That means that just because five cases of the Horror have been reported in Chicago, the entire city of four million inhabitants is under quara ."

 

The pain struck again, more viciously. She doubled over, clutching her middle The microphone pin slipped from her lapel to the grass, but still picked up her awful retching screams of pain

 

The major bellowed in a voice of command, "Medic Get a medic up here on the double "

 

The reporter writhed on the ground, blood bubbling from her mouth, eyes wild with agony The cameraman bent over her and got every last second of her death throes on tape.

 

CHAPTER 25

 

THERE was no way around the robot that stood guard outside his door His captors were too clever to face him, not even the squat serving robot appeared anymore. They had stopped feeding him.

 

I should have made them release me when I had the chance, Stoner thought ruefully Now I'm stuck here

 

We want to find out who they are working for, his star brother reminded him

 

I know who they are, he replied

 

The voices he had heard from the overhead speakers belonged to Janos and Ilona Lucacs Stoner was certain of it. The man who had coldly stated that he intended to amputate Stoner's fingers to see if he could grow them back--that was Zoltan Janos

 

Yes, said his star brother But if he is no longer working for

 

the president of Hungary, for whom is he working' Who built this laboratory Why is he experimenting on us?

 

Ilona was with [anos, too How did they leave Hawaii? How did they get away from fo? Lying quietly on his cot in the dead of night, Stoner tried to expand his awareness past the locked door of his room, past the stupid hulking robot that stood guard outside, beyond the glimpse of hallway he had seen

 

Ilona, are you there' he called silently. Can you sense my presence?

 

No response He waited in the darkness, pretending to be asleep, but every sense in his body was straining to touch another human mind. He could feel the presence of many people, more than twelve of them, but dimly, too far away to reach and examine or control. This building is big, he realized. It must have been an army barracks or a dormitory at one time.

 

And he was trapped in it. None of the humans would dare come close enough for him even to begin to manipulate their minds. They hid away from him and sent their robots by day, controlling them remotely, and then turned them off so that Stoner had no chance to tinker with the machines mentally once their human controllers were finished with them The only robot he could reach at night was the guard outside his door.

 

The damned stupid robot on the other side of that door The perfect security guard, too inhuman to need a cup of coffee or to stretch its legs or move a millimeter from its assigned post. Its electronic brain was an old-fashioned hardwired computer with limited program capacity, not one of the complex decision-capable neural networks that Stoner could manipulate. The damned machine was too moronic to be controlled or maneuvered or even to blink its electro-optical eyes . . .

 

Stoner almost bolted upright in the cot. Only rigid self-control kept him from moving. The robot can see! Maybe I can use its eyes.

 

Slowing his breathing, forcing himself to relax and concentrate all his mental energies, Stoner probed for the simple electrical patterns of the robot's computer

 

And there it was, even simpler and less complicated than the brain patterns of a faithful dog Stoner carefully traced his way through the command paths of the computer's programming With enough time, he thought, maybe I could learn to control this beastie

 

Time That's the one thing I don't have I've got to get out of here And soon

 

For the moment, though, he had to satisfy himself with nothing more than a look through the robot's eyes at the hallway outside his room

 

There was not much to be seen

 

The robot had four electro-optical sensors mounted in the bulbous projection at its top, four eyes in its head Stoner saw the door to his own room, a scant two feet away Without needing to move the robot's head he could see along the corridor in which it stood It was a surprisingly wide hallway, and Stoner noticed that it was carpeted like the hall of a hotel But the carpeting was faded, threadbare There were even patches of fungus here and there

 

Doors were spaced along one side of the broad hallway, all of them closed The walls were cracked here and there, faint squares of lighter plaster showed where pictures had once hung Dim bare bulbs glowed feebly from the ceiling, casting pools of grayish light along the mildewed carpet The other wall of the hallway showed windows, boarded up At the farthest point, where the hall should have ended, rough planks and slabs of plywood had been nailed up, as if the wall had crumbled away

 

Stoner felt puzzled It looked like an old hotel that had been abandoned He wished the robot had electrochemical sniffers, he was certain he would smell the tang of salt sea air

 

All the doors along the corridor were tightly closed, and the robot would not budge from its assigned post to investigate them Ilona Lucacs was somewhere in this building, Stoner

 

knew Lying on a sagging ancient hotel bed, plugged in to her pleasure machine, oblivious to all the world

 

She was his one hope An addict who was in love with the man who was systematically torturing him

 

For more than an hour Stoner wandered mentally through the programmed pathways in the robot's computer brain, learning slowly how he might override its commands and take control of the machine It would take many hours of exertion

 

Sleep, said his star brother

 

No, we need to be able to move this hunk of tin

 

In a few hours they will begin their experiments again We will need all the strength we have Sleep now, rest, prepare

 

Stoner knew his star brother was right Still, he wanted to learn how to control the robot Before they started hacking off his fingers

 

"With all due respect for her long years of fine service to this corporation," said Amanda Tilley from her seat across the circular table from Jo, "and with great sorrow for the loss of her daughter and kidnapping of her husband, I move that the board ask Ms Camerata for her resignation "

 

