A Matter of Importance
be picked up in space.
"It's Four, sir," he reported unnecessarily, because the sergeant hadwatched as he worked. "They've got detectors out. I could just barelypick up the pulses. But by the time they've been reflected back they'llbe away below thermal noise-volume. I don't think even multiples couldpick 'em out. I'm saying, sir, that I don't think they can detect us atthis distance."
Sergeant Madden grunted.
"D'you think we came this far not to be noticed?" he asked. But he wasnot peevish. Rather, he seemed more thoroughly awake than he'd beensince the squad ship left the Precinct substation back on Varenga IV. Herubbed his hands a little and stood up. "Hold it a minute, Willis."
He went back to the auxiliary-equipment locker. He returned to his seatbeside Patrolman Willis. He opened the breech of the ejector-tube besidehis chair.
"You've had street-fighting training," he said almost affably, "at thePolice Academy. And siege-of-criminals courses too, eh?" He did not waitfor an answer. "It's historic," he observed, "that since time begancops've been stickin' out hats for crooks to shoot at, and thatcrooks've been shooting, thinking there were heads in 'em."
He put a small object in the ejector tube, poked it to proper seating,and settled himself comfortably, again.
"Can you make it to about a quarter-million miles of Four," he askedcheerfully, "in one hop?"
Patrolman Willis set up the hop-timer. Sergeant Madden was pleased thathe aimed the squad ship not exactly at the minute disk which was PlanetIV of this system. It was prudence against the possibility of an errorin the reading of distance.
"Ever use a marker, Willis?"
Patrolman Willis said: "No, sir."
Before he'd finished saying it the squad ship had hopped into overdriveand out again.
* * * * *
Sergeant Madden approved of the job. His son Timmy couldn't have donebetter. Here was Planet IV before them, a little off to one side, as wasproper. They had run no risk of hitting in overdrive.
The distance was just about a quarter-million miles, if Krishnamurti'sLaw predicting the size and distance of planets in a sol-type system wasreliable. The world was green and had icecaps. There should always be,in a system of this kind, at least one oxygen-planet with anearly-terran-normal range of temperature. That usually meant greenplants and an ocean or two. There wasn't quite as much sea as usual, onthis planet, and therefore there were some extensive yellow areas thatmust be desert. But it was a good, habitable world. Anybody whose homeit was would defend it fiercely.
"Hm-m-m," said Sergeant Madden. He took the ejector-tube lanyard in hishand. He computed mentally. About a quarter-million miles, say. A secondand a half to alarm, down below. Five seconds more to verification.Another five to believe it. Not less than twenty altogether to reportand get authority to fire. The Huks were a fighting race and presumablyorganized, so they'd have a chain of command and decisions would be madeat the top. Army stuff, or navy. Not like the cops, where everybody knewboth the immediate and final purposes of any operation in progress, andcould act without waiting for orders.
It should be not less than thirty seconds before a firing key madecontact down below. As a matter of history, years ago the Huks had usedeighty-gravity rockets with tracking-heads and bust-bombs on them. TheseHuks would hardly be behind the others in equipment. And back then, too,Huks kept their rocket missiles out in orbit where they could flare intoeighty-gee acceleration without wasting time getting out to where anenemy was. In their struggle against the cops two generations ago theHuks had had to learn that fighting wasn't all drama and heroics. Thecops had taken the glamour out when they won. So the Huks wouldn't wastetime making fine gestures now. The squad ship had appeared off theirplanet. It had not transmitted a code identification-signal the instantit came out of overdrive. The Huks were hiding from the cops, so they'dshoot.
"Hop on past," commanded Sergeant Madden, "the instant I jerk theejector lanyard. Don't fool around. Over the pole will do."
Patrolman Willis set the hop-timer. Twenty seconds. Twenty-two. Three.Four.
"Hop!" said Sergeant Madden. As he spoke, he jerked the lanyard.
Before the syllable was finished, Patrolman Willis pressed hard on theoverdrive button. There came the always-nauseating sensation of goinginto overdrive combined with the even more unpleasant sensation ofcoming out of it. The squad ship was somewhere else.
