The Tenth Planet (19 page)

When Idris slipped out of the apartment, he was surprised to find the avenue totally deserted. Although it was in the middle of dim-out he had expected that a watch would be kept on his apartment; and it would have been difficult for an observer to hide in what was really no more than a long corridor whose starkness was relieved only by an occasional small tree with brilliantly variegated leaves.

He boarded a monorail car at Talbot. No-one was in it. Nor did anyone jump on at Talbot Farm, Talbot Hydroponics, or Vorshinski Power. He got off at Vorshinski City and waited for the next car. The station was deserted. Perhaps this was not one of the nights when the Friends of the Ways were meeting.

The next car contained two young men who might or might not be Friends of the Ways. Idris got on board, smiled vaguely at them and waited. They did nothing. At Brandt, Damaris de Gaulle and two more young men got on board. She spoke to them and to the two who were already in the car, then she came to sit by Idris.

“Hi, Jesus Freak. Last time round, you did not seem over impressed by our company. We were beginning to think maybe we had lost you. Were you disappointed by us?”

“Yes.”

“Understandable.” She laughed. “A homicidal Earth man is not likely to be impressed by a group of young people who seem to spend their time singing folk songs, drinking, making jokes.”

“I am not a homicidal Earth man.”

“Have you ever killed anybody?”

“Yes, but that does not make me homicidal.”

Again she laughed. “Delicious Jesus Freak! It does, you know. How many people have you killed?”

“Three.”

“Why?”

“They were saboteurs. They were trying to wreck a spaceship at Kennedy on Earth … It was a long time ago.”

“You bet it was long time ago. But not subjectively for you. You are our homicidal Jesus Freak. Could we ask for more?”

At Brandt Hydro, three more young people boarded the car. They were obviously Friends of the Ways. One of them carried the inevitable mandolin, the others had flasks of kafra. Idris was able to put a name to a face—Egon. As before, Egon offered him the kafra.

“Drink, brother. It is good to see you again.”

“Thanks, brother.” Idris drank deeply. “Do you people play these childish night games endlessly, brother, or are there any among you willing to translate juvenile protest into harsh reality? I do not have much time, brother. I want to know if there are any among you who presume to be men?”

It was Damaris who answered him. “We play these childish night games, as you call them, so that our elders will think we are harmless. Only tell us what to do, Idris Hamilton, homicidal Jesus Freak of Earth. Only tell us what to do to destroy the stagnation that threatens us, and you will find the men you need—and the women, too.”

The car stopped at Aragon. More people got on. Obviously young, obviously Friends of the Ways. Idris paid no attention to them. The boy with the mandolin had started to improvise another ballad about the last man of Earth. It
was nauseatingly banal. Also somewhat out of tune.

“I have a plan,” said Idris. “It requires about six resolute men—or women—who are willing to risk their lives in order to change for ever the destructive effect of
Talbot’s Creed
. If you want an expanding society, it can be achieved. But some of you are going to have to take risks.”

“What kind of risks?”

“You are going to have to risk your lives. What else? Get it into your heads that I am not going to perform any single-handed miracle, if that is what you were hoping for. I think I can help you and help myself. But I need backing. I need a few men or women who are not going to run home and put their heads under a pillow if or when the shooting starts.”

“The Jesus Freak speaks big,” said Damaris coolly. “Do any of us speak big also?”

“There will be shooting?” asked somebody.

“Not, I hope, in the literal sense.”

“There will be killing?”

“Possibly. But I will avoid it if I can.”

The monorail car stopped at Chiang City. Four more Friends of the Ways boarded it.

The boy with the mandolin started strumming:

“Abort,” said Idris savagely. “There will be time for the song and dance routines later. Well, which of you totally secure brats will now look me in the eye and say he’s prepared to risk his life for something he believes in?”

“Tell us your plan, brother,” said Egon.

“Brother,” retorted Idris, “I am not a fool. I will tell my plan only to those who sign ship’s articles and are prepared to go for broke.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means, my young friend, that I will not make my plan public. I will trust only those who trust me. They must back me with their lives, as I will back them with mine.”

