Talents, Incorporated Part 12

He said over the s.h.i.+p's speakers, "Everything going well so far. Prize crew, take the cargo-s.h.i.+p. Keep the crew aboard. Then report."

Ten men poured out of the grounded light cruiser's starboard port and trotted on the double toward the other s.h.i.+p aground. The weapons on Bors's s.h.i.+p did not bear upon it.

The sun shone. Clouds drifted tranquilly across the sky. Ma.s.ses of smoke from the demolition-missiles that had smashed the guard-s.h.i.+p rose, curled and very slowly dissipated. Ten men entered the bulbous cargo-s.h.i.+p.

Up to now the entire affair had consumed not more than five minutes, from the appearance of a blip on a s.p.a.ceport radar screen, to the beginning of a full-volume broadcast. Bors turned on the receiver and listened to the harsh voice--especially chosen from among the crew--which now came out of every operating broadcast receiver on the planet.

"_Notice to the people of Tralee! There is aground on Tralee a s.h.i.+p with no home planet nor any loyalty except to its hatred of Mekin. We were part of the fleet of Kandar until that fleet was destroyed. Now we fight Mekin alone! We are pirates. We are outcasts. But we still have arms to defend ourselves with! We demand...._"

A voice said curtly in Bors's ear, "Cargo-s.h.i.+p secured, sir."

"Take off on rockets and maneuver as ordered," said Bors. "Then rendezvous as arranged."

He returned his attention to the broadcast. It was a deliberately savage, painstakingly desperate, carefully terrifying message to the people of Tralee. It demanded supplies and arms on threat of destroying the city around it. A single one of its combat-missiles, as a matter of fact, could have done a good job of destruction on this metropolis.

The broadcast would be a shattering experience to men who had reconciled themselves to subjugation by the rulers of Mekin. The planet Tralee was now governed for the benefit of Mekin by the kind of men who would do such work. They knew that they could stay in office only so long as Mekin upheld them. To hear their protectors denounced if only by a single voice....

There was a monstrous roaring outside. The cargo-s.h.i.+p took off for the skies. It was a thousand feet high before the weapons on the _Isis_ stirred. It seemed to those below that the pirate crew was taken unawares by the cargo-s.h.i.+p's escape. That was part of Bors's plan.

A weapon of the grounded _Isis_ roared. A missile hurtled after the fugitive, and missed. It went on past its apparent target and did not even detonate at nearest proximity, as it should have done. It vanished, and the cargo-s.h.i.+p continued to rise in seemingly panicky fas.h.i.+on. It slanted from its headlong lift, and curved away and darted for emptiness at its maximum acceleration. A second missile from the fighting-s.h.i.+p missed. The cargo-s.h.i.+p dwindled, and dwindled, and now the _Isis_ appeared to take deliberate measurements of the distance and acceleration of its target. It might be a.s.sumed that its radars needed to be readjusted from the long-range-finding required in s.p.a.ce, to the shorter-range measurements called for now.

Something plunged after the fleeing cargo-boat, by now merely a pin-point in the blue. The rising object moved so swiftly that it was invisible. Then it detonated, and the fumes of the explosion blotted out the fugitive. When they cleared, the sky was empty.

There had now been a lapse of less than ten minutes from the first sighting of the _Isis_ screaming toward the s.p.a.ceport. The guard-s.h.i.+p had been destroyed and the cargo-s.h.i.+p which seemed to flee had apparently been destroyed. When someone had leisure to think, it would appear that the cargo-boat's crew had overcome the armed party which entered it and then taken the foolish course of flight.

Bors waited, listening absently. A voice:

"_All clear on board the prize, sir. The cargo seems to be mostly foodstuffs, sir. Proceeding to rendezvous as ordered. Off._"

Bors nodded automatically and resumed listening to the broadcast.

