The Dueling Machine sw-3 Read online

“Huh?”

  Geri was frowning with the memory. “Yes, Father was concerned that Ponte was allied with Kerak. ‘If Kerak ever conquers us,’ Father said to me once, ‘that little coward will be our Prime Minister.’”

  Hector sat upright. “But now he’s serving Martine… and Martine sure isn’t pro-Kerak.”

  “I know,” Geri said, nodding, “Perhaps Father was wrong. Or Ponte may have changed his mind. Or…”

  “Or he could still be working for Kerak.”

  Geri smiled. “Even if he is, Professor Leoh took care of him.”

  “Umm.” Hector leaned back again and saw that he and Geri had somehow moved slightly apart. He pushed over toward her.

  “My foot!” Geri leaped up from the bench.

  “Oh, I’m sorry. Did I step on…” Hector jumped up too.

  Geri was hopping on one foot in the tiny cockpit, making the skimmer rock with each bounce. Hector reached out to hold her, but she pushed him away. The effort toppled her over backward. The cockpit gunwale caught her behind the knees and she flipped backward, howling, into the water with a good-sized splash.

  Hector, appalled, never hesitated a second. He leaped right into the sea from the point where he stood, narrowly missing Geri as he hit the water, head first, arms and legs flailing.

  He came up spouting, blurry-eyed, gasping. Geri was treading water beside him.

  “I… I… I…”

  She laughed. “It’s all right, Hector. It’s my own fault. I lost my temper when you stepped on my foot.”

  “But… I… are you?…”

  “It’s a lovely night,” she said. “As long as we’re in the water anyway, why don’t we have a swim?”

  “Uh… fine, except, well, that is… I can’t swim,” Hector said, and slowly he sank under.

  As he stepped from the ramp of the spaceship to the slideway that led into the terminal building, Odal felt a strange sense of exhilaration.

  He was in Acquatainia again! The warm sunlight, the bustling throngs of people, the gleaming towers of the city—he almost felt Dulaq’s sense of joy about being here. Of course, Odal told himself, it’s probably just a reaction to being free of Kor’s dreary Ministry of Intelligence. But the Kerak major had to admit to himself—as he moved toward the spaceport terminal, escorted by four of Kor’s men—that Acquatainia had a rhythm, a freshness, a sense of freedom and gaiety that he had never found on Kerak.

  Inside the terminal building, he had fifty meters of automated inspectors to walk through before he could get into the ground car that would take him to the Kerak embassy. If there was going to be trouble, it would be here.

  Two of his escorts got into the inspection line ahead of him, two behind.

  Odal walked slowly between the two full-length X-ray screens and then stopped before the radiation detector. He inserted his passport and embassy identification cards into the correct slot in the computer’s registration processor.

  Then he heard someone in the next line, a woman’s voice, saying, “It is him! I recognize the uniform from the tri-di news.”

  “Couldn’t be,” a man’s voice answered. “They wouldn’t dare send him back here.”

  Odal purposely turned their way and smiled gravely at them. The woman said, “I told you it was him!” Her husband glared at Odal.

  Kor had arranged for a few newsmen to be on hand. As Odal collected bis cards and travel kit at the end of the inspection line, a small knot of cameramen began grinding their tapers at him. He walked briskly toward the nearest doors, and the ground car that he could see waiting outside. His four escorts kept the newsmen at arm’s length.

  “Major Odal, don’t you consider it risky to return to Acquatainia?”

  “Do you think diplomatic immunity covers assassination?”

  “Aren’t you afraid someone might take a shot at you?”

  The newsmen yelped after him like a pack of puppies following a man with an armful of bones. But Odal could feel the hatred now. Not so much from the newsmen, but from the rest of the people in the crowded terminal lobby. They stared at him, hating him. Before, when he was Kerak’s invincible warrior, they feared him, even envied him. But now there was nothing in the crowd but hatred for the Kerak major, Odal knew.

  He ducked into the ground car and sank into the back seat. Kor’s guards filled the rest of the car. The door slammed shut, and some of the emotion and noise coming from the terminal crowd was cut off. For the first time, Odal thought about why he had returned to Acquatainia. Leoh. He frowned at the thought of what he had to do. But when he thought about Hector, about revenging himself for the Star Watchman’s absurd victory in their duel, he allowed himself to smile.