“At least,” said Damaris, “tell us what you think you can
achieve. At the moment, dear Jesus Freak, it seems that you are asking us to follow you blindly.”

“Fair comment. I will say this much, then. With the absolute backing of, say, six men and women, I think I can get us into a position where we can dictate terms to the Five Cities Council.”

“What if they reject the terms?”

“They will not be able to afford to reject the terms,” said Idris, “because the alternative will be the rapid destruction of Talbot City and quite possibly the other four.”

“Man!” someone breathed. “This Jesus Freak thinks big. I mean big.”

The boy with the mandolin stood up. He put down the mandolin, at the same time drawing something from the bulge of its base. The weapon he held looked very much like an ancient automatic pistol. He pointed it at Idris. Another of the Friends stood by his side. He, too, produced a similar weapon.

“Idris Hamilton, I arrest you in the name of the Five Cities Council. We know that you are strong and that you have skills of attack that have not been known on Minerva for thousands of years. But I hold in my hand an anaesthetising gun. We use it to stun pigs on the farms before they are slaughtered. Do not compel me to use it on you.”

His companion stepped back and pointed his own gun at the others. They fell back.

Damaris de Gaulle refused to be intimidated. She was white-faced, furious. “We have always known there were traitors among us,” she stormed. “So many of our projects were destroyed before we could operate them. But you, Egon! And you, Leander! This is too much!” She turned to Idris. “I am sorry, dear Jesus Freak. Truly, I am sorry.”

“It was to be expected, my dear. It was to be expected.” Idris laughed. “Despite my new body, I must be getting old.”

The car began to slow down as it approached Talbot City once more.

“We will get off here, Idris Hamilton,” said Egon. “I
must take you to my father, who will know what to do.”

“Would his name be Harlen Zebrov?” asked Idris.

Egon smiled. “You have a quick mind. Too quick. It is a pity.”

The car stopped. Idris put a hand to his head and partly covered his eyes. He swayed a little. “I feel ill.”

“Then you shall have the best medical attention.”

Suddenly, the hand shot out—flat, hard, devastating. It hit Egon in the throat before he realised what had happened. The force of the blow knocked him clean out of the car. There was a sickening thud. For a moment, everyone was frozen.

Then Egon’s companion swung and faced Idris. “Animal!” But as he fired the anaesthetising dart, Damaris grabbed his hand and pulled. The dart pierced her breast. The young man seemed dazed by what he had done. Idris knocked the gun out of his hand and hit him relatively gently. He collapsed, moaning and coughing.

Damaris swayed. “Dear Jesus Freak. You
are
homicidal. Violence comes to you like—” She fell unconscious.

Somebody shouted: “Stop the Ways! Stop the Ways!”

Someone leaped on to Talbot platform and hit the emergency button that would halt the following car.

Three of the Friends of the Ways were already climbing down into the shallow pit under the monorail to reach Egon. Idris joined them.

There was nothing anyone could do for Egon. His head, evidently, had hit the rail on the way down. His neck was broken, and his head was smashed. Not even the genius of a Manfrius de Skun could bring the son of Harlen Zebrov back from the dead …

“You killed him! You killed him!”

“Murderer!”

“Beast!”

“Earth animal!”

Idris felt deadly tired. It was not, he realised, a good time to feel deadly tired. “Earth animal, yes,” he agreed wearily. “Murderer, no. You saw what happened. I intended to disarm him, not to kill him. According to Earth
law, I am guilty of manslaughter, not murder.”

“This time, it will be exile.”

“We were wrong ever to think you would help us. You are a destroyer, Earth man. Your people destroyed their own planet. Now you would destroy ours.”

Idris climbed out of the pit and faced them on the platform. “Well, then, I am a destroyer. So come and get me, children. There are enough of you. But it will be costly. That I can promise you. It will be costly.”

A girl stepped forward. “So, you invite more violence, Idris Hamilton. Your appetite for death is not yet satisfied. I little thought I would ever have to admit the Triple-T are right.”

“Stop making speeches and get Damaris to a doctor,” he said. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that one of the young men had started thinking again and had picked up the anaesthetic gun that was on the floor of the monorail car.

