Unwise Child Page 7

  7

  Two days later Mike the Angel was sitting at his desk making certainthat M. R. GABRIEL, POWER DESIGN would function smoothly while he wasgone. Serge Paulvitch, his chief designer, could handle almosteverything.

  Paulvitch had once said, "Mike, the hell of working for a first-classgenius is that a second-class genius doesn't have a chance."

  "You could start your own firm," Mike had said levelly. "I'll back you,Serge; you know that."

  Serge Paulvitch had looked astonished. "Me? You think I'm crazy? Rightnow, I'm a second-class genius working for a first-class outfit. Youthink I want to be a second-class genius working for a second-classoutfit? Not on your life!"

  Paulvitch could easily handle the firm for a few weeks.

  Helen's face came on the phone. "There's a Captain Sir Henry Quill onthe phone, Mr. Gabriel. Do you wish to speak to him?"

  "Black Bart?" said Mike. "I wonder what he wants."

  "Bart?" She looked puzzled. "He said his name was Henry."

  Mike grinned. "He always signs his name: _Captain Sir Henry Quill,Bart._ And since he's the toughest old martinet this side of thePleiades, the 'Black' part just comes naturally. I served under himseven years ago. Put him on."

  In half a second the grim face of Captain Quill was on the screen.

  He was as bald as an egg. What little hair he did have left wasmeticulously shaved off every morning. He more than made up for his lackof cranial growth, however, by his great, shaggy, bristly brows, blackas jet and firmly anchored to jutting supraorbital ridges. Any other manwould have been proud to wear them as mustaches.

  "What can I do for you, Captain?" Mike asked, using the proper tone ofvoice prescribed for the genial businessman.

  "You can go out and buy yourself a new uniform," Quill growled. "Yourold one isn't regulation any more."

  Well, not exactly growled. If he'd had the voice for it, it would havebeen a growl, but the closest he could come to a growl was an Irishtenor rumble with undertones of gravel. He stood five-eight, and his redand gold Space Service uniform gleamed with spit-and-polish luster. Withhis cap off, his bald head looked as though it, too, had been polished.

  Mike looked at him thoughtfully. "I see. So you're commanding themystery tub, eh?" he said at last.

  "That's right," said the captain. "And don't go asking me a bunch ofblasted questions. I've got no more idea of what the bloody thing'sabout than you--maybe not as much. I understand you designed her powerplant...?"

  He let it hang. If not exactly a leading question, it was certainly ahinting statement.

  Mike shook his head. "I don't know anything, Captain. Honestly I don't."

  If Space Service regulations had allowed it, Captain Sir Henry Quill,Bart., would have worn a walrus mustache. And if he'd had such amustache, he would have whuffled it then. As it was, he just blew outair, and nothing whuffled.

  "You and I are the only ones in the dark, then," he said. "The rest ofthe crew is being picked from Chilblains Base. Pete Jeffers is FirstOfficer, in case you're wondering."

  "Oh, great," Mike the Angel said with a moan. "That means we'll be goingin cold on an untried ship."

  Like Birnam Wood advancing on Dunsinane, Quill's eyebrows moved upward."Don't you trust your own designing?"

  "As much as you do," said Mike the Angel. "Probably more."

  Quill nodded. "We'll have to make the best of it. We'll muddle throughsomehow. Are you all ready to go?"

  "No," Mike admitted, "but I don't see that I can do a damn thing aboutthat."

  "Nor do I," said Captain Quill. "Be at Chilblains Base in twenty-fourhours. Arrangements will be made at the Long Island Base for yourtransportation to Antarctica. And"--he paused and his scowl becamedeeper--"you'd best get used to calling me 'sir' again."

  "Yessir, Sir Henry, sir."

  "_Thank_ you, Mister Gabriel," snapped Quill, cutting the circuit.

  "Selah," said Mike the Angel.

  * * * * *

  Chilblains Base, Antarctica, was directly over the South MagneticPole--at least, as closely as that often elusive spot could bepinpointed for any length of time. It is cheaper in the long run if aninterstellar vessel moves parallel with, not perpendicular to, themagnetic "lines of force" of a planet's gravitational field. Taking off"across the grain" _can_ be done, but the power consumption is muchgreater. Taking off "with the grain" is expensive enough.

  An ion rocket doesn't much care where it lifts or sets down, since itsmethod of propulsion isn't trying to work against the fabric of spaceitself. For that reason, an interstellar vessel is normally built inspace and stays there, using ion rockets for loading and unloading itspassengers. It's cheaper by far.

  The Computer Corporation of Earth had also been thinking of expenseswhen it built its Number One Research Station near Chilblains Base,although the corporation was not aware at the time just how much moneyit was eventually going to save them.