Jo sat up rigidly in her chair Since she had been elected chairman of the board she had insisted that the directors meet around a circular table They had called it "Queen Jo's Round Table" at first, realizing that it was her way to stop the power games that the directors played By emphasizing equality among the board, she also emphasized her own mastery of its members

 

But now there was a motion on the table that would end her presidency of Vanguard Industries and chairmanship of the board Jo studied Amanda Tilley the woman was bone thin, her hair as white as cream, clipped short and neatly coiffed, her paisley frock conservative yet feminine Her eyes shifted away from Jo's gaze uneasily Her mouth was a tight, tense line in her drawn face

 

How like Hsen to use a board member who had been one of

 

Jo's most faithful supporters And to use Cathy's murder as the excuse to push me out Jo held on to her blazing temper Self-control had never been more vitally important The subtle little oriental bastard had not dared to show up for the board meeting, not even in hologrammic projection

 

Glancing around the table, Jo saw that none of the directors were surprised by Tilley's motion Twenty-two men and women, nearly two dozen business people who sat on the boards of the world's most powerful corporations Their clothes were quietly elegant, the women in one-of-a-kind frocks or day suits, the men in hand-tailored suits of gray or dark blue Jo herself wore a sheath of black and beige feather print design, it clung to her figure just enough to be suggestive without being blatant On the table before each member rested a computer keyboard with flat display screen built into the table top, and a gleaming stainless steel pitcher that held a pint of each director's preferred drink

 

Some of the directors looked embarrassed at Tilley's motion, some distressed, others wire-taut Sir Harold Epping was clearly angered But no one was surprised

 

"A motion that I resign has been put before the board," Jo said, mainly for the tape that was automatically recording the board meeting "Is there a second'"

 

She turned her gaze toward Wilhelm Kruppmann and, sure enough, he muttered, "Second "

 

"Discussions" asked Jo

 

Several board members squirmed in their chairs One of the older men cleared his throat, but then said nothing

 

Molten hot anger seethed through Jo's every fiber She deliberately waited for a long moment, waited while the other board members glanced at one another like guilty school-children, waited while she fought for control over her fury

 

At last she said, in a voice that was calm, quiet, and steel-hard, "I suppose I should open the discussion with a statement of my own I have no intention of resigning the presidency of this corporation or the chairmanship of this board "

 

Several of the members nodded, a few even smiled, relieved

 

"I believe," Jo continued, "that this attempt to use the murder of my daughter and the abduction of my husband as an excuse to remove me from office is a contemptible tactic, a return to the sexist maneuvering that was outlawed by the World Court decades ago "

 

That made almost all of them sit up the threat of a discrimination suit in the World Court No director in his or her right mind would want that

 

"Moreover, we all know that this illegal sexist garbage is nothing but a front for the man who wants to take over this corporation Amanda, I'm certain you don't realize it, but you are being used by Li-Po Hsen "

 

Tilley's mouth dropped open "I never this is something Jo, you mustn't believe " she sputtered

 

But Jo had already swung her blazing eyes to Kruppmann "Isn't that right, Wilhelm?"

 

She caught the Swiss banker as he was nervously gulping at a glass of sparkling water He sputtered and his face reddened

 

Before he could reply, Jo said, "Hsen wants to take over Vanguard, he's wanted to do it for years, and now he's using this pretext to try to get me out of his way He's saying to you that I'm just an emotional woman, and the tragedy that's happened to my family has made me unfit to be your president Well it's not true, and I refuse to stand aside and allow Hsen to to gain control of this corporation--especially when he's the one who had my daughter murdered and my bus band kidnapped'"

 

A shock wave went around the table Jo smiled to herself She had almost said that Hsen was trying to rape the corporation, but realized at the last instant that it would be too female a word to use

 

"That is a very serious accusation," Kruppmann said, his voice quavering "Where is your proof"

 

"You are my proof, Wilhelm " Jo sprang the trap "In the anteroom through the double doors is a team from my security division, ready to apply truth serum under medically supervised conditions Will you submit to their examination'"

 

Kruppmann's face went white. "Now you accuse me"

 

"You're damned right I do You've been in this with Hsen from the beginning."

 

"I absolutely refuse to permit your Gestapo robots to interrogate me You have no right ..."

 

Jo cut him short. "As a member of this board you have agreed to periodic medical examinations. As president of the corporation and chairman of the board, I'm calling for an examination now."

 

Kruppmann looked wildly around the table, seeking support and finding none.

 

"This is illegal!" he blustered "A violation of my rights!"

 

"Your rights," Jo mimicked, almost snarling. "You knew that Hsen was going to attack my home, my family, didn't you?"

 

Kruppmann's response was a strangled guttural growl. The other directors were staring at him, unconsciously leaning away from him, faces aghast. Amanda Tilley's eyes were wide, her blue-veined hands clenched before her chin.

 

"Didn't you?" Jo repeated, her voice hot enough to melt steel.

 

Kruppmann crumpled His face sagged and he made a helpless gesture, eyes darting around the table as if for help. He looked like a man who suddenly realized he was going to be hauled before a firing squad

 

"I didn't know . " he said in a tortured whisper. "I had no idea . "

 

Jo smiled grimly at him. Her scheme had worked. The pitcher of sparkling water on the table before Kruppmann had been laced with enough scopolamme to reduce his willpower almost to zero

 

"Tell the board what you do know," she said softly. "Tell us of your own volition."