He leaped back into the monorail pit as the man pressed the trigger. The dart exploded against the wall of the tunnel.

Idris crouched under the car, which gave him temporary protection, thinking what to do next. His mind worked furiously. Only a few metres away was the branch tunnel that led to Talbot Field. Could he make it before the bright boy put him to sleep with the gun? Should he even try to make it? Because, if he did, they would know where he had gone and what he was trying to do.

Someone called: “There is no escape for you now, Earth animal. Even you must know there is no hiding place on Minerva. You are routed for exile.”

If I make a run for it, thought Idris, and if I head up the main tunnel, and if the boy with the gun doesn’t hit me, they will think I’m running towards Brandt. Then if I wait a little until they have left Talbot, and then double back, there is a sporting chance I can get up the branch tunnel. There were too many goddamned ifs. They were bound to leave someone on watch at Talbot.

The boy was right. There was no hiding place on Minerva.

But what else was there to do?

The time had come to stop thinking and to trust to instinct. He made the run towards the tunnel leading to Brandt. Two more anaesthetising darts hit the wall very close to him. But he made the tunnel and kept on running for, perhaps, a hundred metres.

If they have any guts, he thought, they will come in after me and finish it off now.

But they haven’t any guts, he told himself reasonably. These are spoonfed kids who have never known violence. They haven’t any guts. None of them would want to come into the tunnel, even with an anaesthetic gun, to face an Earth man who had nothing to lose. So they would organise a reception committee at Brandt and possibly leave a holding guard at Talbot.

He would have to take his chance with the holding guard.

But strangely, they left no holding guard at Talbot. Clearly, they were unused to hunting criminals. They evidently thought that a criminal would do exactly what he was supposed to do, or what he had shown he intended to do.

Cautiously, after a time, Idris crept back to Talbot. Egon’s body had been removed. But no one had been left on watch.

He emerged from the tunnel, inspected the station carefully, then began to walk up the branch tunnel to Talbot Field. After a few minutes he began to run. It occurred to him that, after a time, even the Minervans would realise what he was trying to do.

He was right. And he had already run out of time. As, puffing and exhausted, he approached the platform that could only be Talbot Field he saw that they were waiting for him.

Another anaesthetic dart whanged against the tunnel wall. He doubled back. But the monorail cars were in service once more. One from Talbot Field began to follow him. He ran until he could run no more.

The anaesthetising dart was a blessed relief. At least it stopped the dreadful pain in his chest.

T
HE TRIAL WAS
over. It had been a fair one by Minervan standards—if less than fair by Earth standards. On the Earth Idris had known, violence had been, alas, no rarity. Because of this it was possible for terrestrial judges to consider the facts of violence dispassionately and to make, where the facts seemed to indicate it, a fine distinction between murder and manslaughter. On Earth a verdict of murder would be given only when the prosecution had established beyond all reasonable doubt that the accused had intended to kill. But on Minerva, where crimes of violence were almost non-existent, the act of striking a person in order to render him or her helpless could readily be construed as an intention to kill.

Minervans abhorred violence. Two civilisations had been destroyed by it; and their reaction to it was almost hysterical. If Idris had not had a recent history of violence—minor by Earth standards—and if he had not been, unintentionally, the symbol of a political and sociological struggle, he might have escaped with a long sentence of imprisonment and psychiatric treatment. But, in Minervan eyes, he had manifested an appetite for violence almost from the time he had been fully in control of his new body. From that proposition it was but a short step to establishing that he was a programmed killer.

Idris was defended by Erwin von Keitel, a close friend
and scientific colleague of the late Manfrius de Skun. But Dr. von Keitel interpreted his role not so much as defending counsel for an Earth man accused of murder but as advocate of the lately abandoned immortality project. With a friend like von Keitel, Idris concluded ruefully, he did not need any enemies.

The prosecution, an able exponent of Triple-T philosophy, destroyed von Keitel’s arguments with negligible effort. It did not matter too much. The tribunal, consisting of the Presidents of the Five Cities was, as Idris saw from the start, a hanging tribunal. They had reached their verdict before the trial began.