Splinter in the Mind's Eye

  "It's been confiscated, of course. You may consider it your fine for being involved in the fight."

  "We were the ones assaulted," Luke argued, for appearance's sake.

  "Are you disputing my judgment?" Grammel asked dangerously.

  "No, Captain-Supervisor!"

  "That's good. I can see that you're an intelligent young man. Pity your companion works her mouth to the exclusion of her brain." Leia glared at him, but for once had the sense not to say anything.

  "I believe we can work something out. Meanwhile, it remains that you two are here on this world illegally, in defiance of a great deal of Imperial effort to keep this installation a secret. So you will be detained until I can verify your story."

  Luke started to speak but Grammel waved him to silence. "No, don't bother with names. I'd expect you to offer me an alias anyway. We'll take retinal prints, natural portraits and other suitable information. I have contacts on Circarpous, both legal and not so.

  "If they send me back information that you two are known petty criminals on that world, and judging from your story you ought to be known, then what you've told me will be substantiated and we'll adjust relationships accordingly-and not necessarily to your detriment.

  "If it turns out that no one unearths any information on you, or information that conflicts with what you've said, then I'll have to assume that everything you've told me is pure fabrication. In that unfortunate event I'll be forced to resort to indelicate methods of obtaining the truth." Luke would have preferred any kind of smile to the empty, inhuman expression Grammel wore as he said that.

  "But there's no reason why we can't be pleasant about things until then. Sergeant!"

  "Captain-Supervisor!" the noncom acknowledged, stepping over smartly.

  "See these two escorted to the restraining area."

  "Which cell, sir?"

  "The maximum secure holding pen," Grammel replied, his face unreadable.

  The sergeant hesitated. "But, sir, that cell's already occupied. Its occupants are dangerous... they've already put three men in the infirmary."

  "No matter," Grammel insisted indifferently. "I'm sure these two can handle themselves. Besides, prisoners don't fight other prisoners. Not too often, anyway."

  "What are you talking about?" the Princess demanded to know, climbing to her feet. "What are you caging us with?"

  "You'll find out," Grammel assured her pleasantly. Several troops entered the room and boxed themselves around Luke and Leia. "Please try to keep yourselves alive until I can check on your story. I'd be distressed if it developed that you've been telling me the truth and couldn't survive the company of your cell companions long enough to be released."

  "We've been honest with you!" Luke insisted, sounding desperate.

  "Sergeant?"

  The noncom led the two prisoners to the exit. Grammel ignored Luke's entreaties to know what they were being sent to.

  When they were gone and the chamber was quiet again, the Captain-Supervisor spent several minutes gazing at the glowing fragment of crystal. Then he touched a switch behind his desk. Another door opened and a small cloaked figure entered the room for the second time.

  "That's the thing you saw, Bot?" said Grammel, gesturing at the open box sitting on the desk. A nod from the hooded shape. "You know what it is?" A negative shake this time.

  "Neither do I," Grammel confessed. "I think the youth underestimates its strangeness. I've never seen or heard of anything remotely like it. Have you?" Another sideways shake of the hooded skull.

  Grammel glanced at the closed doorway where Luke and Leia had been taken out. "Those two could be what the boy said they were. I don't know. I have the feeling his story is a little too neat, too convenient. Almost as if he were gauging his responses to what I wanted to hear. I can't decide whether he's an inefficient crook or a supernally smooth liar.

  "Something else. He sounded almost confident that he and the girl could make contact with Rebels on the Ten or Twelve. None of our agents have been able to do that."

  A husk of a sentence from the figure and Grammel nodded.

  "I know that the Rebels have ways of separating true traitors from our people, but the boy's confidence still troubles me. It seems misplaced in a petty criminal. And the girl had more spirit than her type normally displays. I'm puzzled, Bot. But I think... I think there might be something important in all this. I just don't have the facts available to glue it all together with... yet. It might mean much to us both." The figure nodded vigorously, pleased.