Matters were going well. Everything had gone through with the precision of clockwork, which meant simply that Bors had planned in detail something that had never been antic.i.p.ated and so had not been counter-planned. Before anyone on Tralee realized that anything had happened, everything had happened--the _Isis_ aground, the guard-s.h.i.+p demolished, the grid taken over, and a fleeing cargo-s.h.i.+p apparently destroyed in the upper atmosphere. And a harsh voice now rasped out of loudspeakers everywhere, uttering threats, cursing Mekin--few could believe their ears--and rousing hopes which Bors knew regretfully were bound to be disappointed.

The rasping broadcast cut off in the middle of a syllable. Somebody had come to believe that he really heard what he thought he heard. Now there would be reaction. At the sunrise-line on Tralee only a handful of people were awake. They were dumbfounded. Where people breakfasted, the intentionally savage voice made food seem unimportant. Where it was midday, waves of violent emotion swept over the land.

"Call the defense forces," Bors commanded the grid office, by transmitter. "They'll be Mekinese--Mekinese-officered, anyhow. We don't want them to get ideas of attacking us, so identify us as the pirate s.h.i.+p _Isis_ and order all police and garrison troops to stay exactly where they are. Say we've got all our fusion-bombs armed to go off in case of an artillery-fire hit."

This was the most valid of all possible threats against the most probable form of attack. Fusion-bombs could be used against enemies in s.p.a.ce, or for the annihilation of a population, but they could not be used in police operations against a subject people. To coerce people one must avoid destroying them. So while a s.h.i.+p the size of the _Isis_ could--and did--carry enough confined h.e.l.lfire in its missile warheads to destroy an area hundreds of miles across, the occupation troops of Mekin could not use such weapons. They needed blast-rifles for minor threats and artillery for selective destruction. In any case no sane man would try to destroy the _Isis_ aground after an announcement that its bombs were armed, and that they were fused to explode.

"Now repeat the demand for stores," ordered Bors. "We might as well stock up. Speed is essential. We can't use stores they've time to b.o.o.by-trap or poison. Give them twenty minutes to start the stuff arriving. Demand fuel, extra rocket-fuel especially. Remind them about our bombs."

He waited. Speakers beside him could inform him of any action anywhere outside or inside the s.h.i.+p. The landing-party in the s.p.a.ceport building reported as it went through the s.p.a.ceport records, picking up such information concerning Mekinese commercial regulations, identification-calls and antic.i.p.ated s.h.i.+p-movements as might prove useful elsewhere. The rasping voice began to broadcast again. It went on for fifteen seconds and cut off.

"Tell the government broadcasting system that if they stop relaying our broadcast," said Bors, "we'll heave a bomb into the police barracks and the supply-depots."

He heard the threat issued and very soon thereafter an agitated voice announced to the people of Tralee that a pirate s.h.i.+p was in possession of the planet's s.p.a.ceport and that it insisted upon broadcasting to the planet's people. It was considered unwise to refuse. Therefore the broadcast would continue, but of course citizens could turn off their sets.

There came a roar of anger and the harsh-voiced broadcaster returned to the air. His taped broadcast had run out. Now he bellowed such subversive profanity directed at the officials of Tralee-under-Mekin that Bors smiled sourly. It was not good for Mekinese prestige to have a subject people know that one s.h.i.+p could defy the empire, even for minutes. It was still less desirable to have the members of the puppet government described as dogs of particularly described breeds, of particularly described characteristics, and particular lack of legitimacy. Bors had chosen for his broadcast a man of vivid imagination and large vocabulary. He did not want the _Isis_ to appear under discipline, lest it seem to act under orders. He wanted to create the impression of men turned pirates because everything they lived for had been destroyed, and who now were running amok among the planets Mekin had subjugated.

The broadcast was not incitement to revolt, because Bors's s.h.i.+p was posing as the only survivor of a planet's fleet. But it conveyed such contempt and derision and hatred of all things Mekinese that for months to come men would whisper jokes based on what an _Isis_ crewman had said on Tralee's air. The respect the planet's officials craved would drop below its former low level.

