Intervention

  "You must go with us there, Papa, " Tamara said to Pyotr. "We will celebrate your birthday in the American style. "

  "No feasts!" Pyotr pleaded.

  "If you came up to New Hampshire," said Denis, "we could cook you a traditional ham and baked-bean supper with pumpkin pie and whipped cream. "

  The old man leaned toward the American. Being unable to converse telepathically on the intimate mode, he simply whispered. "I think it would be a great improvement over this boiled lamb's head. I am a Georgian, you see, and our cuisine is celebrated throughout the Soviet Union. My grandchildren have been barbarized by their resi­dence in this way station of Marco Polo... My dear Professor, I am so grateful to you for salvaging the dinner. None of the others would have had the mind-power to coerce the waitresses over such a distance. "

  "You must call me Denis. And it was my pleasure. But I think that any one of your grandchildren, had they thought of it, would have been able to do as I did. "

  Valery, Ilya, and Anna protested: Oh NO Professor!

  Pyotr did not hear, but the expressions on the young faces were eloquent enough. "It's true. They are growing up to be mental bullies, all three, too clever by half. They are — are — oy! I don't know the English word for what they are!"

  "Whippersnappers," Denis offered.

  Pyotr was delighted. "Yes! They think the world will leap as they snap their marvelous mental whips. You must take care, Denis, that your own new baby son does not grow up so disrespectful of his short-brained elders. "

  "We attempted a simple form of ethical guidance even before the baby was born, " Denis said seriously. "I'll be describing the new pre­natal educational techniques that my wife Lucille and I devised for Philip in a paper I'm delivering tomorrow. "

  There were expressions of interest from the other academics around the table. Urgyen Bhotia said, "I find it fascinating that you would include ethics in your prenatal curriculum. Newborns are, of course, completely self-centered. And the infant human is egotistical in its evaluation of right and wrong. "

  "When the infant is a normal, that's acceptable, " Denis said. "It may even be acceptable for the weaker operants. But" — he shrugged — "Lucille and I weren't sure just how strong-minded our offspring would be. You may have — er — read the article in Nature."

  Alla and Mukar Kizim, who were friends and close associates of Tamara at the university, exchanged meaningful looks. "It is a matter that perplexed us as well, " Alla admitted. "We have held off having children, wishing to give their young minds the best possible guidance both before and after birth. But I think we also were somewhat fearful of not being able to control them. There have been instances among our colleagues... "

  "In America, too, " Denis said.

  "I don't think we've had much trouble in Scotland, " said Jamie MacGregor. "Even normal Celtic parents are coercers from the word go. You hardly find a spoiled brat among us. " He hesitated, then added, "There are crazies, though. And I have a paper on that. "

  "Children are very precious to our people, " Tamara said. "It is always so in lands where nature is cruel and young life is vulnerable. It has been said by some psychologists that we have been too kind... that our children grow up lacking in initiative and inner strength because they were coddled. And when they become adults, and find how harsh life is, they either strike back and become cruel themselves or else bend dumbly to the yoke. "

  "Each nation, " Urgyen said, "has its own strength and weakness. The roots of both are in the relationship of parents and children. I think Denis's talk of ethical training for the infant mind will be among the most significant to be delivered at this Congress. It will be my pleasure to lead a symposium on operant-nonoperant moral relationships. In light of the Tashkent tragedy, the subject is appropriate. "

  There was an uncomfortable silence. Finally, Annushka Gawrys said impulsively, "It couldn't have been one of us who did that awful thing! It's not possible!"

  Jamie MacGregor said, "Lassie, I'm sorry. But it is possible. My dear friend Nigel Weinberg has had to retire from active metapsychic work just because it's possible. "

  "It could have been a provocateur, " Tamara said. She switched to mental speech, even though it would exclude her father: Our internal politics... you visitors see only the bright new face of the Soviet Union the Secretary's sweeping changes in the economy the unrestricted flow of information the new pride taken by workers inspired by Otkro­veyinost'... but there is a faction in the Kremlin bitterly opposing the Secretary as a traitor to Marxist-Leninist ideology and they are allied with senior militarists who resent their drastic budget cuts and dimin­ished power... Marshal Kumylzhensky aspires to head the Politburo himself and has deep hatred for Kirill Pazukhin Chairman KGB and General Secretary it is suspected that some of the Islamic rioting was fomented by agents Glavnoye Razvedyvatelnoye Upravleniye so as to discredit the Twentieth Directorate assassination of Grand Mufti would fit in with such a scheme...