  Grammel reached a decision. "I'm going to have to contact higher authority. I don't like the idea of sharing anything like this, but I don't see a way around it." He jerked his head contemptuously toward the door. "In any event, we'll cut the truth out of them before anyone of importance can get here."

  Leaving the desk, he walked to the wall behind it and touched a small switch. A section of wall vanished, leaving revealed behind a blank screen of golden hue. Grammel adjusted another control. A panel awash with dials and studs slid out of the wall beneath the reflective screen. Further adjustment, and then he spoke into a protruding vo-pickup.

  "I have a deep-space communication of the First Priority for Governor Bin Essada, on the territorial administrative world of Gyndine." He glanced back at the cloaked form for reassurance, was rewarded with a nod.

  "Call is being processed," a computer voice declared flatly. Visual static appeared for a moment, then the screen cleared with gratifying speed. By Imperial distances Gyndine was not very far away.

  The portrait that appeared on the screen was of an overweight, swarthy individual whose most outstanding feature was a series of chins falling in steps to the upper part of his shirt. Curly black hair, touched with white at the sides and dyed orange in a spiral pattern on top, crowned the face like seaweed on some water-worn boulder. Dark eyes squinted perpetually, their pink pupils ever sensitive to light. "I have work to do," Governor Essada grunted in a porcine contralto. "Who calls and what for?"

  With that smug, powerful visage looming over him on the screen, much of Grammel's customary assurance melted away. His own words came out sounding shaky and subservient.

  "It is only I, Governor, a humble servant of the Emperor, Captain-Supervisor Grammel."

  "I don't know any Captain-Supervisor Grammel," the voice said.

  "I am in charge of the secret mining colony on Cicarpous V, sir," explained Grammel hopefully.

  Essada paused momentarily, looked up from the tape he was inspecting. "I am familiar with the Imperial operations in that system," he replied guardedly. "What business do you have that requires First Priority with me?" The huge bulk leaned forward. "It had better be important, Captain-Supervisor Grammel. I know you now."

  "Yes, sir." Grammel bowed his head repeatedly to the screen. "It's a matter involving two strangers who somehow set down here secretly. Two strangers and a peculiar bit of crystal they had in their possession. The people aren't important, but as you, sir, are widely famed as an expert on unusual radiations, I thought perhaps-"

  "Don't waste my time with flattery, Grammel," Essada warned. "Since the Emperor dissolved the Senate, we regional governors have been overwhelmed with work."

  "I understand, sir," Grammel said hastily, rushing to gather up the tiny box containing the stone. He held it so that the vis-pickup in the room could see it. "Here it is."

  Essada peered at it. "Strange... I've never seen anything like that, Grammel. The radiation is generated from within?"

  "Yes, sir, I'm certain."

  "I'm not," the Governor replied, "but I admit it looks to be so. Tell me more about the people who had it."

  Grammel shrugged. "They're nothing, probably just a couple of petty thieves who stole it, sir."

  "A couple of petty thieves penetrated and landed in secret on Circarpous V?" said the Governor disbelievingly.

  "I think so, sir. A boy and a young woman..."

  "Young woman," Essada repeated. "We've heard rumors fro
m Circarpous IV, about an important meeting that the underground leaders there were preparing for... a young woman, you say? Would she be dark-haired, fiery-tempered, perhaps even a touch sarcastic?"

  "The very person, sir," a startled Grammel stammered.

  "You have identified them?"

  "No, sir. We've only just imprisoned them. They've been jailed together with-"

  "Chaos take your details, Grammel!" Essada shouted. "Give me visual representation of both of these people."

  "That is easily done," a relieved Grammel replied. He took the plastic recorder rod from the desk, held it up uncertainly before the screen. "This has not yet been transferred, sir. Do you think you can make out the rod imagery?"

  "I can make out many things, Grammel, down to the shallow depths of your own soul. Place it close to your vis-pickup."

  The administrator adjusted the requisite switch and placed the long glassy tube close to the screen panel. He touched the retrieval stud and two-dimensional portraits appeared within the rod's substance. A pause, and then he shifted the rod to show full-length views of both subjects.

