Mercenary

  Several more referees were on the hull. They watched without interfering. As yet, none of the observers realized the actual nature of this encounter.

  It was Heller’s evident intent to bash me as I landed. If he could knock me loose from the hull before my magnetic boots found firm attachment, I would drift helplessly through space, my mission incomplete, and the victory in the match would be his. On the other hand, if I could land and knock him loose, I would then have the advantage. He did have fuel remaining, so he could return; but I could intercept him as he did so.

  I rotated so that I came at him boots first. Then I hurled the rapier at him. He had to dodge aside lest his suit be punctured. The throw also provided me some braking action, slowing my approach. As he dodged, the weapon smashed into the hull and rebounded back into space, and I landed safely before he could attack.

  Heller strode into me, thrusting at my head with one of the padded ends, but I was ready. I blocked his pugil stick and quickly countered with a butt stroke to his groin. A point is scored when a contestant lands a solid blow to a vulnerable region: the head, throat, chest, stomach, or groin. Of course, our suits protected all these regions of the body, but the referees would tally the score for any such blows made. In addition, there was the knockoff strategy: to knock the opponent loose from the hull and into space. This would be the object on an enemy hull: literally, to hurl the defenders away.

  Heller readily blocked my stroke, and struck swiftly at my shoulder. I ducked and dodged aside, letting the padded end graze my shoulder while I countered to his briefly vulnerable midsection. I scored on his stomach solidly enough to rock him back, and I knew the referees were making notes.

  But something was wrong, and in a moment I realized what it was. There was a scratch on my shoulder where his strike had scraped across it.

  Scratch? From the soft, padded end of the pugil stick?

  I fenced with him, watching his stick. The ship was spinning, so that we were in effect hanging by our shoes with light and darkness alternating frequently; as we swung back into “day,” I saw the bumps in his stick. Originally the pugil sticks were wooden rods wrapped in polyfoam, enclosed by canvas bags at each end; today they were wholly synthetic but similarly padded and enclosed, and the materials were still called “foam” and “canvas” and “wood” though they were not. There should have been no bumps in the canvas. Heller’s stick had to be spiked with hard or sharp objects fixed between foam and canvas. They showed only slightly, but any solid blow would bring their sharp surfaces into direct contact with the opposing surface: my suit.

  I slashed viciously at his head, forcing him to counter. Thus his canvas struck mine—and mine tore. Now I had confirmation. His supposedly harmless pugil stick had been rendered into a deadly weapon, here in space. He was still out to kill me, and the referees still didn’t know it.

  I could retreat, grab a referee, and have Heller arrested. But wise as that course might be in the practical sense, it would not be good in the social sense. No officer should flee an enlisted man in a situation like this, or pull rank to get out of a difficult situation. I would be entirely within my rights in this instance, but I could suffer a critical loss of respect in my unit. I needed that respect, not for personal pleasure but to enable me to forge an absolutely dedicated corps. I wanted troops who put the welfare of the unit ahead of their own, and I had to set the example. This remained my fight, win or lose, regardless of the handicap. After all, in real battle situations the unexpected had to be dealt with, too.

  I continued to analyze Heller’s style. He was strong and skilled, but I was flexible; already I grasped his patterns. This was my talent, and it was of inestimable value to me in a crisis. It was as if he were calling his shots in advance, while mine were surprises. Now that I knew his weapon, I guarded against it. The tide of battle was turning in my favor.

  Heller became aware of this. He strove desperately to take me out, smashing brutally at my body with alternate ends of his stick, but no shot touched my suit. My own pugil stick was in shreds, however. When his intemperate effort put him out of position, I countered devastatingly; I chopped at his feet, sweeping both his boots free of the hull. He fell away from the ship, and in the moment he did so, I lofted him with a stick-end uppercut that caught in his padded crotch and shoved him out. He was on his way.

  Of course, he used his jet to brake and return, but that took precious seconds, and in that time I charged the air-lock he was supposed to be defending and spun the exterior wheel. Heller returned before I got the lock open, but I was mindful of his progress and paused to bash him back into space. On his next return he was more careful, landing at a small distance so he could anchor his boots before encountering me, but by that time I was inside the lock.

  He jammed his pugil stick into the closing aperture, preventing me from shutting him out. I grabbed the stick, opened the panel, and hurled the stick away into space. But that gave Heller time to scramble into the lock with me.

  Now it was the third phase of the contest: hand-to-hand. This was where the judo came in. Judo is one of the old Earth martial arts, and though in its full scope it includes all of the blows and holds known by man, its essence is the technique of throwing. On Earth this meant throwing the opponent to the ground on his back hard enough to knock the fight from him, and perhaps holding him down; the idea was to overcome him without having to hurt him. The term judo meant, in the original Japanese, “gentle way,” in contrast to the necessary violence of striking with fist or foot. In that respect judo was superior to most other martial arts; it provided an avenue of limited or measured force, regardless of the effort of the opponent. Such an avenue was invaluable when it was necessary to subdue an intoxicated friend, or an enemy one preferred to reason with.

