A large anthology of sci.., p.175
A Large Anthology of Science Fiction, page 175
“I still don’t really believe it,” Blake said. “The only thing I am firmly convinced of is my headache.”
“IT’S real enough and logical enough. Logical as hell. And hell on Earth if they ever get there. Evolution is always trying to produce an animal that can survive anywhere, conquer all enemies, the fittest of, the surviving fit. All life is based on one thing: protoplasm. Basically, it’s the same in every creature, every living thing, plant and animal, amoeba and man. It is just modified slightly, hooked together in slightly different ways. The thushol are built of protoplasm—but infinitely more adaptable protoplasm. They can do something about it, make it take the form of a bone cell and be part of a thigh bone, or be a nerve cell in a brain. From some of that ten-second-college-course Loshthu poured into me, I gather that at first the thushol were good imitations outside, but if you cut into one, you could see that the organs weren’t there. Now they have everything. They went through Martian medical colleges, of course, and know all about what makes a centaur tick, and so they make themselves with the same kind of tickers. Oh, very nice.”
“They don’t know much about us. Maybe with the X-ray fluoroscope screen we could have told those imitations of us,” suggested Blake.
“Oh, no, by no means. If we knew the right form, they’d read it in our minds, and have it. Adaptive protoplasm. Just think, you couldn’t kill it in an African jungle, because when a lion came along, it would be a little, lady lion, and when an elephant showed up, it would be a helpless baby elephant. If a snake bit it, I suppose the damned thing would turn into something immune to snake bites—a tree, or something like that. I just wonder where it keeps the very excellent brain it evidently has.”
“Well, let’s find out what Loshthu can offer us by way of proofs.”
CHAPTER III
Mind-Readers and Company
IT developed that the Martians had once had museums. They still had them, because nobody was sufficiently interested to disturb their age-long quiet. Martians lived centuries, and their memories were long; but once or twice in a lifetime did a Martian enter the ancient museums.
Penton and Blake spent hours in them, intensive hours under Loshthu’s guidance. Loshthu had nothing but time, and Penton and Blake didn’t want to linger. They worked rapidly, collecting thin metal sheaves of documents, ancient mechanisms, a thousand things. They baled them with rope that they had brought from the ship when they moved it nearer the museum. Finally, after hours of labor, bleary-eyed from want of sleep, they started out again to the ship.
They stepped out of the gloomy dusk of the museum into the sun-lit entranceway. Immediately, from behind a dozen pillars, a leaping, flashing group of men descended upon them, tore the books, the instruments, the data sheaves from their hands. They were upset, slugged, trampled on and spun around. There were shouts and cries and curses.
Then there was silence. Twelve Pentons and thirteen Blakes sat, lay or stood about on the stone stairway. Their clothes were torn, their faces and bodies bruised, there was even one black eye, and another developing swiftly. But twelve Pentons looked exactly alike, each clasping a bit of data material. Thirteen Blakes were identical, each carrying a bit of factual mustiness under his arm or in his hand.
Loshthu looked at them, and his lined, old face broke into a pleased smile. “Ah,” he said. “There are more of you. Perhaps some can stay with us to talk now.”
Penton looked up at Loshthu, all the Pentons did. Penton was quite sure he was the Penton, but he couldn’t think of any way to prove it. It was fairly evident that thushol had decided to try Earth again. He began to wonder just—”
“Loshthu, just why,” asked one of the Pentons in Penton’s voice, “did the thushol not stay on Earth if they could live there?”
Penton was quite sure he had been the one to think of that panic—”Pardon me, but wasn’t that the question I was going to ask?” said another Penton in well-controlled fury. Penton smiled gently. It seemed evident that—”I can apparently be spared the trouble of doing my own talking. You all help so,” said one of the numerous Pentons angrily.
“Say, how in hell are we going to tell who’s who?” demanded one of the Blakes abruptly.
