Hugo awards the short st.., p.81
Hugo Awards: The Short Stories (Volume 1), page 81
"I'm not a holy man," I said, "just a second-rate poet with a bad case of hubris."
I lit my last cigarette.
Finally, "All right, what prophecy?"
"The Promise of Locar," she replied, as though the explaining were unnecessary, "that a holy man would come from the Heavens to save us in our last hours, if all the dances of Locar were completed. He would defeat the Fist of Malann and bring us life."
"How?"
"As with Braxa, and as the example in the Temple."
"Example?"
"You read us his words, as great as Locar's. You read to us how there is `nothing new under the sun.' And you mocked his words as you read them--showing us a new thing.
"There has never been a flower on Mars," she said, "but we will learn to grow them.
"You are the Sacred Scoffer," she finished.
"He-Who-Must-Mock-in-the-Temple--you go shod on holy ground."
"But you voted `no,'" I said.
"I voted not to carry out our original plan, and to let Braxa's child live instead."
"Oh." The cigarette fell from my fingers. How close it had been!
How little I had known!
"And Braxa?"
"She was chosen half a Process ago to do the dances--to wait for you."
"But she said that Ontro would stop me."
M'Cwyie stood there for a long time.
"She had never believed the prophecy herself. Things are not well with her now. She ran away, fearing it was true. When you completed it, and we voted, she knew."
"Then she does not love me? Never did?"
"I am sorry, Gallinger. It was the one part of her duty she never managed."
"Duty," I said flatly....Dutydutyduty! Tra-la!
"She has said good-bye, she does wish to see you again.
"...and we will never forget your teachings," she added.
"Don't," I said automatically, suddenly knowing the great paradox which lies at the heart of all miracles. I did not believe a word of my own gospel, never had.
I stood, like a drunken man, and muttered "M'narra."
I went outside, into my last day on Mars.
I have conquered thee, Malann--and the victory is thine! Rest easy on thy starry bed. God damned!
I left the jeepster there and walked back to the Aspic, leaving the burden of life so many footsteps behind me. I went to my cabin, locked the door, and took forty-four sleeping pills.
But when I awakened I was in the dispensary, and alive.
I felt the throb of engines as I slowly stood up and somehow made it to the port.
Blurred Mars hung like a swollen belly above me, until it dissolved, brimmed over, and streamed down my face.
NO TRUCE WITH KINGS
Poul Anderson
“Charlie! Give's a song!”
“Yeah, Charlie!”
The whole mess was drunk, and the junior officers at the far end of the table were only somewhat noisier than.their seniors near the colonel. Rugs and hangings could not much muffle the racket, shouts, stamping boots, thump of fists on oak and clash of cups raised aloft, that rang from wall to stony wall. High up among shadows that hid the rafters they hung from, the regimental banners stirred in a draft, as if to join the chaos. Below, the light of bracketed lanterns and bellowing fireplace winked on trophies and weapons.
Autumn comes early on Echo Summit, and it was storming outside, wind-hoot past the watchtowers and rain-rush in the courtyards, an undertone that walked through the buildings and down all corridors, as if the story were true that the unit's dead came out of the cemetery each September Nineteenth night and tried to join the celebration but had forgotten how. No one let it bother him, here or in the enlisted barracks, except maybe the hex major. The Third Division, the Catamounts, was known as the most riotous gang in the Army of the Pacific States of America, and of its regiments the Rolling Stones who held Fort Nakamura were the wildest.
"Go on, boy! Lead off. You've got the closest thing to a voice in the whole goddamn Sierra," Colonel Mackenzie called. He loosened the collar of his black dress tunic and lounged back, legs asprawl, pipe in one hand and beaker of whisky in the other: a thickset man with blue wrinkle-meshed eyes in a battered face, his cropped hair turned gray but his mustache still arrogantly red.
“Charlie is my darlin', my darlin', my darlin',” sang Captain Hulse. He stopped as the noise abated a little. Young Lieutenant Amadeo got up, grinned, and launched into one they well knew.
“I am a Catamountain, I guard a border pass.
And every time I venture out, the cold will freeze m—”
“Colonel, sir. Begging your pardon.”