  The original reason had simply been lower power costs. A cryotron unithas to be immersed at all times in a bath of liquid helium at atemperature of four-point-two degrees absolute. It is obviously mucheasier--and much cheaper--to keep several thousand gallons of helium atthat temperature if the surrounding temperature is at two hundredthirty-three absolute than if it is up around two hundred ninety orthree hundred. That may not seem like much percentagewise, but it comesout to a substantial saving in the long run.

  But, power consumption or no, when C.C. of E. found that Snookums eitherhad to be moved or destroyed, it was mightily pleased that it had builtPrime Station near Chilblains Base. Since a great deal of expense also,of necessity, devolved upon Earth Government, the government was, to sayit modestly, equally pleased. There was enough expense as it was.

  The scenery at Chilblains Base--so named by a wiseacre American navyman back in the twentieth century--was nothing to brag about. Thousandsof square miles of powdered ice that has had nothing to do but blowaround for twenty million years is not at all inspiring after the firstfew minutes unless one is obsessed by the morbid beauty of cold death.

  Mike the Angel was not so obsessed. To him, the area surroundingChilblains Base was just so much white hell, and his analysis wasperfectly correct. Mike wished that it had been January, midsummer inthe Antarctic, so there would have been at least a little dim sunshine.Mike the Angel did not particularly relish having to visit the SouthPole in midwinter.

  The rocket that had lifted Mike the Angel from Long Island Base settleditself into the snow-covered landing stage of Chilblains Base,dissipating the crystalline whiteness into steam as it did so. Thesteam, blown away by the chill winds, moved all of thirty yards beforeit became ice again.

  Mike the Angel was not in the best of moods. Having to dump all of hisbusiness into Serge Paulvitch's hands on twenty-four hours' notice wasirritating. He knew Paulvitch could handle the job, but it wasn't fairto him to make him take over so suddenly.

  In addition, Mike did not like the way the whole _Branchell_ businesswas being handled. It seemed slipshod and hurried, and, worse, it wasentirely too mysterious and melodramatic.

  "Of all the times to have to come to Antarctica," he grumped as the doorof the rocket opened, "why did I have to get July?"

  The pilot, a young man in his early twenties, said smugly: "July is bad,but January isn't good--just not so worse."

  Mike the Angel glowered. "Sonny, I was a cadet here when you werelearning arithmetic. It hasn't changed since, summer or winter."

  "Sorry, sir," said the pilot stiffly.

  "So am I," said Mike the Angel cryptically. "Thanks for the ride."

  He pushed open the outer door, pulled his electroparka closer aroundhim, and stalked off across the walk, through the lashing of the sleetywind.

  He didn't have far to walk--a hundred yards or so--but it was a goodthing that the walk was protected and well within the boundary ofChilblains Base instead of being out on the Wastelands. Here there werelights, and the Hotbed equipment of the walk warmed
the swirling iceparticles into a sleety rain. On the Wastelands, the utter blackness andthe wind-driven snow would have swallowed him permanently within tenpaces.

  He stepped across a curtain of hot air that blew up from a narrow slitin the deck and found himself in the main foyer of Chilblains Base.

  The entrance looked like the entrance to a theater--a big metal andplastic opening, like a huge room open on one side, with only that sheetof hot air to protect it from the storm raging outside. The lights andthe small doors leading into the building added to the impression thatthis was a theater, not a military base.

  But the man who was standing near one of the doors was not by a longshot dressed as an usher. He wore a sergeant's stripes on his regulationSpace Service parka, which muffled him to the nose, and he came over toMike the Angel and said: "Commander Gabriel?"

  Mike the Angel nodded as he shook icy drops from his gloved hands, thenfished in his belt pocket for his newly printed ID card.

  He handed it to the sergeant, who looked it over, peered at Mike's face,and saluted. As Mike returned the salute the sergeant said: "Okay, sir;you can go on in. The security office is past the double door, firstcorridor on your right."

  Mike the Angel tried his best not to look surprised. "_Security_ office?Is there a war on or something? What does Chilblains need with asecurity office?"

  The sergeant shrugged. "Don't ask me, Commander; I just slave away here.Maybe Lieutenant Nariaki knows something, but I sure don't."

  "Thanks, Sergeant."

  Mike the Angel went inside, through two insulated and tightlyweather-stripped doors, one right after another, like the air lock on aspaceship. Once inside the warmth of the corridor, he unzipped hiselectroparka, shut off the power, and pushed back the hood with itsfogproof faceplate.

  Down the hall, Mike could see an office marked _security officer_ insmall letters without capitals. He walked toward it. There was anotherguard at the door who had to see Mike's ID card before Mike was allowedin.

  Lieutenant Tokugawa Nariaki was an average-sized, sleepy-lookingindividual with a balding crew cut and a morose expression.

  He looked up from his desk as Mike came in, and a hopeful smile tried tospread itself across his face. "If you are Commander Gabriel," he saidsoftly, "watch yourself. I may suddenly kiss you out of sheer relief."

  "Restrain yourself, then," said Mike the Angel, "because I'm Gabriel."