  Urgyen Bhotia was incredulous: This Marshal would toy with civil war just to bring down a political enemy? He would cause the death of thousands of citizens merely to consolidate his power in Moscow?

  Mukar Kizim said: It is only non-Slavic people the blackarses like us who die.

  Jamie MacGregor asked: What'll stop this fool Marshal?

  Tamara said: He is 73 years old... But his lackey Vadim Terekhov head of the GRU is only 56 and a Politburo aspirant. The consensus is that the General Secretary himself a man loved and respected by almost all the proletariat is the greatest bulwark against the militarists and diehard Marxist ideologues.

  Denis Remillard said: I hope he has good bodyguards... especially tonight.

  Tamara said: Tonight the nine of us the strongest minds I am able to trust utterly will guard him.

  The General Secretary was showing signs of winding down now. He had set aside his notes to address the Congress delegates less formally, and Finster whispered, "It won't be long now. I hope those TV cameras stay on close-up for the big finale. We want this to be the zap seen round the world. "

  Colonel Sergei Arkhipov was incapable of vocal response. He was a skull-prisoner, no longer in control of his own body and knowing he would soon die. Nevertheless he watched the Killer Squirrel's profes­sional modus operandi with fascinated detachment through the win­dows of his own eye sockets; and from time to time he even asked mental questions, which his captor answered quite frankly.

  At supper, the Squirrel had given a brief account of his life — the creepy child, the third-rate entertainer and drug addict, the obscene "redemption" through bonding to the American megalomaniac, the progression from psychic spy to blackmailing suborner to specialist in wet affairs... It appealed to Sergei's mordant Russian sense of humor that the Squirrel's master, the archcapitalist exploiter O'Connor, should be the great enemy of metapsychic globalism. And in Moscow the zealous Marxist ideologue Kumylzhensky shared the identical viewpoint! If this crucial mission of the Killer Squirrel succeeded, both O'Connor and Kumylzhensky would win. Everyone else would lose. Oh, it was rich.

  Four other KGB agents stood there in the wings of stage right with Sergei and Fabian Finster, and all including the Squirrel wore on their lapels the golden shield with stylized sword and red star, surmounted by the black IV of the Ninth Directorate. It was the insignia of the unit assigned to the security of top Party leaders. To any casual observer backstage in the Lenin Palace of Culture, the men — including the rather undersized one in the flashy double-breasted glen plaid — were part of the General Secretary's bodyguard.

  To the subordinate four, the Killer Squirrel was simply invisible. This was a most useful faculty for an assassin to have, but Finster had ex­plained to Sergei that there were limitations. The mental exertion re­quired to project the illusion increased with the cube of the distance from the operant's brain. Thus it was very easy to render oneself invis­ible (or psychically disguised) when close to a normal observer, but relatively difficult to manage when the observer was f
arther away. Finster was also limited by having to retain his coercive hold on Sergei himself. Effectively, this limited his invisibility radius to less than nine meters. Thus he could not simply walk out onto the palace stage and terminate the General Secretary without being detected. Nor could he fulfill the special purpose of his assignment by means of an ambush. It was O'Connor's plan to incite antioperant feeling by making the assas­sinations seem to be an operant conspiracy, and so Finster had to play a part.

  Sergei had been very surprised to learn that Finster was armed. He assumed that the longbrain would kill with astral fire, generated by mind-power alone. As all the world knew, this was the way that the Scottish operant had worked. But no. The Squirrel had explained that he was quite impotent in the conjuring up of mental fire. It was a knack, and his talents ran along other lines. Nor could he kill by cooking brains or stopping hearts, lethal aptitudes possessed by his master, O'Connor, among others. Finster explained that these killing methods, while tidy and much more efficient than psychocreative flaming, would not have the propaganda impact of the latter. So Finster intended to use an in­genious infernal device to simulate astral fire, and the General Secre­tary would — as the Grand Mufti before him — seem to die from the assault of an operant terrorist.