Mackenzie twisted around and looked into the face of Sergeant Irwin. The man's expression shocked him. “Yes?”
“I am a bloody hero, a decorated vet:
The order of the Purple Shaft, with pineapple clusters yet!”
“Message just come in, sir. Major Speyer asks to see you right away.”
Speyer, who didn't like being drunk, had volunteered for duty tonight; otherwise men drew lots for it on a holiday. Remembering the last word from San Francisco, Mackenzie grew chill.
The mess bawled forth the chorus, not noticing when the colonel knocked out his pipe and rose.
“The guns go boom! Hey, tiddley boom!
The rockets vroom, the arrows zoom.
From slug to slug is damn small room.
Get me out of here and back to the good old womb!
(Hey, doodle dee day!)”
All right-thinking Catamounts maintained that they could operate better with the booze sloshing up to their eardrums than any other outfit cold sober. Mackenzie ignored the tingle in his veins; forgot it. He walked a straight line to the door, automatically taking his sidearm off the rack as he passed by. The song pursued him into the hall.
“For maggots in the rations, we hardly ever lack.
You bite into a sandwich and the sandwich bites right back.
The coffee is the finest grade of Sacramento mud.
The ketchup's good in combat, though, for simulating blood.
(Cho-orus!)
The drums go bump! Ah-tumpty-tumpt!
The bugles make like Gabriel's trump—”
Lanterns were far apart in the passage. Portraits of former commanders watched the colonel and the sergeant from eyes that were hidden in grotesque darknesses. Footfalls clattered too loudly here.
“I've got an arrow tn my rump.
Right about and rearward, heroes, on the jump!
(Hey, doodle dee day!)”
Mackenzie went between it pair of fieldpieces flanking a stairway—they had been captured at Rock Springs during the Wyoming War, a generation ago—and upward. There was more distance between places in this keep than his legs liked at their present age. But it was old, had been added to decade by decade; and it needed to be massive, chiseled and mortared from Sierra granite, for it guarded a key to the nation. More than one army had broken against its revetments, before the Nevada, marches were pacified, and more young men Mackenzie wished to think about bad gone from this base to die among angry strangers.
But she's never been attacked from the west. God, or whatever are, you can spare her that, can't you?
The command office was lonesome at this hour. The room where Sergeant Irwin had his desk lay so silent: no clerks pushing pens, no messengers going in or out, no wives making a splash of color with their dresses as they waited to see the colonel about some problem down in the Village. When he opened the door to the inner room, though, Mackenzie heard the wind shriek around the angle of the wall. Rain slashed at the black windowpane and ran down in streams which the lanterns turned molten.
“Here the colonel is, sir,” Irwin said in an uneven voice. He gulped and closed the door behind Mackenzie.
Speyer stood by the commander's desk. It was a beat-up old object with little upon it: an inkwell, a letter basket, an interphone, a photograph of Nora, faded in these dozen years since her death. The major was a tall and gaunt man, hooknosed, going bald on top. His uniform always looked unpressed, somehow. But he had the sharpest brain in the Cats, Mackenzie thought; and Christ, how could any man read as many books as Phil did! Officially he was the adjutant, in practice the chief adviser.
"Well?" Mackenzie said. The alcohol did not seem to numb him, rather make him too acutely aware of things: how the lanterns smelled hot (when would they get a big enough generator to run electric lights?), and the floor was hard under his feet, and a crack went through the plaster of the north wall, and the stove wasn't driving out much of the chill. He forced bravado, stuck thumbs in belt and rocked back on his heels. "Well, Phil, what's wrong now?"
“Wire from Frisco,” Speyer said. He had been folding and unfolding a piece of paper, which he handed over. “Huh? Why not a radio call?”
“Telegram's less likely to be intercepted. This one's in code, at that. Irwin decoded it for me.”
“What the hell kind of nonsense is this?”
“Have a look, Jimbo, and you'll find out. It's for you, anyway. Direct from GHQ.”
