“But he did,” someone said. “I saw him.”
“I certainly had the impression that I saw him turn,” said the President slowly. “You are suggesting that Governor Packer is himself possessed?”
“Correct. You saw what you were meant to see. There was a camera cut just before he was fully turned; people hardly ever notice them; they are used to them. Depend on it. Mister President, every message out of Iowa is faked.”
The President looked thoughtful. Secretary Martinez shook his head emphatically and said, “Impossible. Granted that the governor’s message could have been faked—a clever character actor could have faked it. Remember the inaugural address in the crisis of ’96, when the President Elect was laid up with pneumonia? Granted that one such ’cast could be faked, we’ve had our choice of dozens of ’casts from Iowa. How about that street scene in Des Moines? Don’t tell me you can fake hundreds of people dashing around stripped to their waists—or do your parasites practice mass hypnotic control?”
“They can’t that I know of,” conceded the Old Man. “If they can, we might as well throw in the towel and admit that the human race has been superseded. But what made you think that that ’cast came from Iowa?”
“Eh? Why, damn it, sir, it came over the Iowa channel.”
“Proving what? Did you read any street signs? It looked like any typical street in a downtown retail district. Never mind what city the announcer told you it was; what city was it?”
The Secretary let his mouth hang open. I’ve got fairly close to the “camera eye” that detectives are supposed to have; I let that picture run through my mind—and I not only could not tell what city, I could not even place the part of the country. It could have been Memphis, Seattle, or Boston—or none of them. Allowing for special cases like Canal Street in New Orleans, or Denver’s Civic Center, the downtown districts in American cities are as standardized as barber shops.
“Never mind,” the Old Man went on. “I couldn’t tell and I was looking for landmarks. The explanation is simple; the Des Moines station picked up a Schedule Bare Back street scene from some city not contaminated and rechanneled it under their own commentary. They chopped out anything that would localize it…and we swallowed it. Gentlemen, this enemy knows us, inside and out. This campaign has been planned in great detail and they are ready to outwit us in almost any move we can make.”
“Aren’t you being an alarmist, Andrew?” said the President. “There is another possibility, that the titans have moved somewhere else.”
“They are still in Iowa,” the Old Man said flatly, “but you won’t prove it with that thing.” He gestured at the stereo tank.
Secretary Martinez squirmed. “This is ridiculous!” he exclaimed. “You are saying that we can’t get a correct report out of Iowa, as if it were occupied territory.”
“That is what it is.”
“But I stopped off in Des Moines two days ago, coming back from Alaska. Everything was normal. Mind you, I grant the existence of your parasites, though I haven’t seen one. But let’s find them where they are and root them out, instead of dreaming up fantasies.”
The Old Man looked tired and I felt tired. I wondered how many ordinary people were taking it seriously, if this was what we ran into at the top.
Finally the Old Man replied, “Control the communications of a country and you control the country; that’s elementary. You had better take fast steps, Mister Secretary, or you won’t have any communications left.”
“But I was merely—”
“You root ’em out!” the Old Man said rudely. “I’ve told you they are in Iowa—and in New Orleans, and a dozen other spots. My job is finished. You are Secretary of Security; you root ’em out.” He stood up and said, “Mister President, I’ve had a long pull for a man my age; when I lose sleep I lose my temper. Could I be excused?”
“Certainly, Andrew.” He had not lost his temper and I think the President knew it. He doesn’t lose his temper; he makes other people lose theirs.
Before the Old Man could say goodnight. Secretary Martinez interrupted. “Wait a moment! You’ve made some flat-footed statements. Let’s check up on them.” He turned to the Chief of Staff. “Rexton!”
“Uh, yes, sir.”
“That new post near Des Moines, Fort something-or-other, named after what’s-his-name?”
“Fort Patton.”
“That’s it, that’s it. Well, let’s not dally; get them on the command circuit—”
“With visual,” put in the Old Man.
“With visual, of course, and we’ll show this—I mean we’ll get the true situation in Iowa.”
The Air Marshal handed a by-your-leave-sir to the President, went to the stereo tank and patched in with Security General Headquarters. He asked for the officer of the watch at Fort Patton, Iowa.
Shortly thereafter the stereo tank showed the inside of a military communications center. Filling the foreground was a young officer. His rank and corps showed on his cap, but his chest was bare. Martinez turned triumphantly to the Old Man. “You see?”
“I see.”
“Now to make certain. Lieutenant!”
“Yes, sir!” The young fellow looked awestruck and kept glancing from one famous face to another. Reception and bi-angle were in synch; the eyes of the image looked where they seemed to look, as if he were actually sitting in the receiver tank.
“Stand up and turn around,” Martinez continued.
“Uh? Why, certainly, sir.” He seemed puzzled, but he did so—and it took him almost out of scan. We could see his bare back, up to about the short ribs—no higher.
“Confound it!” shouted Martinez. “Sit down and turn around.”
“Yessir!” The youth seemed flustered. He leaned over the desk and added, “Just a moment while I widen the view angle, sir.”
The picture suddenly melted and rippling rainbows chased across the tank. The young officer’s voice was still coming over the audio channel. “There—is that better, sir?”