 

The Swiss banker began blubbering. The board members listened in growing horror as he hesitantly told them of Hsen's determination to take over Vanguard and to break up the International Investment Agency.

 

"What about my husband?" Jo demanded.

 

"That too," Kruppmann confessed. "Hsen wanted to capture Stoner to find out how he survived freezing. The man wants to live forever."

 

"Where is he now?"

 

Kruppmann heaved his massive shoulders. "I don't know. China, somewhere in China, I think. He knows you are after him. He has gone into hiding."

 

Jo pursed her lips and decided to let Kruppmann off the hook. He could be monitored electronically and by human surveillance teams. He was her best lead to Hsen's whereabouts.

 

"Very well," she said, her voice turned to ice. "Now we should return to the business of the board."

 

Amanda Tilley got unsteadily to her feet. "I would like to withdraw my motion," she said, her voice trembling.

 

The entire board clapped their hands loudly. All except Kruppmann, who sat dazedly, staring into emptiness Jo accepted their applause with a tight smile. The cowardly bastards are too scared to throw me out now, she knew. But at least they've given me a free hand to deal with Hsen-- whether they realize it or not. Now, with the board solidly behind me, now we start the moves to take over Pacific Commerce. And kill the murdering sonofabitch.

 

The voice from the ceiling speaker said almost casually, "We will not use an anesthetic, since we want to determine how well you are able to control the pain."

 

One of the many-armed robots had clamped Stoner's left hand in a grip of steel inches above a small table that was covered with absorbent surgical sheeting. Two of its other arms held Stoner's shoulders against the back of the chair on which he had been seated. A fourth steel-fingered hand pinned Stoner's right arm tightly against his side.

 

"If our sensors show you are in great pain," the voice went on, "naturally we will immediately inject you with a local anesthetic."

 

"Naturally," said Stoner through gritted teeth Even though his star brother was controlling his fear, slowing the chemical secretions that produced the bodily sensations of terror, Stoner's mind still knew full well that in a few moments they were going to amputate one of his fingers

 

Controlling fear is not the same as being fearless, Stoner realized He could feel his heart thumping in his chest, feel perspiration beading his upper lip

 

The second robot held two of its clawhke hands above Stoner's outstretched fingers One hand gripped a pneumatic hypodermic syringe, its needle inches above Stoner's wrist The other held a hair-thin optical fiber that wound back from the robot's delicate fingers to a compact surgical laser resting on a second table, closer to the door

 

Stoner never heard a command given The fiber suddenly glowed and a white-hot beam of light lanced across the base of his little finger He knew that all sensations of pain were being shunted away, controlled by his star brother But his breath still went ragged as he watched with staring eyes while the beam of light severed his little finger from his hand

 

He heard a howling, bellowing noise and realized it was his own voice screaming not in pain but in savage, uncontrolled rage His star brother was startled momentarily, but deep within his mind Stoner felt the alien presence agree that his primal scream was the simplest way to release the tension that racked his body

 

The robots were totally unaffected by Stoner's feral roar Their grip on his flesh did not tighten a millimeter Or loosen The laser light winked out and the finger dropped to the table top, disconnected, and rolled over slightly so that it lay askew, like a ship with a bad list Stoner blinked and felt tears in his eyes His throat was raw There was a bit of bleeding but even that quickly stopped The robot picked up the severed finger, its arm bending in ways impossible to a human, and deftly deposited it in a fluid-filled glass jar

 

"We will preserve the finger," said fanos's voice from the ceiling speaker, "to compare its tissue composition with that of the new finger he grows "

 

"If he grows a new finger," said Ilona's voice

 

"He will, I'm certain "

 

"Not without food," Stoner heard a voice reply His own Croaking, dry, harsh with brute anger and the rawness of his throat

 

"What did you say, Dr Stoner?"

 

"I won't be able to regenerate unless I get food Any system needs an energy input "

 

"We must allow him food," Ilona's voice said

 

"Tomorrow," replied Janos "I want a baseline profile Tomorrow morning we will go through the complete physical exams, plus a brain scan, and then he can be given food "

 

The robots released Stoner, gathered up their tools with quiet efficiency, and left the room Stoner glimpsed the guard robot out in the hallway, massive as a small tank

 

He flexed his left hand The stub where his little finger had been was seared black No blood, although a little clear liquid leaked through the burned skin A tide of sullen, remorseless anger began to rise in him, only to be drained away by a coldly rational calm, like flames extinguished by a blast of icy water

 

Let me have my anger, he snarled inwardly Let me feel what a human being should feel

 

His star brother replied silently, The most horrible things that human beings do, they do in anger

 

Or in fear

 

Or in fear, his star brother admitted Anger is often the mask for fear

 

"Bastards," he muttered aloud But to himself, to both his selves, he said, We've got to find a way out of here

 

Ilona, he called silently Ilona, I need your help He's going to kill me You know that he won't stop until the ultimate test--to see if I can survive a fatal trauma

 

He felt her presence, her own fear, her uncertainty But he got no reply to his plea

 

CHAPTER 26

 

FOR the first time in nearly two weeks Vie Tomasso leaned back and relaxed. He had been nervous throughout the Pacific Commerce flight from Hilo to Tokyo, wondering if Hsen had the balls to sabotage one of his own rocketplanes just to get rid of a man he no longer wanted alive. But the flight went smoothly and he transferred on the hovertrain to the spaceport out in the harbor, streaking along the superconducting rails that levitated the train on a cushion of magnetic force.