Mackenzie focused on Irwin's scrawl. The usual formalities of an order; then:
You are hereby notified that the Pacific States Senate has passed a bill of impeachment against Owen Brodsky, formerly Judge of the Pacific States of America, and deprived him of office. As of 2000 hours this date, former Vice Humphrey Fallon is Judge of the PSA in accordance with the Law of Succession. The existence of dissident elements constituting a public danger has made it necessary for Judge Fallon to put the entire nation under martial law, effective at 2100 hours this date. You are therefore issued the following instructions:
1. The above intelligence is to be held strictly confidential until an official proclamation is made. No person who has received knowledge in the course of transmitting this message shall divulge same to any other person whatsoever. Violators of this section and anyone thereby receiving information shall be placed immediately in solitary confinement to await court-martial.
2. You will sequestrate all arms and ammunition except for ten percent of available stock, and keep same under heavy guard.
3. You will keep all men in the Fort Nakamura area until you are relieved. Your relief is Colonel Simon Hollis, who will start from San Francisco tomorrow morning with one battalion. They are expected to arrive in Fort Nakamura in five days, at which time you will surrender your command to him. Colonel Hollis will designate those officers and enlisted men who are to be replaced by members of his battalion, which will be integrated into the regiment. You will lead the men replaced back to San Francisco and report to Brigadier General Mendoza at New Fort Baker. To avoid provocations, these men will be disarmed except for officers' sidearms.
4. For your private information, Captain Thomas Danielis has been appointed senior aide to Colonel Hollis.
5. You are again reminded that the Pacific States of America are under martial law because of a national emergency. Complete loyalty to the legal government is required. Any mutinous talk must be severely punished. Anyone giving aid or comfort to the Brodsky faction is guilty of treason and will be dealt with accordingly.
Gerald O'Donnell, Gen. APSA, CINC
Thunder went off in the mountains like artillery. It was a while before Mackenzie stirred, and then merely to lay the paper on his desk. He could only summon feeling slowly, up into a hollowness that filled his skin.
“They dared,” Speyer said without tone. “They really did.”
“Huh?” Mackenzie swiveled eyes around to the major's face. Speyer didn't meet that stare. He was concentrating his own gaze on his hands, which were now rolling a cigarette. So the words jerked from him, harsh and quick:
“I can guess what happened. The warhawks have been hollering for impeachment ever since Brodsky compromised the border dispute with West Canada. And Fallon, yeah, he's got ambitions of his own. But his partisans are a minority an he knows it. Electing him Vice helped soothe the warhawks some, but he'd never make Judge the regular way,.because Brodsky isn't going to die of old age before Fallon does, and anyhow more than fifty percent of the Senate are sober, satisfied bossmen who don't agree that the PSA has a divine mandate to reunify the continent. I don't see how an impeachment could get through an honestly convened Senate. More likely they'd vote out Fallon.”
“But a Senate had been called,” Mackenzie said. The words sounded to him like someone else talking. “The newscasts told us.”
“Sure. Called for yesterday 'to debate ratification of the treaty with West Canada.' But the bossmen are scattered up and down the country, each at his own Station. They have to get to San Francisco. A couple of arranged delays—hell, if a bridge just happened to be blown on the Boise railroad, a round dozen of Brodsky's staunchest supporters wouldn't arrive on time—so the Senate has a quorum, all right, but every one of Fallon's supporters are there, and so many of the rest are missing that the warhawks have a clear majority. Then they meet on a holiday, when no cityman is paying attention. Presto, impeachment and a new Judge!” Speyer finished his cigarette and stuck it between his lips while he fumbled for a match. A muscle twitched in his jaw.
“You sure?” Mackenzie mumbled. He thought dimly that this moment was like one time he'd visited Puget City and was invited for a sail on the Guardiaii's yacht, and a fog had set in. Everything was cold and blind, with nothing you could catch in your hands.
“Of course I'm not sure!” Speyer snarled. “Nobody will be sure till it's too late.” The matchbox shook in his grasp.
“They, uh, they got a new Cinc too, I noticed.”
“Uh-huh. They'd want to replace everybody they cant trust, as possible, and De Barros was a Brodsky appointee.” The match flared with a hellish scrit. Speyer inhaled till his cheeks collapsed. “You and me included, naturally. The regiment reduced to minimum armament so that nobody will get ideas about resistance when the new colonel arrives, You'll note he's coming with a battalion at his heels just the same, just in case. Otherwise he could take a plane and be here tomorrow.”