“That damned mind-thief stole my question before I had a chance—”
“Why you—you—you talking! I was just about—”
“I think,” said one of the Pentons wearily, “you might as well stop getting peeved, Blake, because they’ll all act peeved when you do. What do you know. I beat all my imitators to the draw on that remark. A noble achievement, you’ll find, Rod. But you might just as well pipe down, and I’ll pipe down, and we’ll see what our good friend, Loshthu, has to say.”
“Eh,” sighed Loshthu. “You mean about the thushol leaving Earth? They did not like it. Earth is a poor planet, and the people were barbarians. Evidently they are not so now. But the thushol do not like work, and they found richer sustenance on Mars.”
“I THOUGHT so,” said Penton. (Does it matter which one?) “They’ve decided that Earth is richer than Mars now, and want a new host. Don’t draw that pistol, Blake! Unfortunately, my friend, we had twenty-five ionguns and twenty-five violet-guns made up. If we’d had more we would have more companions. We were exceedingly unfortunate in equipping ourselves so well in the matter of clothing, and being so. thoughtful as to plan all of it right, so we carried a lot of each of the few kinds. Exceedingly. However, I think we can improve things a little bit. I happen to remember that one ion-gun is out of commission, and I had the coils out of two of the violet-guns to repair them. That makes three guns out of service. We will each stand up and fire, one at a time, at the sand in front there. The line forms on the right.”
The line formed. “Now,” continued that particular Penton, “we will each fire, beginning with myself, one at a time. First ion, then violet. When one of us evidences lack of a serviceable gun, the others will join in removing him rapidly but carefully. Are we ready? Yes?” That Penton held up his ion-gun, and pushed the button.
It didn’t fire, and immediately the portico stank with his smoke.
“That’s one,” said the next Penton. He raised his ion-gun and fired.. Then his violet-gun. Then he raised it and fired again, at a rapidly dissolving Blake. “That makes two. That one evidently found, when we fired at the first one, that his didn’t work. We have one more to eliminate. Next?”
Presently another Blake vanished. “Well, well,” said Penton pleasantly, “the Blake-Penton odds are even. Any suggestions?”
“Yes,” said Blake tensely. “I’ve been thinking of a patch I put in one suit that I ripped on Venus.” Another Blake vanished under the mutual fire.
“There’s one more thing I want to know. Why in blazes are those phonies so blasted willing to kill each other, and though they know which is which, don’t kill us? And how did they enter the ship?” Rod demanded. Or at least a Rod.
“They,” said two Pentons at once. Another one looked at them. “Bad timing, boys. Rodney, my son, we used a combination lock. These gentlemen are professional mind-readers. Does that explain their possession of the guns? I’ve been thinking right along of one way to eliminate these excessive excrescences, consisting of you going into a huddle with your tribe, and eliminating all but the one you know to be yourself, and I doing the same. Unfortunately, while they’re perfectly willing to kill each other so long as they don’t die, they will prevent their own deaths by adequate, unfortunately adequate defense.
“Now since these little gun tests and others have been made I think it fairly evident that we are not going to leave this planet until the two right men are chosen and only two go into that ship with us. Fortunately they can’t go without us, because while they can read minds, it takes more than knowledge to navigate a space ship, at least such knowledge as they can get from us. It takes understanding, which mere memory will not supply. They need us.
“We will, therefore, march dutifully to the ship, and each of us will replace his guns carefully in the prepared racks. I know that I’m the right Penton—but you don’t. So no movement will be made without the unanimous agreement of all Pentons and Blakes.”
Blake looked up, white-faced.
“If this wasn’t so world-shakingly serious, it would be the damnedest comic opera that ever happened. I’m afraid to give up my gun.”
“If we all give them up, I think it puts us even. We have some advantage in that they don’t want to kill us, and if worst comes to worst, we could take them to Earth, making damned sure that they didn’t get away. On Earth we could have protoplasmic tests made that would tell the story. By the way, that suggests something. Yes indeed, I think we can make tests here. Let us repair to this ship.”
CHAPTER IV
Penton’s Strategy
THE Blakes sat down and stayed down. “Ted, what in blazes can we do?” His voice was almost tearful. “You can’t tell one of these ghastly things from another. You can’t tell one from me. We can’t—”
“Oh, God,” said another Blake, “that’s not me. That’s just another one of those damned mind stealers.”