  8

  Leoh sat slumped at the desk chair in the office behind the dueling machine chamber. He had some thinking to do, and his apartment was too comfortable for creative thought.

  Through the closed door of the office he heard an outer door bang, hard fast-moving footsteps, and a piercing off-key whistle. With a reluctant smile, he told the door control to open. Hector was standing there with a fist raised, ready to knock.

  “How’d you know?…”

  “I’m partly telepathic,” Leoh said.

  “Really? I didn’t know. Do you think that helped you in your duel with… oh, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about.…”

  Leoh raised a hand for silence. “Come in, my boy, and sit down. Tell me, have you seen the tri-di newscasts this morning?”

  Taking a chair next to the Professor, Hector said, “No, sir. I, uh, got in kind of late last night and sort of late getting up this morning.… Got some water in my left ear… it gurgles every time I move my head…”

  With an effort, Leoh stayed on the subject. “The newscasts showed Odal landing at the main spaceport. He’s returned.”

  Hector jerked as though someone had stuck him with a pin. “He… he’s back?”

  “Now don’t get rattled,” Leoh said as calmly as he could. “No one’s going to come in here with pistols blazing to assassinate me.”

  “Maybe… but, well, I mean… there’s a chance that Odal—or somebody—will try something.”

  “Nonsense,” Leoh grumbled.

  Hector didn’t reply. He seemed to be lost in an inner debate; his face was flashing through a series of expressions: worried, puzzled, determined.

  “What’s the matter?” Leoh asked.

  “Huh? Oh, nothing… just thinking.”

  “This news about Odal has upset you more than I thought it would.”

  “No, no… I’m not upset… just, uh, thinking.” Hector shook his head, as if trying to clear his mind. Leoh thought he could hear the gurgling of water.

  “It’s my duty,” Hector said, “to, uh, protect you. So I’ll have to stay, well, very close to you at all times. I think I should move into your apartment and stay with you wherever you go.”

  Now Leoh found himself upset more than he thought he would be. But he knew that if he didn’t let the Watchman stay close to him openly, Hector would try to do it secretly, which would merely be more agonizing for both of them.

  “All right, my boy, If you insist; although I think you’re being overly dramatic about this.”

  Hector said, “No, I’ve got to be there when Odal shows up.… And anyway, I think the Terran ambassador was getting a little tired of having me around the embassy. He, uh, he seemed to be avoiding me as much as he could.”

  Leoh barely suppressed a smile. “Very well. Get your things together and you can move in with me today,”

  “Good,” Hector said. And to himself he added, I won’t leave him for a minute. Then when Odal shows up I can protect him… and do what Geri wants me to.

  There was no escaping Hector. He moved into Leoh’s apartment and stood within ten meters of the old scientist, day and night. When Leoh awoke, Hector was already whistling shrilly in the autokitchen, punching buttons, and somehow managing to make the automatic equipment burn at least one part of breakfast. Hector
drove him wherever he wanted to go, and stayed with him when he got there. Leoh went to sleep with Hector’s cheerful jabbering still in his ears.

  Increasingly, they ate dinner at Geri Dulaq’s sumptuous home on the outskirts of the city. Hector waggled like an overanxious puppy whenever Geri was in sight. And Leoh saw that she was coolly able to keep him at arm’s length. There was something that she wanted Hector to do for her, the old man quickly realized, something Hector wouldn’t talk about. Which—for Hector—was completely unusual.

  About a week after the news of Odal’s return, the Kerak major still hadn’t been seen outside of his embassy’s building. But an enterprising newsman, expecting new duels, asked for an interview with Leoh. The Professor met him at the dueling machine. Hector was at his side.

  The newsman turned out to be Hector’s age and Leoh’s girth, florid in complexion, sloppy in dress, and slightly obnoxious in attitude.

  “I know all about the basic principles of its operation,” he told Leoh airily when the Professor began to explain how the dueling machine worked.

  “Oh? Have you had courses in psychonics?”

  The newsman laughed. “No, but I understand all about this dream-machine business.”