 

Now he sat back in a Pacific Commerce space shuttle, confident that if Hsen was too cheap to blow up one of his own aerospace planes he certainly would not destroy a much more expensive shuttle. Not just to assassinate me, Tomasso thought. And he wouldn't spend the money to take me to the Moon if he wanted to get rid of me. He could have had a couple of goons knock me off at the airport or on the train. Cheaper, by far.

 

So he felt reasonably confident that his information about the secret starship project had bought his life for him. Now all he had to do was lead Hsen's people to Delphi base out on the Mare Imbrium and let them take things from there.

 

After the shuttle took off from the harbor spaceport and angled steeply into the sky, Tomasso even managed to drift off into a restful sleep while the craft glided weightlessly toward the Vanguard space station that was the first stop on the way to the Moon.

 

In her office at Vanguard's headquarters Jo smiled humor-lessly to herself as she studied the computer screen display. So it was Vie after all. The truth drug session had been a sham. I'll have to check on the doctor who handled the interrogation, she thought. I'll bet it was a woman.

 

The Hungarians should have been a tip-off, Jo realized with perfect hindsight. They disappeared the day after Cathy's murder and I never even paid any attention to it. No one but Vie could have gotten them out of the house, even in all that uproar. It's been him all along, the smiling traitorous murdering bastard.

 

Vie thought he was so clever, flying to Tokyo unannounced and getting onto a Moon-bound shuttle flight so quickly that no one could follow him.

 

What Vie did not know was that he carried imbedded beneath the skin on the back of his left shoulder a microscopic transmitter, powered by the heat of his own body, that faithfully beeped out a location signal every minute of the day and night. It had been implanted during Tomasso's very first physical examination by Vanguard medics when he had first been hired by the corporation. A routine procedure that no one, not even the chief of corporate security, knew about. No one except Jo and the medics who did the work. And the medics were bought off nicely with early retirements at huge pensions--and distant retirement homes.

 

The procedure had started years earlier as a security move against terrorism, when corporate executives were under constant threat of kidnapping or worse. Although such hazards had dwindled greatly Jo still found it convenient to be able to keep tabs on selected members of her staff--without their knowing it, of course.

 

Vanguard surveillance satellites routinely monitored only the location signals of the corporation's top executives. Jo had no need or desire to keep track of everyone, although there had been times when an individual attracted her attention enough to start the satellites searching. Since the murder of her daughter, they had been tracking Vie Tomasso. Jo wished bitterly that Keith had allowed her to implant a monitoring device in him, but he had refused with a grin.

 

"I've got enough going on under my skin, don't you think?" he had said. And she had reluctantly let him go unprotected.

 

Now she sat alone in her office late at night, the only light in the room coming from the glow of the display screen. Jo

 

tried to put herself in Tomasso's position, tried to determine what he was up to Clearly he was on the run Probably to the Pacific Commerce mining center on the Sea of Tranquillity He's a damned fool if he thinks I can't reach him there

 

She eased back in her butter-soft leather reclmer, thinking to herself, Vie will be out of range of the satellite sensors once he transfers to the lunar shuttle I'll have to get somebody on the space station to lock onto him before he gets away Which means I've got to act fast Using the keyboard set into the armrest of her chair she asked the computer to locate Nunzio, her erstwhile bodyguard

 

The dogged old Italian was on Taiwan, the screen told her, stubbornly tracking down rumors that Li-Po Hsen had retired to a fortified castle high in the island's central mountains It was close to the dinner hour in Taipei Jo put through a call

 

It took a few minutes of computerized searching and switching, but finally Nunzio's craggy, wary-eyed face showed on her screen

 

"Si, Signorai"

 

"Nunzio, I have a different task for you to do "

 

A man of few words, Nunzio said nothing, waiting for her to instruct him further Jo transmitted Vie Tomasso's photograph and personnel dossier to him and told him to follow Vie to the Moon

 

"La Luna, Signorai" For once, Nunzio's shaggy brows rose with surprise

 

"You've never been in space, have you?"

 

"No, Signora "

 

Jo quietly explained that everyone gets sick their first few hours in weightlessness, and it was nothing to be ashamed of The spacecraft crew provides pills, but still he will feel nauseous

 

Nunzio's face became an impassive mask Finally he asked, "And this Tomasso he is to be killed?"

 

"No He is to be held until I can join you "

 

"And the Chinese, Hsen?"