“Damn it, we can’t see a thing!”
“You can’t? Just a moment, sir.”
We could hear him breathing heavily. Suddenly the tank came to life and I thought for a moment that we were back at Fort Patton. But it was a major on the screen this time and the place looked larger. “Supreme Headquarters,” the image announced, “Communications officer of the watch. Major Donovan.”
“Major,” Martinez said in controlled tones, “I was hooked in with Fort Patton. What happened?”
“Yes, sir; I was monitoring it. We’ve had a slight technical difficulty on that channel. We’ll put your call through again in a moment.”
“Well, hurry!”
“Yes, sir.” The tank rippled and went empty.
The Old Man stood up again. “Call me when you’ve cleared up that ‘slight technical difficulty’. Meantime, I’m going to bed.”
XV
If I have given the impression that Secretary Martinez was stupid, I am sorry. Everyone had trouble at first believing what the slugs could do. You have to see one—then you believe in the pit of your stomach.
There were no flies on Air Marshal Rexton, either. The two must have worked all night, after convincing themselves by more calls to known danger spots that “technical interruptions” do not occur so conveniently. They called the Old Man about four a.m. and he called me, using our special phones. Those flesh-embedded receptors should not be used as alarm clocks; it’s too rough a way to wake a man.
They were in the same conference room, Martinez, Rexton, a couple of his high brass, and the Old Man. The President came in, wearing a bathrobe and followed by Mary, just as I arrived. Martinez started to speak but the Old Man cut in. “Let’s see your back, Tom!”
The President looked surprised and Mary signaled that everything was okay, but the Old Man chose not to see her. “I mean it,” he persisted.
The President said quietly, “Perfectly correct, Andrew,” and slipped his robe off his shoulders. His ba
ck was clean. “If I don’t set an example, how can I expect others to cooperate?”
The Old Man started to help him back into the robe, but the President shrugged him off and hung it over a chair. “I’ll just have to acquire new habits. Difficult, at my age. Well, gentlemen?”
I thought myself that bare skin would take getting used to; we made an odd group. Martinez was lean and tanned, carved smooth from mahogany. I’d judge he was part Indian. Rexton had a burned-in, high-altitude tan on his face, but from his collar line down he was as white as the President. On his chest was a black cross of hair, armpit to armpit and chin to belly, while the President and the Old Man were covered front and back with grizzled, wiry fur. The Old Man’s mat was so thick that mice could have nested in it.
Mary looked like a publicity pic—low angle shot to bring out the legs and careful posing, that sort. Me—well. I’m the spiritual type.
Martinez and Rexton had been shoving push pins into a map, red for bad, green for good, and a few amber ones. Reports were still coming and Rexton’s assistants kept adding new pins.
Iowa looked like measles; New Orleans and the Teche country were as bad. So was Kansas City. The upper end of the Missouri-Mississippi system, from Minneapolis and St. Paul down to St. Louis, was clearly enemy territory. There were fewer red pins from there down to New Orleans—but there were no green ones.
There was another hot spot around El Paso and two on the East Coast.
The President looked it over calmly. “We shall need the help of Canada and Mexico,” he said. “Any reports?”
“None that mean anything, sir.”
“Canada and Mexico,” the Old Man said seriously, “will be just a start. You are going to need the whole world with you on this job.”
Rexton said, “We will, eh? How about Russia?”
Nobody had an answer to that one; nobody ever has. Too big to occupy and too big to ignore—World War III had not settled the Russian problem and no war ever would. The parasites might feel right at home behind the Curtain.
The President said, “We’ll deal with that when we come to it.” He drew a finger across the map. “Any trouble getting messages through to the Coast?”
“Apparently not, sir,” Rexton told him. “They don’t seem to interfere with straight-through relay. But all military communications I have shifted to one-link relay through the space stations.” He glanced at his watch finger. “Space Station Gamma, at the moment.”
“Hmmm—” said the President. “Andrew, could these things storm a space station?”
“How would I know?” the Old Man answered testily. “I don’t know whether their ships are built for it or not. More probably they would do it by infiltration, through the supply rockets.”
There was discussion as to whether or not the space stations could already have been taken over; Schedule Bare Back did not apply to the stations. Although we had built them and paid for them, since they were technically United Nations territory, the President had to wait until the United Nations acted on the entire matter.
“Don’t worry about it,” Rexton said suddenly.
“Why not?” the President asked.
“I am probably the only one here who has done duty in a space station. Gentlemen, the costume we are now wearing is customary in a station. A man fully dressed would stand out like an overcoat on the beach. But we’ll see.” He gave orders to one of his assistants.
The President resumed studying the map. “So far as we know,” he said, pointing to Grinnell, Iowa, “all this derives from a single landing, here.”
The Old Man answered, “Yes—so far as we know.”
I said, “Oh, no!”
They all looked at me and I was embarrassed. “Go ahead,” said the President.
“There were at least three more landings—I know there were—before I was rescued.”
The Old Man looked dumbfounded. “Are you sure, son? We thought we had wrung you dry.”