  Tell me something belkushka, Sergei asked now. Were you there in Edinburgh to kill Professor MacGregor?

  Yes, said Finster. But not at the press conference. By then it was too late, and I only went to provide a firsthand account of the affair to my principal. I tried to kill MacGregor six times during the months preceding his announcement. Each time I failed. He was being guarded.

  By his metapsychic compères?

  No... By somebody else. It was worrying. I never told the Boss about that bit.

  This Boss. Why do you serve him? Kill for him?

  Irony. I love him.

  Now do not balls about with me! Why?

  Why do you work for the KGB?

  At first I was patriotic. Then I enjoyed the power. Then I was stuck in the shit like everybody else. Then... [laughter] when we were trans­formed it was just a job. Just a job...

  You don't enjoy it now that you're respectable cops?

  No.

  That's where we differ then Sergei. I've always liked my job! This assignment's the biggest kick yet.

  Belkushka. Little killer squirrel.

  Laughter.

  Out in the auditorium, the delegates were laughing, too. There was a smattering of applause for a particularly well-chosen piece of comic relief delivered by the General Secretary as he approached the end of his speech.

  Finster pinched off the KGB colonel's maundering thoughts and con­centrated on the matter at hand. Behind the Commie leader, seated at a long table decorated with red bunting and bouquets of autumn flowers, were ten or a dozen people — high mucky-mucks of the Metapsychic

  Congress with a few odd spouses and older kids. One seat was empty. The head lady, after introducing the Comrade Secretary, had gone off into the left wings. She was a plump, auburn-haired woman with a distracted overcast to her well-guarded mind, but she did not project the dangerous vibes Finster had learned to beware of. Most of the others seated on the platform seemed similarly harmless: an old guru type, four assorted Russkies, Jamie MacGregor, a Russky couple, and three kids in their late teens or early twenties who had to be the offspring of Madame Chairperson. No threat in the lot, for all their vigilance. He'd take care of them with the mind-buster, his great projection of sensory confusion.

  The only potential joker in the pack sat at the far end of the table. Unlike the others, he was dressed formally in a dinner jacket and had a cold, uptight little smile on his face. Oh, yeah. Give Denis Remillard a guitar and a mike, take away the chromalloy bear-trap mind, and you'd have a young John Denver! Talk about a monster in wimp's clothing... Remillard would have to be handled. He was at extreme coercion range and probably uncoercible anyway. So stick to the mind-buster, but thicken it to max between Remillard and the podium. Then? Would the prof try a hit? He wasn't a known antiaggression freak like MacGregor or Madame Sakhvadze. Fact was, he almost never demonstrated his faculties in public, or even talked about them. Which was bad.

  All right, just go for it. Speed and surprise and fwoosh and then haul ass for dear life to the big ZIL ticking over outside the stage door of the palace.

  Ready...

  "You have changed the course of world history, " the General Secre­tary told the Metapsychic Congress. "In six short years you have given fresh hope and a vision of a golden Third Millennium to all nations, large and small. Thanks to you — and to others who had the good sense to understand and implement your dream — we have seen the end of the suicidal arms race and the beginning of true globular social think­ing. But let us not deceive ourselves. There are still grave problems confronting humanity in many parts of the world, and some of them pose as great a threat to civilization as the late, unlamented nuclear deterrent. There is a terrible plague in Africa. There is continued blood­shed and terrorism in parts of the Islamic world. There is hunger and suffering caused by extremes of weather. There is a growing shortage of energy. And, yes... there is even controversy over the proper role of operant persons in relation to the larger human community. We must confront these problems honestly and openly, and work together to solve them. We must never lose sight of the fact that we all belong to the human family. All of us share the wish that the future will bring to us and our children peace, prosperity, and mutual respect. I thank you. I thank you for everything. "

  The delegates rose for a standing ovation and Finster turned to the four agents standing behind him. He held a silvery cylinder. The sounds it made were nearly inaudible and its needles coated with poison killed in a subtle way. The four agents, blinded and voiceless, crumpled slowly to the floor.