 

"If you find Tomasso you will find Hsen also I am certain of it "

 

"Su la Luna "

 

"Yes If you do find Hsen there, you know what to do "

 

"Si, Signora " And almost as if he did not know what his hand was doing, Nunzio drew an extended finger across his throat

 

That will take care of Vie, Jo said to herself once the call ended Then she thought about sending some Vanguard security people to the Moon as backup for Nunzio With a curt shake of her head she decided against it Hsen's people would not recognize one gray-haired Italian tourist as a threat, but they would quickly sniff out a team of Vanguard profes sionals Besides, Nunzio's honor was at stake He had failed to protect his patroness and her family, he was working now to redeem himself He would die before failing her, she knew

 

She sighed deeply, looked around her darkened office, then got up to head for home She wanted to be there when Rickie woke up in the morning Her son was sleeping without nightmares now, but Jo was careful to be with him when he went to bed and to be there when he awoke, no matter how busy she might be during the business day

 

During the nights she worked on her revenge

 

Pretending to sleep, Stoner lay hungry and alert on his cot For hours he had tried to make some kind of mental contact with Ilona Lucacs, but the young Hungarian scientist was ei ther totally engrossed in her pleasure machine or simply too far away to feel his silent cries for help

 

Then the lock on his door clicked Stoner felt every nerve in him go taut as a bowstring Slowly the door swung open Feeble light from the hallway spilled onto the floor, marking out a dim rectangle with the figure of a woman framed within it And the implacable guard robot behind her

 

For a long moment neither one of them moved Stoner lay on his cot, the woman stood silently in the doorway

 

Then he got to his feet and called softly, "Ilona?"

 

She seemed to flinch, but finally entered the darkened room "Are you all right'" she whispered

 

"I'm still alive," he said, pulling on his jeans

 

"Your hand . . . ?"

 

"It will heal."

 

"And the finger will grow back?"

 

"Maybe. I don't really know."

 

Without closing the door she took a few more steps into the room. Instead of her customary tweeds she wore a pair of snug-fitting dark slacks and a man's tailored shirt, unbuttoned low enough to show considerable cleavage.

 

"Zoltan plans to leave you alone for a few days, to see what the finger does."

 

"And after that?"

 

She fell silent. Stoner deliberately stepped into the rectangle of light thrown across the floor from the hall; as he had expected, Ilona's eyes widened at the ugly red burn marks on his chest. But she quickly looked away. Beyond the door Stoner could see the obstinate robot standing on its unmoving treads.

 

"Can you get me past that robot?" he asked as he slipped on his shirt.

 

"No," she said.

 

Stoner walked up to her and, lifting her chin gently, looked deeply into her eyes.

 

"Before they find you in here, we've got to get away," he said softly.

 

But she pushed his hand away. "I am supposed to be the one on duty monitoring the video screens and other displays tonight. No one will see me here. You made me come in here to you, didn't you?"

 

"I called to you and you responded."

 

"Zoltan wants the powers you have. He's obsessed with the idea of becoming superhuman. I think he is going insane."

 

"We've got to get past that robot," Stoner insisted.

 

"I don't know how to change its programming. I don't even know how to shut it off. I can't help you. I'm useless to you, to Zoltan--even to myself."

 

Stoner turned away from her and went to sit on the bed. "Then he's going to kill me. He'll keep pushing my physical limitations until he kills me."

 

She said nothing.

 

"He's killing you, too, you know. With that electrical ecstasy machine of yours."

 

"Please, Dr. Stoner, no lectures."

 

"Are you going to let him murder me? Are you going to help him?"

 

"What can I do?" There was no fear or conflict in her voice. Merely the statement of someone who felt helpless. "We will all die soon enough. What difference does it make? I have nothing to live for."

 

She really believes that, Stoner saw. Her willpower, her individuality, is being sapped away like lifeblood trickling from a wound that won't heal. He looked at her more carefully. Her face was pale, eyes red with dark half-circles below them. She seemed to have lost weight. Like a vampire, the pleasure machine was sucking her life away a little more each night.

 

"Where are we?" Stoner asked. "How did you get here? Who's behind all this?"

 

Languidly, as if it took more effort than she could spare, Ilona went to the stiff wooden chair by the monitoring equipment and slowly sat on it.

 

"The morning after you were kidnapped and . . . and ..."

 

"And my daughter killed," Stoner said grimly.

 

Ilona swallowed hard, then went on, "A security team from your wife's office took Zoltan and me out to a private airport and put us aboard a jet plane. We flew directly here with no stops. We refueled from tankers in mid-air. Twice."

 

"Here? Where?"

 

"Beirut. The old city."

 

Stoner nearly gasped with surprise. Old Beirut had been abandoned for decades. Shattered by a civil war that had lasted for a generation, bombed, gassed, blasted by rocket artillery, every wall in the old city pockmarked by machine gun bullets and shell fragments. Old Beirut had even been treated to the last nuclear explosion in the world.

 

The homemade plutonium bomb had gone off prematurely while still in the cargo hold of an Italian passenger liner. The waterfront area was flattened beneath a towering cloud of ra-

 

dioactive steam. Half a million people died, most of them in long-lingering cancerous agonies.

 

The world trembled with terror for days after that blast, then took the steps necessary to make it the final nuclear explosion in history. Old Beirut was abandoned and a new city, financed heavily by both Arabs and Israelis, with plenty of help from the superpowers, began to rise south of the once-embattled airport.