“Of course I’m sure.”
“Why didn’t you mention it?”
“I never thought of it before.” I tried to explain how it feels to be possessed, how you know what is going on, but everything seems dreamy, equally important and equally unimportant. I grew quite upset. I am not the jittery type, but being ridden by a master does something to you.
The Old Man put his hand on me and said, “Steady down, son.” The President said something soothing and gave me a reassuring smile. That stereocast personality of his is not put on; he’s really got it.
Rexton said, “The important point is: where did they land? We might still capture one.”
“I doubt it,” the Old Man answered. “They did a cover-up on the first one in a matter of hours. If it was the first one,” he added thoughtfully.
I went to the map and tried to think. Sweating, I pointed to New Orleans. “I’m pretty sure one was about here.” I stared at the map. “I don’t know where the others landed. But I know they did.”
“How about here?” Rexton asked, pointing to the East Coast.
“I don’t know. I don’t know.”
The Old Man pointed to the other East Coast danger spot. “We know this one is a secondary infection.” He was kind enough not to say that I had been the means of infecting it.
“Can’t you remember anything else?” Martinez said testily. “Think, man!”
“I just don’t know. We never knew what they were up to, not really.” I thought until my skull ached, then pointed to Kansas City. “I sent several messages here, but I don’t know whether they were shipment orders, or not.”
Rexton looked at the map; around Kansas City was almost as pin-studded as Iowa. “We’ll assume a landing near Kansas City, too. The technical boys can do a problem on it. It may be subject to logistic analysis; we might derive the other landing.”
“Or landings,” added the Old Man.
“Eh? ‘Or landings’. Certainly. But we need more reports.” He turned back to the map and stared at it thoughtfully.
XVI
Hindsight is confoundedly futile. At the moment the first saucer landed the menace could have been stamped out by one determined man and a bomb. At the time “The Cavanaughs”—Mary, the Old Man, and I—reconnoitered around Grinnell and in Des Moines, we three alone might have killed every slug had we been ruthless and, more important, known where they all were.
Had Schedule Bare Back been ordered during the fortnight after the first landing it alone might have turned the trick. But by the next day it was clear that Schedule Bare Back had failed as an offensive measure. As a defense it was useful; the uncontaminated areas could be kept so, as long as the slugs could not conceal themselves. It had even had mild success in offense; areas contaminated but not “secured” by the parasites were cleaned up at once… Washington itself, for example, and New Philadelphia. New Brooklyn, too—there I had been able to give specific advice. The entire East Coast turned from red to green.
But as the area down the middle of the country filled in on the map, it filled in red, and stayed so. The infected areas stood out in ruby light now, for the simple wall map studded with push pins had been replaced by a huge electronic military map, ten miles to the inch, covering one wall of the conference room. It was a repeater map, the master being located down in the sublevels of the New Pentagon.
The country was split in two, as if a giant had washed red pigment down the Central Valley. Two zigzag amber paths bordered the great band held by the slugs; these were overlap, the only areas of real activity, places where line-of-sight reception was possible from both stations held by the enemy and from stations still in the hands of free men. One such started near Minneapolis, swung west of Chicago and east of St. Louis, then meandered through Tennessee and Alabama to the Gulf. The other cut a wide path through the Great Plains and came out near Corpus Christi. El Paso was the center of a ruby area as yet unconnected with the main body.
I looked at the map and wondered what was going on in those border strips.
I had the room to myself; the Cabinet was meeting and the President had taken the Old Man with him. Rexton and his brass had left earlier. I stayed there because I had not been told where to go and I hesitated to wander around in the White House. So I stayed and fretted and watched amber lights blink red and, much less frequently, red lights blink amber or green.
I wondered how an overnight visitor with no status managed to get breakfast? I had been up since four and my total nourishment so far had been one cup of coffee, served by the President’s valet. Even more urgently I wanted to find a washroom. I knew where the President’s washroom was, but I did not have the nerve to use it, feeling vaguely that to do so would be somewhere between high treason and disorderly conduct.
There was not a guard in sight. Probably the room was being scanned from a board somewhere; I suppose every room in the White House has an “eye & ear” in it; but there was no one physically in view.
At last I got desperate enough to start trying doors. The first two were locked; the third was what I was looking for. It was not marked “Sacred to the Chief” nor did it appear to be booby-trapped, so I used it.
When I came back into the conference room, Mary was there.
I looked at her stupidly for a moment. “I thought you were with the President?”
She smiled. “I was, but I got chased out. The Old Man took over for me.”
I said, “Say, Mary, I’ve been wanting to talk with you and this is the first chance I’ve had. I guess I—Well, anyway, I shouldn’t have, I mean, according to the Old Man—” I stopped, my carefully rehearsed speech in ruins. “Anyhow, I shouldn’t have said what I did,” I concluded miserably.
She put a hand on my arm. “Sam. Sam, my very dear, do not be troubled. What you said and what you did was fair enough from what you knew. The important thing, to me, is what you did for me. The rest does not matter—except that I am happy again to know that you don’t despise me.”
“Well, but—Damn it, don’t be so noble! I can’t stand it!”