  Sergei realized that he was next. A sudden spurt of adrenalin ener­gized him, weakening Finster's coercive hold. Clumsily, Sergei fell against the killer and knocked the needle-gun to the floor. Finster's arm scythed out and he broke Sergei's neck with a single karate chop. Then a swift-moving foot crushed Sergei's larynx.

  Paralyzed and silenced, but with his mind free, Sergei watched Finster take up a huge bouquet of red roses from a folding table near the proscenium arch. Out on the stage, the General Secretary was bowing and smiling. He waved to the continuing thunder of applause. Finster approached, his mind radiating homage and loyalty, and the leader of the Soviet Union held out his hands to accept the flowers.

  Sergei's lips moved. He managed a small, useless sound. His eyes caught sight of Academician Sakhvadze in the opposite wings and he thought at her. She started as though electrically shocked and hesitated. Fool! Sergei raged. He thought at the American — but, ah! Holy Mother! A mind-numbing surge of sensation smote him, obliterating pain and darkening his vision. Was he dead? No, not yet! He saw a flash of brilliant orange and felt an unspoken shriek of disbelief. His nervous system — that fragment of it still precariously connected to his brain — shrank from another mental assault emanating not from one mind but from thousands.

  Sergei seemed to hear two titanic voices shouting. NO! NO! NO! The formally dressed American and Tamara Petrovna had paid for their in­decision and together they were trying to support a terrible headless figure. Cowards, Sergei told them. Cowards.

  NO! NO! NO! the man and Tamara begged the raging audience. The anger and sorrow swelled into a vital thing; the minds of the delegation meshed spontaneously into metaconcert and focused on the hated tar­get.

  Something was running toward Sergei.

  NO! NO! NO!

  It was a man, brighter than the sun. A flaming angel come for him and his sins.

  NO...

  Not an angel. Only a small man enveloped in seething energy, and then tumbling bones glowing red-hot on the boards of the stage.

  From each, Sergei thought, according to his abilities. To each accord­ing to his needs.

  He closed his eyes for the la
st time, smiling.

  11

  LACONIA, NEW HAMPSHIRE, EARTH

  7 FEBRUARY 1998

  As THE CRITICAL years of coadunating consciousness dawned for the indigenes of planet Earth, the Milieu stepped up its psychosocial surveillance. Ever larger numbers of field-workers went planetside to track firsthand the irruptions of operancy among different population groups, gathering data on the numbers of metapsychically talented children being born, the spectrum of the various functions, and their potential strength — given optimum nurture and education.

  The results of these late studies were a source of both enthusiasm and anxiety among the exotic observers. It had been known even in Earthly prehistoric times that the race had an exceptional creative component to its Mind; but the most recent samplings had begun to show just how awesome human psychocreativity might eventually prove to be. Ana­lysts among the Krondaku were finally able to verify what the Lylmik had cavalierly stated at the inception of the Intervention scheme: humanity's mental potential undoubtedly exceeded that of any other race in the galaxy — coadunate or noncoadunate. Whether the puerile Earthlings would survive to manifest the potential was as questionable a point as ever.

  Exotic field-workers on Earth were usually Simbiari or Poltroyans, since they had the most humanoid form and so required the least ex­penditure of psychic effort in projecting illusory bodies. Often the Poltroyans did not even bother with mental disguise. They were a trifle short in stature compared to average humans, but with wigs, a dab of Pancake make-up to lighten their purplish-gray skin, and contact lenses over their ruby irises they could pass as natives among many Earth populations.

  Fritiso-Prontinalin, who called himself Fred during his sojourn on Earth, and his colleague Vilianin-Tinamikadin, who was known as Willy, were young Poltroyan psychogeomorphologists on their first assignment as xenosurveyors. Their project, a rather tedious one that had them tending automated data accumulators in widely separated parts of the world, attempted to correlate operancy in the farsensory spectrum with long-term population residence in the proximity of granitic lithoforms. The hypothesis wasn't working out too well in any sampling area except New Hampshire — and here the correlates were so high that the two researchers suspected a fudging factor. Discouraged and very much in need of a break, they decided to drive down to Laconia from their secret base camp in Waterville Valley and take a holiday. Primed for a weekend of alien thrills, they joined the crowd that had packed Laconia for the annual World Championship Sled-Dog Derby.