  Here on the hull of a spaceship, the thrust of the judo throw was reversed. Now it meant breaking the opponent’s magnetic contact and hurling him into the void. The seemingly opposite techniques were not too different in practice; the presence or absence of gee made all the difference. But in the close confines of an airlock, it was another matter.

  Strength counts for a lot in hand-to-hand combat, but skill counts for more. Here I had the advantage; I had spent more time in a space suit, and had faced worse hazards than had Heller. I maneuvered him into an arm-lock that was just as effective in suits as it was naked; he could not move without dislocating his elbow. I maintained the hold with one arm and my body and feet, pinning him to the wall by using the leverage in my magnetic boots as well as bracing against the opposite wall. With my free hand I sealed the lock, pressured it, and set off my bomb.

  When the inner panel opened, my “nerve gas” spread rapidly into the ship. It was actually colored, perfumed vapor, harmless, but it made the point: I had taken the ship and won the match.

  Now I signaled Sergeant Smith. “Arrest this man,” I said as my helmet came off. Respect was no longer an issue.

  The referees recovered the rapier and doctored pugil stick; there was no question what Corporal Heller had tried to do. But before taking any further action, I interviewed him in my office.

  “Corporal,” I said briskly, “you have your choice of summary unit discipline or a formal court-martial. I recommend the former.”

  “Sir?” he asked, perplexed.

  “I am prepared to deal,” I said.

  He understood. “Unit discipline,” he said immediately.

  “You may have information I want. Provide it freely, and I will assign nominal punishment.” I remembered how Sergeant Smith had said this to me, years ago; I had learned from him.

  “Sir, you know I tried to kill you,” he protested.

  “You are not the first,” I said dryly. “I know you are only a tool. I want the mind.”

  “Sir, my life—”

  “Is forfeit to the Navy. I will protect you.”

  He yielded, knowing the nature of my commitment. “I will tell you anything I know.”

  “Who hired you to k
ill me?”

  “Kife,” he said, his mouth seeming to be reluctant to form the syllable.

  That surprised me. Not the answer; I already knew that. But the fact that he answered without evasion. Few who betrayed QYV, I was sure, survived long. In fact, he could have been hired indirectly, not knowing his true employer. QYV was being less devious here than I had expected.

  I got the story from him; Heller’s family was poor, with no real prospect for improvement. He had been sending most of his service pay back home; the normal Navy allotments for dependent parents were not sufficient in this case for the medication required. QYV had offered instant, anonymous settlement of the family debts, and a handsome reward upon discharge from the Service, so that the family would be secure and Heller himself would have much-improved future prospects. Heller trusted QYV because QYV always kept his word; in any event, the debt settlement had been arranged before Heller made the attempt on my life. If he died in the attempt, or was executed, his family remained better off. “It was the best I could do for them,” he concluded.

  “Now that you have failed—”

  He smiled grimly. “No bonus. I’m on my own.”

  “If you had succeeded—”

  “I was to fetch a little key from your body and fling it into space.”

  I was surprised again. “You had no delivery route?”

  “No, sir. Just to fling it away. After that, Kife would send a lawyer to plead my case in court-martial and get my sentence reduced.”

  With such a lawyer, and the strings QYV could pull, I knew Heller would have done all right. But he had failed, was now a liability to QYV, and so had accepted my terms instead.

  That was the extent of his pertinent information. I knew he was telling the truth, because of my talent.

  “You have no personal animosity toward me?”

  “No, sir. I respect you. It was a put-up job; I’m no good for command, just for fighting. We knew you’d have to turn me down, giving me cause for challenge. You’re not bad at combat yourself, sir.”

  I pondered. “I can’t give you riches, but I can give you life and a clean record.” I had not forgotten the potency of that offer, either. I knew he would respond; when he made a commitment, he honored it all the way. “Will you serve me loyally henceforth, if I give you the chance?”

  He spread his hands. “You beat me fair, sir. You’ve got me, if you want me. I wouldn’t want me.”

  “Then you are hereby assigned to my personal staff. Your record will not be affected, and your family will not know.”

  He was amazed. “What about the punishment, sir?”

  “You will be my bodyguard. If I am to be killed, you will intercept the attempt to the best of your ability. If you die or are wounded, that is your punishment. You tried to take my life; until you save it, you have not paid.”

  “Yes, sir!” he agreed.

  Another person could not have afforded the risk, but my talent made it feasible for me. Heller would be the best bodyguard I could obtain. He owed me life and knew it.

  “Uh, sir—” “Yes, Corporal?”

  “Something I heard, can’t be sure it’s true—”

  “Yes?”

  “There’s another attempt on you slated. Some other way to get the key from you. But I don’t know how. Just that there’s someone or something on the ship. Indirect, maybe.”

  “Thank you, Heller.” I wasn’t surprised. QYV had tried three times; why not four?