Time pa.s.sed. Bors, of course, could not send a landing-party anywhere, lest it be sniped. He had actually accomplished the purpose for which he'd landed, the getting of a s.h.i.+pload of food out to s.p.a.ce, the announcement of the destruction of Kandar's fleet and the spreading of contempt and derision for Mekin in Tralee. Now he had to keep anyone from suspecting the importance of the cargo-s.h.i.+p. The demand for stores was a cover-up for things already done. But that cover-up had to be completed.

Vehicles appeared at the edge of the landing-grid. Figures advanced individually, waving white flags. Bors sent men out with small arms to get their messages. These were the supplies he'd demanded. Food.

Rocket-fuel. More food.

The vehicles trundled into the open and stopped. Men from the _Isis_ waved away the drivers and took over the trucks. They brought most of them to the s.h.i.+p's side. A petty-officer came into the control room and saluted.

"Sir," he said briskly. "One of the drivers told me his load of grub had time-bombs in it. The secret police use time-bombs and b.o.o.by-traps here, sir, to keep the people terrified. He says the bombs will go off after we're out in s.p.a.ce, sir."

"What did you do?" asked Bors.

"I pretended the truck stalled and I couldn't start it. Two other drivers tipped off our men. We left those trucks and some others out on the field, so the drivers wouldn't be suspected of alerting us."

"Good work," said Bors. "Better put detectors on all parcels from all trucks before bringing them aboard."

"b.o.o.by-traps can be made very tricky indeed, but when they are used by secret police...." Bors allowed himself to rage for a moment only, at the idea of that kind of terrorism practiced by a government on its supposed citizens. It would be intended to enforce the totalitarian idea that what is not commanded for the ordinary citizen to do is forbidden to him. But secret-police b.o.o.by-traps and time-bombs would be standardized. He hadn't allowed time for complex, detection-proof devices to be made. Detectors would pick out any ordinary trickery.

The harsh-voiced broadcaster continued to harangue the population of Tralee, of which the least of his words was high treason. They enjoyed the broadcast very much.

Presently Bors began to fidget. The _Isis_ had been aground for thirty-five minutes. He had sat in the control room that whole time, supervising a smoothly-running operation. He had had to supervise it.

n.o.body else could have planned and carried it out. But it was not heroic. He had the line officer's inherent scorn for administrative officers, who are necessary but not glamorous or admired. He was stuck with just that kind of duty now. But he fretted. The local officials were given time to get over their panic. They ought to be planning some counter-measure by this time.

He called the s.p.a.ceport office.

"There should be a map of the city somewhere about," he said crisply.

"Send it along special. Bring a communicator call-book. If you find any news-reports, new or old, we want them."

"_Yes, sir_," said a brisk voice. "_The broadcast's right, sir?_"

"It is," said Bors. "You're mining the grid set-up. We'll blow it before we leave. There's no point in letting Mekin set down transports loaded with troops to punish innocent people because they heard the Mekinese accurately described. Make 'em land on rockets and there won't be so many landing."

"_Yes, sir. Will do, sir._"

A click. Bors heard heavy materials being loaded aboard. Each object was being examined by a detector. The loading process stopped. Bors pressed a b.u.t.ton.

"What happened?" he demanded.

"_Looks like a b.o.o.by-trapped box, sir_," said a voice. "_Among the supplies, sir._"

"Take it off a hundred yards and riddle it," ordered Bors. "This may settle a problem for us."

"_Yes, sir._"

Bors fidgeted again. A messenger from the grid-control building arrived.

He had a map of the capital city of Tralee.

There was an explosion. A violent one. Bors looked out a port and saw where the suspected parcel had been set up as a target a hundred yards from the s.h.i.+p. It had been riddled with blast-rifle bolts, and had exploded. It might not have destroyed the _Isis_ if it had exploded in s.p.a.ce, but it would not have done it any good.

Bors pushed the b.u.t.ton for the loading-port compartment.