The duty of the council, as they saw it, was to preserve the tribal and local customs and government, and install over all of it a clan system, appointing local leaders as clanchiefs. The coordinators spread the news and were extremely welcome and successful.
The hard-worked pilots were ferrying in chiefs and visitors and simply anyone who got on their passenger planes. If there were too many going or coming they simply told them to wait until next week and that was fine.
But there was no really organized forward motion. Local control of the tribes was often slack. Some had retained literacy in their language, some had not. Most of them were poor, half-starved, ragged.
The one incredible fact that after over a thousand years there was freedom from Psychlos, even if possibly temporary, united them in a wave of hope. They had once gazed from their mountains on the ruins of cities they dared not visit; they had looked upon fertile plains and great herds they dared not benefit from; they had seen no hope whatever for their dying race. And then suddenly men from the sky, speaking their language, telling them of the remarkable feats that led to possible freedom, had brought them soaring hope and reburgeoning pride in their race.
The council’s existence they accepted. They joined it and, with radios parked on rocks and in huts, communicated with it.
They all had one question. Was the Jonnie MacTyler of whom the coordinators spoke a part of this council? Yes, he was. Good, no more questions.
But the council well knew that Jonnie was not an active part of the council now. Completely aside from the political significance of it, every council member was himself personally concerned for Jonnie.
There were all kinds of things happening over the world, most of the actions taken without even informing the council. People were moving about. A group of South Americans, with baggy pants and flat leather hats, swinging wide lariats and riding almost as well as Jonnie once did, had suddenly walked off a plane with their women and lariats and saddles and said, through their Spanish-speaking Scot coordinator, that they were llaneros or gauchos and they knew cattle—but would find out what to do with buffalo—and were taking over the management of the vast herds to preserve them and make sure the people at the compound and base were properly fed. Two Italians from the Italian Alps had shown up and taken over the commissary after making peace with the old women. Five Germans from Switzerland had shown up and opened a factory in Denver to salvage and service man-equipment such as knives and tools, you name it, and if you sent it to them they would make it shiny and working and send it back. This put a freight line into an already overburdened pilot zone. Three Basques showed up and simply started making shoes; the difficulty was that Basque as a language had been omitted by the coordinators, and the shoemakers were learning English and Psychlo while they turned out shoes from the hides the South Americans dedicatedly furnished them. Many others came in.
Everybody wanted to help and simply helped.
“There is no control of it,” Robert the Fox told Jonnie one day in the hospital room.
Jonnie simply gave him a small smile and said, “Why control them?”
The historian, except for Jonnie’s account of the drone, which was too sketchy to be called history, was getting bogged down in assembling tribal histories of the last thousand or more years. The coordinators sent him all kinds of stuff and he couldn’t even keep it in order. Some serious-eyed Chinese from a mountain fastness there had shown up to help him, and they were furiously studying English, but were not of much help yet.
It seemed at first that language would be an obstacle. But it soon became clear that the future educated person would speak three languages: Psychlo for technical matters; English for arts, humanities and government; and their own tribal language if not English. The pilots chattered Psychlo at each other: all their equipment was in Psychlo as well as their manuals and navigation and related skills.
There was a lot of protest at speaking the language of the hated Psychlos until the historian learned that Psychlo as a language was really a composite of words and technical developments stolen from other peoples in the universes, and there never had been a basic language called “Psychlo.” People were glad of that and thereafter learned it more willingly, but they liked to refer to it as “Techno.”
The parson had his own problems. He had about forty different religions on his hands. They had one thing in common: the myths of the conquest a thousand or more years ago. Otherwise, they were miles apart. He had witch doctors and medicine men and priests and such flooding his doorstep. He knew very well the wars that can develop out of different faiths, and he was not going to evangelize any one of them. Man wanted peace.
He explained to them that man, being divided and internally at war, had advanced too slowly as a culture and so had been wide open to an invasion from elsewhere. They all agreed man should not be at war with man.
The myths—well, they knew the truth of it now. They were happy to abandon those myths. But on this question of which gods and which devils were valid . . . well . . .
The parson had neatly handled the whole thing for the moment. He would disturb no beliefs at all. Every one of these tribes was demanding to know what was the religion of Jonnie MacTyler? Well, he wasn’t really of any religion, the parson told them. He was Jonnie MacTyler. Instantly and without exception, Jonnie MacTyler became part of their religions. And that was that.
But Jonnie was lying a bit wan, trying each day at Chrissie’s and MacKendrick’s persuasion to walk, to use his arm. And when the parson tried to tell him he was getting woven into the pantheon of about forty religions, he said nothing. He just lay there, not much life or interest showing in the depths of his eyes.
The council was not having a happy time of it.
4
He lay half-awake in his bed, not really wanting to try.
The secret behind Jonnie’s lethargy was the feeling that he had failed. Maybe the bombs hadn’t landed on Psychlo. Maybe all this was just a brief interlude of peace for man. Perhaps soon the beautiful plains of his planet would once more be denied the human race.
And even if the bombs had landed and Psychlo was no longer a menace, he had heard of other races out there in the universe, savage races as pitiless as the Psychlos. How could this planet defend itself against those?