A vast, curving whiteness hung catercornered in the sky. It was theplanet's icecap, upside down. Patrolman Willis had possibly cut it atrifle too fine.
"Right," said the sergeant comfortably. "Now swing about to go back andmeet the _Aldeb_. But wait."
The stars and the monstrous white bowl reeled in their positions as theship turned. Sergeant Madden felt that he could spare seconds, here. Heignored the polar regions of Sirene IV, hanging upside down to rearwardfrom the squad ship. Even a planetary alarm wouldn't get polar-areaobservers set to fire in much less than forty seconds, and there'd haveto be some lag in response to instrument reports. It wouldn't be as iftrouble had been anticipated at just this time.
The squad ship steadied. Sergeant Madden looked with pleasurableanticipation back to where the ship had come out of overdrive andlingered for twenty-four seconds. Willis had moved the squad ship fromthat position, but the sergeant had left a substitute. The small objecthe'd dropped from the ejector tube now swelled and writhed andstruggled. In pure emptiness, a shape of metal foil inflated itself. Itwas surprisingly large--almost the size of the squad ship. But inemptiness the fraction of a cubic inch of normal-pressure gas wouldinflate a foil bag against no resistance at all. This flimsy shape evenjerked into motion. Released gas poured out its back. There was noresistance to acceleration save mass, which was negligible.
A sudden swirling cloud of vapor appeared where the squad ship'ssubstitute went mindlessly on its way. The vapor rushed toward thespace-marker.
A star appeared. It was a strictly temporary star, but even from aquarter-million-mile distance it was incredibly bright. It was a bomb,blasting a metal-foil flimsy which the electronic brain of amissile-rocket could only perceive as an unidentified and hence enemyobject. Bomb and rocket and flimsy metal foil turned together toradioactive metal vapor.
Sergeant Madden knew professional admiration.
"Thirty-four seconds!" he said approvingly.
The Huks could not have expected the appearance of an enemy just hereand now. It was the first such appearance in all the planet's history.They certainly looked for no consequences of the seizure of the_Cerberus_, carefully managed as that had been. So to detonate a bombagainst an unexpected inimical object within thirty-four seconds afterits appearance was very good work indeed.
"Hm-m-m," said Sergeant Madden, "we've nothing more to do right now,Willis. We'll go back to that hunk of ice you spotted comin' in, andwait for the _Aldeb_."
Patrolman Willis obediently set the hop-timer and swung the squad shipto a proper aiming. He pressed the overdrive button.
His manner, like that of Sergeant Madden, was the manner of someoneconducting a perfectly routine operation.
* * * * *
"If my son Timmy were with me on this job," said Sergeant Madden, "I'dpoint out the inner meaning of the way we're going about handling it."
He reposed in his bucket-seat in the squad ship, which at that momentlay aground not quite right-side-up close to the north pole of SireneVIII. The local sun was not in view. The squad ship's ports opened uponthe incredible brilliance of the galaxy as seen out of atmosphere. Therewas no atmosphere here. It was all frozen. But there was a horizon, andthe light of the stars showed the miniature jungle of gas crystals.Frozen gases--frozen to gas-ice--they were feathery. They were lacy.They were infinitely delicate. They were frost in three dimensions.
"Yes, sir," said Patrolman Willis.
"The _Aldeb_'s due soon," said Sergeant Madden, "so I'll make it short.The whole thing is that we are cops, and the Huks are soldiers. Whichmeans t
hat they're after feeling important--after glamour. Every one of'em figures it's necessary to be important. He craves it."
Patrolman Willis listened. He had a proximity detector out, which wouldpick up any radiation caused by the cutting of magnetic lines of forceby any object. It made very tiny whining noises from time to time. Ifanything from a Huk missile rocket to the salvage ship _Aldeb_approached, however, the sound would be distinctive.
"Now that," said Sergeant Madden, "is the same thing that makes delinks.A delink tries to matter in the world he lives in. It's a small world,with only him and his close pals in it. So he struts before his pals. Hedon't realize that anybody but him