 

Old Beirut was left to stand as a shattered hulk, a reminder of the madness of war and terrorism. Abandoned to bleach under the hot Mediterranean sun, visited only by tourist helicopters that quickly flitted across the radioactive ruins while their pretaped lectures spoke of the horrors of war and their tourists took pictures of Earth's last battlefield.

 

"This hotel is well away from the harbor area," Ilona said. "The residual radioactivity has gone down almost to the background level."

 

But Stoner was working on another puzzle. "It couldn't have been a Vanguard Corporation team that brought you here. Not for this. Not for what you're doing to me."

 

Ilona said, "A Vanguard security executive took us to the plane. He had an Italian name: Tomasso, I think."

 

"Is Janos still working for the government of Hungary?"

 

"No, I don't think so. I don't know," Ilona replied. "What difference does it make?"

 

Stoner sat silently on the edge of the bed for several moments, trying to sort it all out. Finally he looked up at Ilona, waiting passively, and focused all his mental energies on her.

 

"You've got to find out who Janos is reporting to, and get a message to them. Tell them that instead of determining how I survived freezing, he's slowly killing me. Tell them that I'll be dead in a few more days if they don't stop him."

 

Ilona blinked slowly at him. "Zoltan would not kill you."

 

"Yes he would," Stoner answered, certain of it. "He'll keep pushing until he kills me just to see if I can repair myself and come alive again."

 

She nodded. He could not tell if she actually agreed or was merely unable to argue against him.

 

"If he kills me, his superiors--whoever they are--will be extremely unhappy with him. His usefulness to them will be at an end. They will murder him."

 

That made her dark-circled eyes widen slightly.

 

"You've got to save me. Otherwise Janos is going to die."

 

Stoner desperately hoped that she believed what he was saying, and still had enough volition in her to act on his words.

 

CHAPTER 27

 

KIRK Matthews cherished the simple life. No matter that he was in charge of a secret Vanguard Corporation base buried far out in Mare Imbrium. No matter that neither he nor the three dozen technicians living in the base knew what the hell was being created in the gigantic vat at the heart of the underground complex. The simple life was what he sought.

 

Back on Earth there were complexities. An ex-wife seeking every penny he earned. Lawyers hounding him. One of them nursing a broken jaw and several cracked ribs as the result of accosting him once too often.

 

Here on the Moon life should be simple. All he had to do was supervise thirty-six technicians whose job was to make certain the mysterious twenty-story-high crystalline vat was fed the prescribed chemicals and maintained at certain temperatures and pressures. The technicians were educated, well-balanced, eminently stable men and women. The pay was good, and it was piling up nicely, since there was no place to spend it. Living conditions were somewhat spartan, but much more comfortable than an Earthside courtroom. Or jail cell.

 

Liaisons among the men and women living in the underground complex were casual and easygoing. They all had signed up for the duration of the experiment at this remote site, knowing that it would take at least two years, they were all consenting adults who preferred not to make permanent attachments.

 

Matthews clasped his gnarled hands behind his graying crew cut and leaned far back in his desk chair. The simple life. Until this goddamned Latino wandered in.

 

Paulino Alvarado, as far as Matthews could tell, was neither a spy from another corporation nor a snoop from the International Astronautical Council. He seemed to be a genuinely lost soul, a Vanguard employee who got dangerously lost up there on the lunar surface and would have died if he hadn't stumbled onto Delphi base.

 

But now that he was here and had seen whatever the hell it was bubbling away inside the vat, Paulino could not be allowed to leave and blab to the outside world.

 

Worse still, the kid had a pocket full of Moondust pills. Matthews didn't believe that Paulino had the guts or personality to be a pusher. But a user was just as bad.

 

The simple life Matthews had bucked the whole problem up the chain of command in a carefully coded message to his bosses, back at Archimedes. For days he had waited for a response, while Paulino wandered around the base, not exactly getting in anybody's way, but he sure enough made people nervous.

 

Apparently the problem had been directed all the way back to corporate headquarters, because Hilo was where the message resting on Matthews's desk had come from. The mono-molecular-thin slip of reusable plastic bore a mere seven words, plus the name of the sender. An explosive seven words

 

HOLD THE INTRUDER UNTIL I GET THERE

 

JO CAMERATA

 

* * *

 

Stoner sat impassively through all the medical tests that

 

the two tall, many-armed robots put him through. His mind, though, spent the whole morning probing the massive machine guarding the door to his room, tracing the pathways of its computer brain's programming For hours he allowed the robots to take blood samples, test his reflexes, run him on the treadmill, check his eyesight and hearing

 

They sprayed electrodes onto the skin of his chest, back, and legs. They minutely examined the charred stump of his little finger They fitted a helmet over his tangled thick hair and connected it to a muJtzchanneJ brainwave recorder.

 

Not a word from the ceiling speakers. The robots had been precisely programmed for these tests, no human direction was necessary. I could finagle these machines, Stoner said to himself. Their networks are complex enough to allow me to slip in and plant changes They're not pre-programmed inflexible tin soldiers like the robot guarding the door.