It haunted him at every awakening; it plagued his sleep. People now looked so happy and industrious, so revived. What cruelty if it were just a brief interlude. How crushed they would be!
Today would be just another day. He would get up, and a Russian attendant would bring in his breakfast and help Chrissie straighten the room. Then MacKendrick would come and they would exercise his arm and he would try to walk a bit. Something about there being nothing wrong, really, just having to learn to do it again. Then Sir Robert or the parson would come over and sit uncomfortably for a while until Chrissie shooed them out. A few more dull routine actions and another day would be gone. His failure oppressed him. He saw more clearly than they did how cruel a letdown this would be if the Psychlos counterattacked. He felt a little guilty when he saw a glad face: how soon it might turn to grief.
He had given the historian, Doctor MacDermott, a colorless outline of the drone destruction, all from the viewpoint of what one could or could not do if another one appeared, and Doctor Mac had well supposed there was far more to the action than that, but he had been chased out by Chrissie.
Chrissie had just washed his face and he was sitting at a trolley table when he noticed something odd going on with the Russian attendant. It really did not thoroughly challenge Jonnie’s interest, for there were always Scots guarding him in the outside passage against intruders or disturbance—a guard he had at first protested and then accepted when they all seemed so upset at the refusal.
Jonnie had not seen this particular Russian in two weeks; others had been taking his place. Once this Russian had come in with a great big black eye and a triumphant grin on his face; questioned, Chrissie had explained that the
Russians sometimes fought among themselves over the right to serve him. Well, this fellow looked like he could win any fight. As tall as Jonnie, heavyset with slightly slanted eyes, and dressed in baggy-bottomed trousers and a white tunic, he was quite imposing, his bristling black mustache standing straight out on both sides of his big nose. His name was, inevitably, Ivan.
After putting down the breakfast, he had drawn back and was standing there at the stiffest attention Jonnie had ever seen.
A coordinator came slipping in the door, the Scot sentry scowling and privately vowing to send for Sir Robert by runner the moment the door was closed.
Jonnie looked at the Russian questioningly.
The Russian bowed from the hips and straightened up, looking stiffly ahead. “How do you do, Jonnie Tyler sir.” His was a very thick accent. He did not go on.
Jonnie went on eating oatmeal and cream. “How do you do,” he said indifferently.
The Russian just stood there. Then his eyes rolled appealingly at the Scot coordinator.
“That’s all the English he knows, Jonnie sir. He has some news and a present for you.”
Chrissie, with a broom in her hand, her corn-silk hair tied out of her eyes with a buckskin thong, bristled at this violation of proper announcement. She looked like she was going to hit both of them with the broom. Jonnie motioned her to be still. He was slightly interested. The Russian was so imposing and was fairly bursting with what he had to say.
Ivan barked off a long string of Russian and the coordinator took it up. “He says he is Colonel Ivan Smolensk of the Hindu Kush—that’s in the Himalayan Mountains. They are descended from a Red Army detachment that was cut off there and intermarried locally; there are about ten groups in the Himalayas; some speak Russian, some an Afghanistan dialect. They really aren’t army units. ‘Colonel’ to them means ‘father.’ They’re really Cossacks.”
The Russian thought this was going on too long—it was more than he had said. So he rattled off another string. The coordinator cleared up a couple of points and turned to Jonnie.
“This is very irregular,” said Chrissie, her black eyes flashing.
The coordinator was already in awe of Chrissie, and Jonnie had to tell him to go on. “It seems like when they found they could travel around—the steppes there are huge—a troop—that’s their name for a family unit—rode clear over to the Ural Mountains. They got on the radio to him—anybody can use a radio it seems—and they gave him some news. Our coordinator there had told them about this base and that troop for some reason thought there might be a Russian base.
“They came back and radioed Ivan here about it and he took off—anybody can hook a ride on a plane; they schedule ’round the various tribes about once a week—and he rode like the wind, he says, on their very swift horses and he went to check it personally and he’s just come back and wants to tell you.”
“He should tell the council!” said Chrissie. “Jonnie is in no condition to be holding what they call audiences!”
The Russian let out another string. The coordinator timidly translated (he did not like crossing Chrissie; she was such a beautiful woman and such a celebrity herself). “There is such a base. It is as big as this one and just as full of atom bombs and hardware and dead men.”
Jonnie was vaguely interested. Might serve them as a refuge if there were a counterattack. “Well, tell him that’s fine and why not clean it up and use it.”
A brief interchange between the coordinator and the Russian, and then fireworks! Russian splattered off the very walls.
Robert the Fox came in short of breath from hurrying, thoroughly disapproving of anyone disturbing Jonnie, as well as short-circuiting proper channels. But he paused. Jonnie seemed interested. Not much, but more than Robert had seen for a while. The veteran leaned back against the wall and signaled the coordinator to go on.
The coordinator was getting overwhelmed. He was quite used to dealing with important tribal heads and notables, but here he was in the company of three of the most important names this planet had ever had, especially Jonnie sir. But Colonel Ivan was almost stomping his feet for him to translate.