  "It may be her, by the Force, it just may be," Governor Essada muttered, now excited. "The youth I don't know, but he may also be important. I am pleased."

  "Important, sir? You know of them?"

  "I hope to have part credit for their capture and eventual execution-hers, at least." Essada looked sharply at the bewildered officer. "They must not be harmed or injured until proper authority arrives for them, Grammel."

  "It shall be as you say, sir," a bemused Captain-Supervisor conceded. "But I don't understand. Who are they, and how do they come to the notice of someone such as-"

  "I require only service from you, Grammel. Not questions."

  "Yes, sir," the administrator barked stiffly.

  Essada took a lighter tack. "You did well to contact me directly, though not for the reasons you thought. Once those two are in Imperial hands, you will become Colonel-Supervisor Grammel."

  "Governor!" Grammel lost his poise completely. "Sir, you are too generous. I don't know what to say...."

  "Say nothing," Essada suggested. "It makes you more tolerable. Keep them alive, Grammel. Whether you go to hell or glory is dependent on how well you carry out these orders. Beyond keeping them alive and healthy you have my permission to restrain them as you please."

  "Yes, sir. Sir, may I..."

  But Governor Essada had already all but forgotten Grammel.

  "One particular party should find this information of particular notice. It will be well for me, yes." Abruptly, he noticed that communications were still open.

  "Alive, Grammel. Remember that."

  "But, sir, can't you tell...?"

  The screen went blank.

  The Captain-Supervisor stood motionless before the dark rectangle for several long, thoughtful moments. Then he repositioned screen and control panel, turned to the cloaked figure which was crawling out from behind the concealing bulk of a free-formed chair across the room.

  "We appear to have stumbled onto something far more important than either of us dreamed, Bot. 'Colonel-Supervisor'!" He gazed down at the crystal in his hand, all thoughts of its possible lethal nature shunted aside by the vision of the glittering future ahead of him. "We must take care."

  The cloaked figure nodded energetically....

  VI

  "TAKE it easy," Luke complained, shrugging his arm free of the trooper who was escorting them down the long, narrow stone hallway. As they paced, Luke took the opportunity to study the damp, dripping walls. Some of them showed dark moss. Clearly, the omnipresent moisture of Mimban penetrated the old walls here.

  "You'd think the Imperial government could have invested some credit in modern quarters," he murmured.

  "Why," the subofficer ahead of them wanted to know, "when the primitives of this world left us such useful structures?"

  "A temple, a place of worship, and it's been turned into offices and a prison," the Princess declared angrily.

  "The Empire does what is necessary," the subofficer observed in a phlegmatic manner which would have gratified his superiors. "I am told this mining is an expensive venture. The Empire is smart enough to save where it is able," he concluded with pride.

  "That probably extends to your pay and retirement benefits," the Princess ventured maliciously.

  "That's enough talk from the prisoners," the disgruntled subofficer decided aloud, unhappy with the turn the conversation had taken. They rounded a sharp corner. A network of intersecting diagonal bars formed an unbreakable mesh at the end of the corridor.

  "Here's your new home," the subofficer informed them. "Inside you can muse about what the Empire has in store for your future." As the subofficer passed a palm over the wall on his immediate right, an unbarred ellipsoid appeared in the center of the metal grill.

  "Move," the trooper next to Luke ordered, prodding him with his rifle.

  "I was told we were going to have company," Luke ventured, walking toward the empty space with great reluctance. This provoked considerable merriment among the assembled troopers.

  "You'll find it soon enough," the subofficer chuckled, "or it'll find you."

  Once both prisoners stood inside the cell, the sub-officer passed his hand over the photoplate again and the dematerialized bars reappeared with a solid clank.

  "Company, he says," one of the retreating troopers echoed, as they walked back up the corridor. They continued laughing among themselves.