Another one groaned hopelessly.
“That wasn’t either.” They all looked helplessly at the line of Pentons. “I don’t even know who’s my friend.”
Penton nodded. All the Pentons nodded, like a grotesquely solemn chorus preparing to recite some blessing. They smiled in superhuman unity. “That’s all right,” they said in perfect harmony. “Well, well. A new stunt. Now we all talk together. That makes things easier. I think there may be a way to tell the difference. But you must absolutely trust me, Blake. You must give up your guns, putting all faith in my ability to detect the right one, and if I’m wrong, realize that I will not know. We can try such simple tests as alcohol, whiskey, to see if it makes them drunk, and pepper to see if it bums their tongues—”
“It won’t work,” said Blake tensely. “Lord, Penton, I can’t give up my guns—I won’t—”
Penton, all the Pentons smiled gently. “I’m half again as fast as you are, Blake, and no Martian-born imitation of you is going to be faster. Maybe these Martian imitations of me are as fast as I am. But you know perfectly well that I could ray the whole gang of you, all ten of you, out of existence before any one of you could move a finger. You know that, don’t you, Rod?”
“Lord, yes, but Ted, Ted, don’t do that—don’t make me give up my guns—I’ve got to keep them. Why should I give up mine, if you keep yours?”
“That probably was not you speaking, Rod, but it doesn’t matter. If it wasn’t what you thought, we could do something about it. Therefore, that is what you wanted to say, just as this is what I wanted to say, whether I said it or not. Oh, Lord preserve us. It talks with my voice! But anyway, the situation is this; one of us has to have unquestioned superiority over the other gang. Then, the one with the whip hand can develop proof of identity, and enforce his decisions. As it is, we can’t.”
“Let me be that one, then,” snapped one Blake.
“I didn’t mean that,” sighed another. “That wasn’t me.”
“Yes it was,” said the first. “I spoke without thinking. Go ahead. But how are you going to make the others give up their guns? I’m willing. You can’t make them?”
“Oh, yes I can. I have my faithful friends, here,” said Penton grimly, his eleven hands waving to his eleven counterparts. “They agree with me this far, being quite utterly selfish.”
“But what’s your system. Before I put my neck in the noose, I have to know that noose isn’t going to tighten on it.”
“If I had a sound system in mind—I’m carefully refraining from developing one—they’d read it, weigh it, and wouldn’t agree at all. They still have hopes. You see that pepper and alcohol system won’t work perfectly because they can read in my mind the proper reaction, and be drunk, or have an inflamed tongue at will, being perfect actors. I’m going to try just the same. Rod, if you ever trusted me, trust me now.”
“All right, come on. We’ll go to the ship, and any one of these things that doesn’t part with its gun is not me. Ray it.”
Blake rose jerkily, all ten of him, and went down to the ship.
The Pentons followed faithfully after. Abruptly Penton rayed one Blake. His shoulder blades had humped curiously and swiftly. Wings were developing. “That helps,” said Penton, holstering his guns.
The Blakes went on, white-faced. They put the weapons in the racks in the lock stoically. The Martians had seen the, to them, inconceivably swift movements of Penton’s gun hands, and Penton knew that he, himself, had done the raying that time. But he still didn’t know a way to prove it without causing a general mêlée which would bring about their own deaths. That wasn’t so important. The trouble was that given fifty years, the rest of the world would descend on this planet unwarned. Then all Earth would be destroyed. Not with flame and sword and horrible casualty lists, but silently and undetectably.
The Blakes came out, unarmed. They shuffled and moved about uneasily, tensely, under the watchful eyes of eleven Pentons armed with terrifically deadly weapons.
Several Pentons went into the ship, to come out bearing pepper, saccharine tablets, alcohol, the medicine chest. One of them gathered them together and looked them over. “We’ll try pepper,” he said, rather unhappily. “Line up!”