  I had survived the encounter with no more than some chafes about my body, owing to the unexpectedly strenuous nature of it. I didn’t bother with sick bay, preferring to assume the pose of indestructibility. I rubbed some salve on the sore spots, had a light meal, and settled down in my hammock for a nap, alone. When I had been married, I had rated a bed; I missed it, but single enlistees or officers had hammocks, and I was no exception.

  Several hours later I awoke, feeling odd. The room was dimly illuminated, the way I preferred it for sleep; there was sufficient light for vision. I looked at the ceiling, for I had caught a flicker of something there, something in a dark color, oblique to my vision. I could not quite focus on it, seeing it mostly peripherally as it flowed gently by. I was not alarmed; the sight was pleasant. It occurred to me I was dreaming, for there was no holo-projector here, yet I knew I was awake.

  Now the image changed, becoming brighter, more defined, undulating iridescently, as though an ocean of rainbows were heaving by. Bands of color separated from the mass, forming into arcs, semicircles, spirals, and loops. Other bands realigned, forming patterns of lines that somehow passed through the individual curves without interference. Perhaps it was like the petals of flowers floating on a heaving sea, the waves distinct from the objects yet interacting in a curious, intangible fashion.

  I closed my eyes, and the sight changed but did not disappear.

  Rather, it became muted, an underlying grid of color, as if this were the fundamental form that filtered through my eyelids. I opened my eyes again, and the grid was clothed with new ornaments, symmetrical motifs, that slowly turned in space three-dimensionally, like galaxies or rare ancient urns, each more lovely and significant than the others, each a vessel of sheerest wonder. Faster they turned, like spinning planets, spraying out colors like gravity waves, more and more rapidly until their outlines blurred, and even then they were impossibly beautiful.

  Abruptly, all was gone. I saw only my room, stark and bare. There are no loose items in a Navy ship, for they could become missiles during accelerative action. No pictures or paperweights. All is secured and little is esthetic. I lay still, hoping for a return of the pretty visions, but they were gone. I felt a loss so great it brought tears to my eyes and a burden to my chest. Paradise lost!

  I stirred, sitting up, causing my hammock to swing slightly— and suddenly there was sound. Fragments of marvelous music flitted about me, as if some profound orchestra were tuning up. The room seemed to tilt as I moved, throwing me off-balance; everything was askew. I steadied myself, but though my body was still, it also seemed to be turning; the room was turning, too, in the opposite way, and my legs were rotating in diverse directions; yet somehow all was organized so that I neither twisted apart nor lost my position in the room. The sound clarified, and I heard a distant, lovely, vaguely familiar melody, one I longed to appreciate more closely but could not approach.

  But I tried. I got to my feet and found I was not dizzy despite the motions of the universe and my body. Beautiful bass notes sounded as my feet struck the floor. I walked melodiously to the door in pursuit of the distant theme, passing through the complex tapestry of colors that reformed, without disturbing it. Geometric patterns played across the door, and the latch-release panel was somewhat like a painted goblin’s head, but I touched it and the panel slid open.

  Beyond was flickering fire. Intense orange flames leaped up and came through to touch me, but they had no heat; I was invulnerable to this sort of illusion. I stepped into the inferno, following the melodic theme.

  The flames remained, reminding me somewhat of the savage surface of Io, but once I was fairly in them I discovered new aspects. They had discrete shapes of their own, and these were animate, almost alive. There were flame-flowers blooming from their twining flame-vines, more beautiful than any I had ever seen. The smells of them came to me now, the essences of perfect nature, compatible with the music that enfolded them. The geometric shapes flitted in from the other chamber, becoming angular and sine-wave bees and butterflies and hummingbirds without sacrificing their mathematical identities, and carried sparkling pollen from flower to flower, mating them. There were small, satisfied flashes of light as the sex organs that were the flowers received their gratifications, their completions. Then the flowers faded, for nature has little use for anything whose function is past, and were replaced by fruits on the vines, becoming full and juicy and delicious.

  As I gazed at those fruits and understood the symbolism of their generation, I felt the stirring in
my own loin, the need to merge my own pollen with the ovules of the female, to generate my own fruit and the seeds of my own type of life. The flames became half-naked young females of human persuasion wearing skirts without panties, shawls without halters, dancing, twisting, shaking, writhing, their breasts bouncing and quivering with the fullness of their motions, their legs lifting, spreading, closing beckoningly. The nymphs twined like serpents inside their decorative ornaments, impossibly alluring. Now I saw flame-men, too, with fire phalluses that jetted sparks into the crevices of the female flames. I longed to jet my sparks also, but the flame-girls were intangible to my flesh. I needed my own kind.

  I resolved to search for a human woman of suitable configuration and youth. I strode forward, and suddenly my environment shifted again. Horror fell on me like nocturnal rain, soaking me through the flesh to the bone, and through the bone to the marrow. I shivered, terrified of everything. Things came at me, threatening; I was aware of teeth, claws, eyes, and thin sucking-type proboscises. I fled their chill menaces, but there was nowhere to flee; the very shadows reached their barbed extremities toward me.