 

Maybe I could even get one of them to turn off the guard robot, if I had enough time to tinker. Time. It always comes down to a matter of time.

 

Stoner could sense the presence of Zoltan Janos watching, could feel the tension of the Hungarian scientist as he studied the curves flickering across the display screens, taste the perspiration beading his lip

 

He could not sense Ilona. She was not in the room with the monitoring equipment, where Janos was Stoner could not feel her presence anywhere

 

He returned his attention to the guard robot outside the door. The robot's computer was hard-wired, it contained one set of instructions and one only. It could not be reprogrammed unless you got inside and changed the wiring The only way to prevent the robot from doing its job was to physically reach the circuit breakers on its back and shut off its power

 

Stoner actually smiled, even though he saw nothing humorous. The robot was like the Varangian guards that Byzantine emperors hired foreigners who understood only their duty to the emperor and nothing else, not even the language of the

 

land they lived in Utterly loyal because they knew nothing else.

 

At last the medical robots picked up all their equipment and trundled out of the room. As the lock clicked behind them, Stoner looked up to the ceiling speaker and asked, "When do I get some food?"

 

Janos's voice replied, "You feel hunger?"

 

"Damned right I do!"

 

A few moments of hesitation. Then, "Tonight, perhaps More likely tomorrow morning. I must analyze the data from these tests first."

 

"And then what, another finger?"

 

"Perhaps Perhaps not."

 

Stoner caught a fleeting impression of the robots clamping his head in their steel fingers while a laser beam deftly excised one of his eyes.

 

An electric current of fear shocked through him even before his star brother could damp it down He felt his innards calm even while his mind screamed with outraged fury.

 

And he heard himself say coldly, "If you're thinking of injecting some of my blood into your own veins, remember what happened to Novotny."

 

No answer, but Stoner could sense the surprise and sudden fear that hit Janos

 

"Once those symbiotes are in your blood," Stoner went on, "you can't look out at the world as you did before. You realize, every moment of every day, awake or asleep, that you are not alone It's more than having another presence within your body and your mind. You begin to understand that you are not merely an individual You start to see that you, as a single unit, are part of an entirety, a link between past and future, a member of a family."

 

Still Janos said nothing. He was listening, and Stoner could sense the tangle of curiosity and fear and burning ambition that swirled within him.

 

"That understanding drove Novotny into a collapse. What will it do to you? How do you think you'll feel about the

 

experiments you've been doing on me, once you and I are linked as firmly as two cells of the same creature? What do you think it'll be like when you can feel what I feel, when you can sense my pain and anguish?"

 

"Thank you, Dr. Stoner," said Janos, in a very subdued voice. "Thank you for the warning I was indeed tempted to inject myself to obtain your powers I thought that what happened to Novotny was due to his age, perhaps, or his own psychological weaknesses."

 

Shaking his head, Stoner replied, "Novotny saw himself as a member of the human family for the first time since he'd been weaned "

 

"And have you led such a blameless life, that the alien symbiotes did not drive you insane?"

 

"Hardly," Stoner said to the ceiling speaker. "But I was aboard their ship for years, frozen in cryonic suspension They had a long time to assimilate my memories, to make my unconscious mind grow accustomed to their presence."

 

"I see," said Janos thoughtfully "I see."

 

"So you're out here to help that stupid ape get laid. That's cute "

 

Lela sat by the campfire, silently watching her five captors as they prepared their dinner The utter darkness of the moonless night and the foliage pressing all around their simple camp made her feel terribly cut off from all civilization, all possible help. She felt the chill of the rising mist on her back and the heat of the licking flames on her face. Cold and hot, two kinds of fear that made her tremble and sweat at the same time

 

"You must be some kind of sex pervert," the white man jeered at her He was short, stocky, red-haired. "You have fantasies about making it with a gorilla, eh?"

 

"I can put on its head and skin, after we kill it. You like it that way" one of the black men said.

 

The others all laughed

 

So far they had not harmed her So far Their leader, the

 

blond one with the English accent, had made them keep their hands off Lela. But he could not stop their joking threats.

 

He came up to her now and sat on the rough log beside her, handing her a tin of stew.

 

"fust pull the top off," he said softly. "It heats by itself."

 

Sitting cross-legged, Lela kept her hands pressed firmly against the heavy twill of her trousers. She was afraid to let the men see how her hands would shake.

 

The blond placed the can before her, muttering, "Got to eat sometime, y'know."

 

"Why are you here?" Lela asked. "Why are you hunting the gorillas? No zoo will buy them from you; we have international agreements. No research laboratory will accept a grown primate."

 

The blond smiled sadly. "We're not hired to sell them, lady. We're just supposed to kill them. All of them."

 

Despite herself Lela clutched at the man. "Kill them? Kill them all? Why? Why}"

 

He held her wrists while the other men stared. "Calm down! Calm yourself."

 

"Why do you kill them?" Lela demanded.

 

"If the gorillas are gone, then there's no further purpose for this reserve, is there? The land can be sold to developers."

 

"Developers? To develop what?"

 

The blond shrugged. "New cities, I imagine. Kampala, Ruhengeri, Bukavu--all the old cities are bursting at their seams, aren't they? There's no place to put all the people. They're spreading out all across the countryside."