  "For some reason I'm not amused," Luke muttered. Each of the angled bars was as big around as his forearm. He flicked one with a nail and it rang like a bell. "Solid, not tubular," he announced. "This cell was designed to hold more than ordinary people. I wonder what-"

  The Princess gasped, pointed to a far corner and began backing toward the nearest wall. Two massive, hairy mounds lay clustered near the back of the cell, under the single window. The fur moved up and down, indicating it was surrounding something alive.

  "Easy... easy," Luke instructed, backing close to her and putting both hands on her shoulders. She leaned into him. "We don't know who they are yet."

  "We don't know what they are," the Princess whispered fearfully. "I think they're waking up."

  One of the huge shapes stood, stretched, let out a grunt like a volcano clearing its throat. It turned and caught sight of them.

  Luke's eyes bugged. He started toward the figure. The Princess put out a hand to hold him back, but he shook it off.

  "Are you out of your mind, Luke? They'll tear you to pieces."

  He continued walking slowly toward the waiting figure. It stood little taller than he did, but was built much more massively. Its hair-covered arms reached to the cell floor, the hands dragging on the stone. A long snout protruded from the center of the face, obscuring any mouth. Two huge black eyes stared expectantly at him.

  "Luke, don't do this... come back here."

  A querulous growl-rumble sounding like an angry underground spring came from the figure Luke was nearing. The Princess became quiet, pressed worriedly back against the cold stone wall as she slid toward the farthest corner.

  Luke eyed the massive creature warily. They had to make friends fast, or he and Leia wouldn't have to worry about getting off Mimban except in fragments. He reached out, touched an arm in a certain way. His eyes never left the jet-black orbs staring into his own.

  With startling speed, the creature took a backward hop, chittered something. It was several times Luke's weight. Dun light from the sealed illuminators in the cell ceiling shone on cable-like shoulder muscles above those double-length arms.

  A pair of plate-sized hands reached out for Luke. He responded by uttering something in low tones. Shaking its head, its snout swinging, the creature hesitated, then rumbled again. Luke spoke louder gibberish at it.

  Reaching out, the beast grabbed Luke with both hands and lifted him off the ground over its head, as if preparing to dash him against the stone floor. The Princess scr
eamed. The creature brought Luke close to its body, closer... and planted a wet kiss on each of Luke's cheeks before setting him gently back on the floor.

  The Princess stared in disbelief at Luke's affectionate assailant. "Why didn't it tear your head off. You..." she gazed at Luke admiringly, "you talked to it."

  "Yes," Luke admitted modestly. "I used to study a lot about certain worlds, back on my uncle's farm on Tatooine. It was my only escape, and educational as well. This," and he indicated the creature resting a massive long arm on his head and shaking him in a friendly fashion, "is a Yuzzem."

  "I've heard of them, but this is the first time I've seen one."

  "They're temperamental," Luke told her, "so I thought it would be better to try and make the first greeting ourselves, using what little language I learned." He jabbered at the creature, which chittered back. "It might've killed me somewhere else, but all prisoners are allies, it seems."

  The Yuzzem turned, staggered backward and bumped into the wall. It leaned over and began shaking its still somnolent companion. The second Yuzzem rolled over awake and swung angrily at the first. The massive hand missed, instead connecting with the wall hard enough to leave an impression in the rock. Rolling to a sitting position, it started chittering to its waker, holding its head with one hand.

  "Why," Leia exclaimed as the realization struck her, "they're both drunk!" The second Yuzzem finally managed to get to its feet. It growled at her. "No offense," she quickly added.

  "The one I talked to is called, as near as I can translate it, Hin. That's Kee leaning against the wall, wishing to be someplace else." He jabbered at Hin, listened to the reply.

  "I think he said that they've been working for the Imperial government's operation here, got fed up about a week ago and started breaking things. They've been locked in here ever since."

  "I didn't know the Imperials were hiring non-humans."

  "Apparently these two didn't have any choice," Luke explained, listening to Hin. "They don't like the Imperials any more than we do. I've been trying to convince them that all humans aren't like the Imperials. I'm pretty sure I'm succeeding."