“He says that’s what ruined the whole human race. He says the valiant-Red-Army, trying to fight the capitalist-imperialist-warmongers (these are just names to him, Jonnie sir, he doesn’t have a political axe to grind) had their attention on each other and didn’t cooperate when an invader landed; and he says while tribal wars will and do happen, international wars among whole peoples are against the good welfare of the people. He says he is for the people of Earth and people didn’t stick together, but fought, and this must not happen again. He’s very emphatic, Jonnie sir, and he says all the other Russian tribes are also.”
Jonnie pushed back the tray, and the Russian, suddenly remembering his duty, picked it up. He let out another broadside of Russian.
The coordinator pulled out some papers. “They’ve retained literacy, sir, and he and some of the chiefs drew up some papers—they don’t have much paper so excuse its condition, I think they found it in that base—and they want your agreement to it.”
Jonnie looked tired to Robert the Fox. “This is council business. The Himalayan chiefs are members of the council.”
The Russian seemed to divine what he was saying and rattled off more Russian.
“He says no,” said the coordinator. “This council is over here on this continent and that base is over there on that continent. He says there are silos of nuclear weapons aimed at this continent and have been for a thousand years or so. And he doesn’t want anything to happen to you, Jonnie sir. So he wants a force of South Americans and Alaskans—he knows there are almost no North Americans left—to take charge of that base over there on your authority. He says if the Russians have charge of this base here, they won’t fire at Russia. And if people from this continent take charge of that base there, they won’t fire on this continent. They’ve got it all worked out, Jonnie sir. It’s all here. They worked it out in Russia. If you say all right, and put a little initial here . . .”
Robert the Fox was watching Jonnie. This was the first thing he’d seen the lad take even the slightest interest in. Robert knew it would probably be all right with the council. He saw Jonnie looking at him. He nodded. Jonnie took the offered pen and wrote his initials on the paper.
The Russian seemed to almost deflate with relief. Then he rattled away at the coordinator, who presently said, “He now has a present for you.”
Ivan put down the tray and reached into his tunic pocket. He brought out a gold disk with a big red star in the center of it and two lapel tabs of ancient braid. He gave them to Jonnie, waiting for him to accept.
The coordinator said, “That is the cap ornament they found on the marshal of the Red Army who was in charge of that base and those are his lapel tabs. He wants you to know that they are yours. And you are in charge of both bases.”
Jonnie smiled slightly and the Russian promptly kissed him on both cheeks and rushed out.
Robert the Fox was holding the papers and Chrissie put the gifts in Jonnie’s buckskin pouch.
“If this had happened a thousand or so years ago,” said Robert the Fox, “maybe things would have been different.” Chrissie was shooing him to leave. Jonnie looked tired. “The council will put this through and handle it. There might be vital materials in that base.”
“You might get it cleaned up and filtered,” said Jonnie. “It might help them if gas drones come again.”
When Dr. MacKendrick came to exercise his arm and get him to walk, he told Jonnie he was improved.
Jonnie alarmed him. “Not improved enough!” said Jonnie, a bit bitterly. “I may not have been so smart after all.”
Part 16
1
Terl sat in his dark hole and was gloomy.
He was not with the other Psychlos; they would have torn him to fur fluffs. He was here in a cubicle that had once been used for cleaning supplies on the dormitories. It had been rigged with a bre
athe-gas circulator; it contained a narrow, twelve-foot-long bed; there was a little port that had been rigged to push food through—one could see the outside corridor beyond its revolving panes; and there was a two-way intercom inset below the door.
The place was strong enough: he had already tried every means of opening it and escaping. He was not chained, but every hour of the day and night there was a sentry with an assault rifle just outside.
It was really the fault of the females, both the animal females and Chirk. His hindsight was a bit faulty, but not his conviction that it was correct. Always a master of self-delusion, Terl was at his best these days.
When he compared his present lot with the beautiful dream of being wealthy and powerful on Psychlo, being bowed to by the royalty and trembled at by everyone else, he quivered with suppressed rage. These animals were denying him his due! Ten beautiful gold coffin lids lay moldering in the company cemetery on Psychlo, of that he was utterly certain. The delicious thought of slipping out there some dark night and exhuming them was second only to the thought of the wealth and power that would ensue.
He had befriended these animals. And how had they treated him? A mop closet!
But Terl was nothing if not clever. He roused himself now and began to think hard and brightly. Now was the time to be the calm, cool, masterful Terl.
He would get to Psychlo. He would get these animals and this planet destroyed, finally and forever. He would dig up those coffins. He would be bowed to and trembled at. Nothing must stand in his way!
He began to tally up the bits and scraps of leverage he had. First, of course, it went without saying that his own cleverness was his chief asset; he agreed with himself on that. Second, he was almost certain the first animal he had caught had forgotten that there was a hefty charge of explosive left buried in that cage. Third, there had been three remotes: one was still in his office, one had been seized, but the third was just inside that cage door in case he somehow got tricked or trapped in there. That third one would have enabled him to blow up the females or shut off the power to the bars, and he was certain it had not been found. The fourth piece of leverage was a pretty big one and the fifth was gigantic.