 

"But not here!" Lela snapped. "Not this far away . . ."

 

Patiently, almost like a schoolteacher, the blond explained, "There are people--powerful people--who want to build whole new cities. Cut down the forests and make more farmland. Build roads and airports and even spaceports."

 

"But the gorillas are protected by international agreement! They can't build here!"

 

"They can if the apes are all gone. In a few months they will be."

 

Lela was aghast. "You can't . . . the rangers . . . the World Court ..."

 

The blond gave her a pitying look. "I told you, we're dealing with very powerful people here. Why do you think we can have a fire each night without the satellites reporting us to your rangers? We know you've got a locator beacon imbedded in your skin; the satellites are tracking you okay but the information isn't going to the rangers either."

 

"No! It cannot be!"

 

"Why not?" He pulled a slim dark brown cigar from the pocket of his shirt, clamped it in his teeth and lit it. Lela stared at its glowing tip, her mind racing.

 

"What you do is wrong," she said. "It is evil."

 

He blew a puff of gray smoke into the night. "Why should anybody care more about your stupid apes than they do about people? Human beings who need homes and jobs?"

 

"You don't have to wipe out the gorillas to make homes and jobs for people," Lela answered.

 

"That's a university graduate talking. My older brother went to university. I worked like a dog to help support him. Now he's off saving the bleeding whales somewhere up in the Arctic and I'm here, hunting down the last of the gorillas. Queer world, isn't it?"

 

Lela stared at him. He puffed on his cigar for a while, then started to look uncomfortable. Without another word he hauled himself to his feet and walked slowly to the four other men sitting close to the fire, grinning at Lela.

 

They're going to kill me, Lela realized. They can't let me go, not after what he's told me. They're going to kill me. When they're finished with me.

 

BOOK V

 

And so, to the end of history, murder shall breed murder, always in the name of right and honor and peace, until the gods are tired of blood and create a race that can understand.

 

CHAPTER 28

 

"RICKIE, you and I are going to take a little vacation" fo said brightly, with an enthusiasm she did not truly feel.

 

They were sitting at the breakfast table, set in a sunny glassed-in alcove off the kitchen.

 

Rickie looked up from his raisins and flakes. "A vacation? Where?"

 

"How would you like to see our center on the Moon?"

 

The ten-year-old's eyes widened. "The Moon! Wow!"

 

"You can ask a couple of your friends along, if you like."

 

"Can I? Can I now?"

 

"Sure. As long as you finish your breakfast after you've called them."

 

Rickie was off his chair and dashing to the phone in the kitchen before Jo could finish the sentence. She leaned her elbows on the glass-topped table and sipped at her steaming coffee. The psychologists said that Rickie was adjusting healthily to the traumatic shock he had gone through. He slept through the night now, and claimed that he no longer had nightmares. His appetite seemed normal enough, and the guardians that Jo had surrounded him with, in the guise of household servants, reported that he did not seem to be overly fearful or nervous.

 

Twice since that horrible night, Jo had taken her son to the Vanguard research laboratory where tissue from murdered Cathy's body was being treated in the plastic womb of a cloning tank. She carefully explained that Cathy was going to be born again, a new little baby who would grow up to be the sister he had known.

 

"She's not gone from us forever, Rickie. She'll come back to us."

 

Holding his mother's hand, Rickie had smiled up at Jo and said, "Only I'll be her big brother and she'll be my little sister, right, Mom?"

 

Jo had laughed "Right "

 

His smile was replaced by a worried, "Will Dad come back to us, too'"

 

Jo felt her heart constrict within her "Yes," she promised "Your father will return to us "

 

"When?"

 

"I don't know, Rickie All I know is that somehow he'll come back to us "

 

True to his word, Janos sent in the serving robot the next morning with a tray of breakfast

 

"Good morning, Dr Stoner I trust you slept well," said the squat little robot, as if nothing had happened since the last time it had come into the room

 

Stoner did not reply The robot placed the breakfast tray on the little table in the corner of the room opposite the medical monitoring equipment and rolled out the door without another word The guard stood out in the hallway, it had not moved a millimeter since Stoner had first challenged it more than a week earlier

 

Eggs, sausages, half a melon, thick slabs of bread, a pot of honey, and a large glass of milk Stoner broke his imposed fast with a will The food disappeared quickly

 

All morning long he was left alone in the room No voices from the ceiling speakers No robots coming in to test him Or slice him up Stoner probed with his mind but could sense no other human beings Alone' he wondered Have they packed up and left

 

That didn't make sense But for a few moments he pondered the possibility of being abandoned to die in the deserted emptiness of Old Beirut Nobody left but me and that stupid, stubborn pile of transistors outside the door It would be an odd way to die

 

As he began to wonder if he could break through one of the

 

walls into another room, and get into the hallway and out of the hotel that way, the ceiling speaker crackled

 

"Dr Stoner," said Janos's voice, "I have news for you We will be leaving this place shortly "

 

The Hungarian's voice sounded unhappy He's being forced to stop his experiment, Stoner told himself Ilona got to his boss, whoever that is, and now he's got to stop playing with me