"Why not a train?" Mackenzie caught a whiff of smoke and felt for his pipe. The bowl was hot in his tunic pocket.
“Probably all rolling stock has to head north. Get troops among the bossmen there to forestall a revolt. The valleys are safe enough, peaceful ranchers and Esper colonies. None of them'll pot-shot Fallonite soldiers marching to garrison Echo and Donner outposts.” A dreadful scorn weighted Speyer's words.
“What are we going to do?”
“I assume Fallen's take-over followed legal forms; that there was a quorum,” Speyer said, “Nobody will ever agree whether it was really Constitutional ... I've been reading this damned message over and over since Irwin decoded it. There's a lot between the lines. I think Brodsky's at large, for instance. If he were under arrest this would've said as much, and there'd have been less worry about rebellion. Maybe some of his household troops smuggled him away in time. He'll be.. hunted like a jackrabbit, of course.”
Mackenzie took out his pipe but forgot he had done so, “Tom's coming with our replacements,” he said thinly.
“Yeah. Your son-in-law. That was a smart touch, wasnt it? A kind of hostage for your good behavior, but also a back-hand promise that you and yours won't suffer if you report in as ordered. Tom's a good kid. He'll stand by his own.”
“This is his regiment too,” Mackenzie said. He squared his shoulders. “He wanted to fight West Canada, sure. Young and ... and a lot of Pacificans did get killed in the Idaho Panhandle during the skirmishes. Women and kids among 'em.”
“Well,” Speyer said, “you're the colonel, Jimbo. What should we do?”
“Oh, Jesus, I don't know. I'm nothing but a soldier.” The pipestem broke in Mackenzie's fingers. “But we're not some bossman's personal militia here. We swore to support the Constitution.”
“I can't see where Brodsky's yielding some of our claims in Idaho is grounds for impeachment. I think he was right.”
“Well—”
“A coup d' état by any other name would stink as bad. You may not be much of a student of current events, Jimbo, but i know as well as I do what Fallon's Judgeship will mean. War with West Canada is almost the least of it. Fallon also stands for a strong central government. He'll find ways to down the old bossman families. A lot of their heads and scions will die in the front lines; that stunt goes back to David and Uriah. Others will be accused of collusion with the Brodsky people—not altogether falsely—and impoverished by fines. Esper communities will get nice big land grants, so their economic competition can bankrupt still other estates. Later wars will keep bossmen away for years at a time, unable to supervise their own affairs, which will therefore go to the devil. And thus we march toward the glorious goal, of Reunification"
“If Esper Central favors him, what can we do? I've heard enough about psi blasts. I can't ask my men to face them.”
“You could ask your men to face the Hellbomb itself, Jimbo, and they would. A Mackenzie has commanded the Rolling Stones for over fifty years.”
“Yes. I thought Tom, someday—”
“We've watched this brewing for a long time. Remember the talk we had about it last week?”
“Uh-huh.”
“I might also remind you that the Constitution was written explicitly 'to confirm the separate regions in their ancient liberties.' ”
“Let me alone!” Mackenzie shouted. “I don't know what's right or wrong, I tell you! Let me alone!”
Speyer fell silent, watching him through a screen of foul smoke. Mackenzie walked back and forth a while, boots slamming the floor like drumbeats. Finally he threw the broken pipe across the room so it shattered.
“Okay.” He must ram eachjword past the tension in his throat. “Irwin's a good man who can keep his lip buttoned. Send him out to cut the telegraph line a few miles downhill. Make it look as if the storm did it. The wire breaks often enough, heaven knows. Officially, then, we never got GHQ's message. That gives us a few days to contact Sierra Command HQ. I won't go against General Cruikshank ... but I'm pretty sure which way he'll go if he sees a chance. Tomorrow prepare for action. It'll be no trick to throw back Hollis' battalion, and they'll need a while to bring some real strength against us. Before then the first snow should be along and we'll be shut off for the winter. Only we can use skis snowshoes, ourselves, to keep in touch with the other units and organize something. By spring—we'll see what happens.”