The Blakes lined up, hesitantly. “I’m putting my life in your hands, Ted,” said two of them in identical, plaintive tones.
Four Pentons laughed shortly. “I know it. Line up. Come and get it.”
“First,” he sighed, after a moment, “stick out the tongue, patient.”
With unsteady hands he put a bit of pepper from the shaker on the fellow’s tongue. The tongue snapped in instantly, the Blake clapped his hands to his mouth, gurgling unpleasantly. “Waaaar!” he gasped. “Waar—achooo—damnt!”
With hands like flashing light, Penton pulled his own, and a neighbor’s ion-gun. In a fiftieth of a second all but the single gagging, choking, coughing Blake were stinking, smoking, swiftly dissolving and flowing rubbish. The other Penton methodically helped destroy them.
Blake stopped gagging in surprise.
“My God, it might not have been the right one!” he gasped.
The ten Pentons sighed softly. “That finally proves it. Thank God. Definitely. That leaves me to find. And it won’t work again, because while you can’t read my mind to find the trick that told, these brothers of mine have. The very fact that you don’t know how I knew, proves that I was right.”
Blake stared at him dumbly. “I was the first one—” he managed between a cough and a sneeze.
“Exactly. Go on inside. Do something intelligent. Use your head. See what you can think of to locate me. You have to use your head in some such way that they don’t mind-read it first, though. Go ahead.”
Blake went, slow-footed. The first thing he did was to close the lockdoor, so that he was safely alone in the ship. Blake went into the control room, donned an air-suit complete with helmet, and pushed a control handle over. Then a second. Presently he heard curious bumpings and thumpings, and strange floppings and whimperings. He went back rapidly, and rayed a supply chest and two crates of Venusian specimens that had sprouted legs and were rapidly growing arms to grasp ray pistols. The air in the ship began to look thick and greenish; it was colder.
Contentedly Blake watched, and opened all the room doors. Another slithering, thumping noise attracted him, and with careful violet-gun work he removed an unnoticed, extra pipe that was crawling from the crossbrace hangers. It broke up into lengths that rolled about unpleasantly. Rod rayed them till the smallest only, the size of golf balls with curious blue-veined legs, staggered about uncertainly. Finally even they stopped wriggling.
Half an hour Rod waited, while the air grew very green and thick. Finally, to make sure, he started some other apparatus, and watched the thermometer go down, down till moisture grew on the walls and became frost, and no more changes took place. Then he went around with an opened ion-gun with a needle beam and poked everything visible with it.
The suction fans cleared out the chlorine-fouled atmosphere in two minutes, and Blake sat down wearily. He flipped over the microphone switch and spoke into the little disc. “I’ve got my hand on the main ion-gun control. Penton, I love you like a brother, but I love Earth more. If you can induce your boy friends to drop their guns in a neat pile and retire—O.K. If not, and I mean if not within thirty seconds, this ion-gun is going into action and there won’t be any more Pentons. Now, drop!”
Grinning broadly, with evident satisfaction, ten Pentons deposited twenty heart-cores of ultra-essence of destruction, and moved off. “Way off,” said Blake grimly. They moved.
Blake collected twenty guns. Then he went back into the ship. There was a fine laboratory at one end, and with grim satisfaction, he took down three cotton-stoppered tubes, being very careful to handle them with rubber gloves. “You never did man a good turn before, tetanus, but I hope you spread high, wide and handsome here—”
He dumped them into a beaker of water, and took beaker and glass down to the lock and out. The ten waited at a distance.
“All right, Penton. I happen to know you took a shot of tetanus antivaccine some while ago, and are immune. Let’s see if those blasted brain stealers can steal the secret of something we know how to make, but don’t know anything about. They can gain safety by turning into a chicken, which is immune, but not as human creatures. That’s a concentrated dose of tetanus. Go drink it. We can wait ten days if we have to.”
Ten Pentons marched boldly up to the beaker, resting beside the ship. One stepped forward to the glass—and nine kept right on stepping. They stepped into the lee of the ship where the ion-gun could not reach.
Blake helped Penton into the ship with a broad grin.