  Nariaki's smile became genuine. "So! Good! The phone has been screamingat me every half hour for the past five hours. Captain Sir Henry Quillwants you."

  "He would," Mike said. "How do I get to him?"

  "You don't just yet," said Nariaki, raising a long, bony, tapering hand."There are a few formalities which our guests have to go through."

  "Such as?"

  "Such as fingerprint and retinal patterns," said Lieutenant Nariaki.

  Mike cast his eyes to Heaven in silent appeal, then looked back at thelieutenant. "Lieutenant, _what_ is going on here? There hasn't been asecurity officer in the Space Service for thirty years or more. What amI suspected of? Spying for the corrupt and evil alien beings of DiomegaOrionis IX?"

  Nariaki's oriental face became morose again. "For all I know, you are.Who knows what's going on around here?" He got up from behind his deskand led Mike the Angel over to the fingerprinting machine. "Put yourhands in here, Commander ... that's it."

  He pushed a button, and, while the machine hummed, he said: "Mine is anantiquated position, I'll admit. I don't like it any more than you do.Next thing, they'll put me to work polishing chain-mail armor or make mecommander of a company of musketeers. Or maybe they'll send me to the18th Outer Mongolian Yak Artillery."

  Mike looked at him with narrowed eyes. "Lieutenant, do you actually meanthat you really don't know what's going on here, or are you justdummying up?"

  Nariaki looked at Mike, and for the first time, his face took on thetraditional blank, emotionless look of the "placid Orient." He pausedfor long seconds, then said:

  "Some of both, Commander. But don't let it worry you. I assure you thatwithin the next hour you'll know more about Project Brainchild than I'vebeen able to find out in two years.... Now put your face in here andkeep your eyes open. When you can see the target spot, focus on it andtell me."

  Mike the Angel put his face in the rest for the retinal photos. The softfoam rubber adjusted around his face, and he was looking into blackness.He focused his eyes on the dim target circle and waited for his eyes togrow accustomed to the darkness.

  The Security Officer's voice continued. "All I do is make sure that nounauthorized person comes into Chilblains Base. Other than that, I havenothing but personal guesses and little trickles of confusinginformation, neither of which am I at liberty to discuss."

  Mike's irises had dilated to the point that he could see the dim dot inthe center of the target circle, glowing like a dimly visible star."Shoot," he said.

  There was a dazzling glare of light. Mike pulled his face out of thepadded opening and blinked away the colored after-images.

  Lieutenant Nariaki was comparing the fresh fingerprints with the set hehad had on file. "Well," he said, "you have Commander Gabriel's hands,anyway. If you have his eyes, I'll have to concede that the rest of thebody belongs to him, too."

  "How about my soul?" Mike asked dryly.

  "Not my province, Commander," Nariaki said as he pulled the retinalphotos out of the machine. "Maybe one of the chaplains would know."

  "If this sort of thing is going on all over Chilblains," said Mike theAngel, "I imagine the Office of Chaplains is doing a booming business inTS cards."

  The lieutenant put the retinal photos in the comparator, took a goodlook, and nodded. "You're you," he said. "Give me your ID card."

  Mike handed it over, and Nariaki fed it through a printer which stampeda complex seal in the upper left-hand corner of the card. The lieutenantsigned his name across the seal and handed the card back to Mike.

  "That's it," he said. "You can--"

  He was interrupted by the chiming of the phone.

  "Just a second, Commander," he said as he thumbed the phone switch.

  Mike was out of range of the TV pickup, and he couldn't see the face onthe screen, but the voice was so easy to recognize that he didn't needto see the man.

  "Hasn't that triply bedamned rocket landed yet, Lieutenant? Where isCommander Gabriel?"

  Mike knew that Black Bart had already checked on the landing of thelatest rocket; the question was rhetorical.

  Mike grinned. "Tell the old tyrant," he said firmly, "that I'll be alongas soon as the Security Officer is through with me."

  Nariaki's expression didn't change. "You're through now, Commander,and--"

  "Tell that imitation Apollo to hop it over here fast!" said Quillsharply. "I'll give him a lesson in tyranny."

  There was a click as the intercom shut off.

  Nariaki looked at Mike the Angel and shook his head slowly. "Eitheryou're working your way toward a court-martial or else you know whereBlack Bart has the body buried."

  "I should," said Mike cryptically. "I helped him bury it. How do I getto His Despotic Majesty's realm?"

  Nariaki considered. "It'll take you five or six minutes. Take thetubeway to Stage Twelve. Go up the stairway to the surface and take thefirst corridor to the left. That'll take you to the loading dock forthat stage. It's an open foyer like the one at the landing field, soyou'll have to put your parka back on. Go down the stairs on the otherside, and you'll be in Area K. One of the guards will tell you where togo from there. Of course, you could go by tube, but it would take longerbecause of the by-pass."

  "Good enough. I'll take the short cut. See you. And thanks."