for a light flashed down on him. He wasn't presentableand his haste was suspicious.
"Stop," said the amplified voice. It was probably just a routine check,but he couldn't risk even that.
He dodged into a space between two buildings and began to run. In thecenter of town, this would be a blind alley, but in this section itwasn't. There was a chance he could lose them. The buildings were justhigh enough so that they couldn't use the air car and they'd have tofollow on foot.
The patrol car alighted almost instantly and one of the policemenstarted after him. The man following him knew his business and was ingood physical condition, better than Jadiver was after days of tensionand little sleep.
Jadiver turned and snapped a half dozen shots at his pursuer. He waslucky, a couple were close enough. The policeman crashed to the groundand began to swear. His voice was choked off in seconds.
The other one got out of the patrol car and let it stand. It was theprinciple of the thing: nobody did that to a policeman. Jadiver had asubstantial lead and it was dark, but he didn't know the route. Jadiverwas enormously tired and this was the policeman's regular beat. The gapbetween them closed rapidly.
Out of breath and time and space to move around in, Jadiver took thewrong turn because the man was so close--and found himself boxed in.
* * * * *
Crouching, Jadiver fired at the oncoming man, a dark shape he sensedrather than saw. The tangle gun clicked futilely, out of ammunition. Hefumbled hastily for a clip; before he could reload, the policemansqueezed the trigger and held it down.
The bullets didn't hit him, they were set to detonate a fraction of aninch away. He gave up and awaited the constricting violence of thetangle strands.
The bullets detonated and the strands flashed out, glowing slightly inthe darkness. They never touched him; instead, they bent into strangeshapes and flipped away. The stickiest substance known, and one of thestrongest, from which there was no escape, yet it would not adhere tohim--was, in fact, forcefully repelled!
It was that skin, of course, the synthetic substance they had put on himover the circuit. They should have tested it under these conditions.They might not have been so anxious to boil men alive.
He felt that he was almost invincible. It was an exhilarating feeling.He stopped trying to reload the tangle gun and stood up. He sprinted atthe policeman, who stood his ground, firing frantically at a target hecould not miss and yet did not hit. The tangle strands shattered allaround the target.
Jadiver swung the gun with his remaining strength; the butt connectedwith the policeman's forehead.
Jadiver scooped up the discarded tangle gun and fired twice at closerange, in case the man should decide to revive too soon, which wasdoubtful. He went back and entered the idling patrol car. He hadn't lostmuch time, after all.
He sat the car down on top of a building near the edge of therocketport, straightened his clothing and wiped the grime off his face.Some of the disguise went, too, but that no longer mattered much.
He stepped out of the elevator and walked casually along the streetuntil he came to the interplanetary flight office. The same robot wasthere--would be there every hour, day and night, until the rocketportwas expanded and the building torn down and rebuilt, or the robotitself wore out and had to be replaced.
The clerk looked up eagerly. "You're back. I knew I could count on you."
"I'm interested in that flight you were telling me about," said Jadiver.
"We've changed rates," the robot clerk replied, beaming. "It was abargain before, but just listen to the revised offer. We pay you, on aper diem basis--subjective, of course. When you arrive, you actuallyhave a bank account waiting for you."
Per diem, subjective--the time that _seemed_ to elapse when the rocketwas traveling near the speed of light. It wasn't as good as the robotmade it sound.
"Never mind that," said Jadiver. "I'll take it if it's going far."
"Going far!" echoed the clerk.
A policeman sauntered by outside, just looking, but that was enough.
"I said I'd take it," Jadiver repeated in a loud voice.
The clerk deflated. "I wish I could go with you," it explainedwistfully. It reached under the counter and pulled out a perforatedtape. "This will get you on the ship, and it also constitutes thecontract. Just present it at the other end and collect your money. Youcan send for your baggage after you're on board."
Jadiver opened his mouth and then closed it. His baggage was intangible,mostly experience, not much of it pleasant.
"I'll do that," he said.
The clerk came out from behind the counter and watched Jadiver leave.Lights from the rocketport glittered in its robot eyes.
* * * * *
Jadiver paced about the ship. It was not enough to be on it, for thepolice could still trace him. And if they did, they could get him off.It was not only himself, there was his unknown friend. They had ways tolearn about that.
He passed a vision port on his way through the ship. It was night, butit didn't seem so on the vast, brightly lighted concrete plain. Astrange vehicle streaked across the surface of the rocketport indefiance of all regulations and common sense.
It was coming his way. It dodged in and out of rockets landing andtaking off, escaping blazing destruction with last minute, intricatemaneuvers. The driver had complete control of the vehicle and wasfantastically skillful.
It was a strange machine. Jadiver had never seen anything quite like it.As far as he knew, it resembled nothing the police used.
It didn't halt outside the ship. The loading ramp was down and themachine came up without hesitation. The entrance was too narrow and thevehicle would never get through--that seemed evident. An instant later,he was not so sure. The ship quivered and groaned and vibrations ranthroughout the structure.
He leaned over the railing and looked down. The machine was inside,dented and scraped.
"Captain," bellowed a voice from the vehicle. It was an authoritativevoice and it puzzled Jadiver.
The captain came running, either in response to the command or to findout how much damage had been done in the crash and why.
"Take off, Captain," said the voice. "Take off at once."
The captain sputtered. "I give orders here. I'll take off when I getready."
"You're ready when the ship reaches a certain mass. As soon as I came onboard, you attained it. Check your mass gauges, Captain."
The captain hurried to the gauges and glanced at them. He stared back atthe machine.
"Captain," purred the machine, "you have a little daughter. By the timeyou get back, she will be grown and will have children of her own. Thesooner you leave, the sooner you will see her again. I will regard it asa personal favor if you see that we take off immediately."
The captain looked at the machine. Tentacles and eye stalks rose up outof the tip as he watched. It was a big machine, well put together, andit appeared quite capable of handling a roomful of armed men. As amatter of fact, it just had.
The captain shrugged and gave the order to lift ship.
* * * * *
It was none too soon. Out of the visionport, Jadiver could see uniformedmen edging up from the underground shelters. They backed out of sightwhen the rockets began to flame.
Faster the ship rose and higher. They were in the dense clouds and thenthrough them, out in the clear black of space, away from Venus.
Jadiver looked down at the machine. It wasn't a vehicle. It was a robot,and it was familiar.
"It ought to be familiar," said the robot softly. That voice was for himalone, directly on the auditory nerve. "You designed most of it back onEarth, remember?"
He remembered. It was not a pretty imitation of a human--it was hisperfect robot. And it was also, his unknown friend, the one who hadwatched over him.
He walked slowly down the stairs and stood beside it.
The robot switched to the regular speaking voi
ce. "They built yourdesign, after all. They needed a big and powerful mobile robot, one thatcould house, in addition to the regular functions, an extensive anddelicate mechanism."
That was the voice that had haunted him so long and in so manysituations. It was not Jadiver's own voice, but it resembled his. Athird person might not recognize the difference.
"That other mechanism," said Jadiver. "Is that the one that monitors thecircuit in my body?"
"That _parallels_ the circuit in your body." Tentacles were busystraightening out the dents. "When I was built, they gave me a goodmind, better than your own in certain respects. What I lacked wassensory perception. Eyes and ears, to be sure, good ones in a way, butwithout the delicate shadings a human has, particularly tactileinterpretations. I didn't need better, they thought, because my functionwas to observe and report on the