  Pacing slowly by the empty control desk and peering up at the dueling machine’s bulky consoles and power conditioners, he asked, “How can you be sure that people can’t be killed in this rig again? Major Odal actually killed people.…”

  “I understand the question,” Leoh said. “I’ve added three new circuits to the machine. The first psychonically isolates the duelists inside the machine; it’s now impossible for Odal or anyone else to contact the outside world while the machine is in operation.”

  The newsman turned up the volume control on his wrist recorder. “Go on.”

  “The second circuit,” Leoh continued, “monitors the entire duel. If either side requests, the dueling machine’s chief meditech can review the tape and determine if any rules were broken. Thus, even if there is foul play of some sort, we can at least catch it”

  “After the fact,” the newsman pointed out.

  “Yes.”

  “That wouldn’t have helped Dulaq or Massan, or the others that were killed.”

  Leoh could feel irritation growing inside him. “After one duel, we could have found out what Odal was doing and stopped him.”

  The newsman said nothing.

  “Finally, we have added an automatic override to the medical monitoring equipment, so that if one of the duelists shows the slightest sign of actual medical danger, the duel is automatically stopped,”

  The newsman thought it over for half a second. “Suppose a man gets a sudden heart attack? He might be dead before you can get the door to his booth open, even though you’ve stopped the duel immediately.”

  Leoh fumed. “And if there’s an earthquake, both duelists and much of the city may be destroyed. Young man, there is no way to make the world absolutely safe.”

  “Maybe not.” But his round, puffed face showed he didn’t believe it absolutely.

  They talked for a quarter-hour more. Leoh showed him the equipment involved in the three new safety circuits and tried to explain how they worked. The newsman looked professionally skeptical and unimpressed. Leoh’s exasperation mounted.

  “Frankly, Professor, all you’ve told me is a lot of scientific mumbo jumbo. There’s no guarantee that the machine won’t kill people again.”

  Reddening, Leoh snapped back, “The machine didn’t kill anyone! A man murdered his opponents, deliberately.”

  “In the machine.”

  “Yes, but it can’t happen again!”

  Shrugging, the newsman said, “All I’ve got to go on is your word.”

  “My reputation as a scientist means something, I should think.”

  Hector interrupted. “If the Acquatainian government is satisfied that the dueling machine’s safe.…”

  The newsman laughed. “Both the government and the Professor claimed the machine was absolutely safe when it was first installed here. Two men died in this gadget, and who knows how many others have been killed in Szarno and other places?”

  “But that…”

  Turning back to Leoh, he asked, “How many people have been killed in dueling machines in the Commonwealth?”

  “None!”

  “You sure? I can check, you know.”

  “Are you calling me a liar?”

  “Look, it boils down to this: you told us the machine was safe, and two very important men were killed. Now you’re saying it’s safe again.…” He let the implication dangle.

  “Out!” Leoh snapped. “Get out of here, or by all the ancient gods, old as I am…”

  The newsman backed off a step. Then, “Suppose I am doubting you. Not your veracity, but your optimism about the machine’s being safe. Suppose I said you don’t really know that it’s safe, you’re just hoping that it is.”

  Hector stepped between them. “Now wait… if you can’t.…”

  “Suppose,” the newsman went on, ducking past Hector, “suppose I challenged you to a duel.”

  “I’ve used this machine many times,” Leoh said.

  “Okay, but I still challenge you.”

  Suddenly Leoh felt absolutely calm. “Very well. I accept your challenge. And you can do whatever you want to during our duel to try to prove your point. But I insist on one condition: the tape of the duel must be made public knowledge immediately after the duel is finished.”

  The newsman grinned. “Perfect.”

  Leoh realized that this was what he had been after all along.

  9

  Odal sat in his cell-like room in the Kerak embassy, waiting for the phone message. The room was narrow and severe, with strictly functional furniture—a bed, a. desk and chair, a view screen. No decorations, plain military gray walls, no window.

  Kor had explained the plan for Leoh’s destruction before Odal had boarded the ship for Acquatainia. Odal did not like the plan, but it seemed workable and it would surely remove Leoh from the scene.

  The phone buzzed.

  Odal leaned across the desk and touched the ON button. The newsman’s chubby face took form on the small screen.

  “Well?” Odal demanded.

  “He accepted the challenge. We duel in three days. And he wants the tape shown publicly, just as you thought he would.”

  Odal smiled tightly. “Excellent.”

  “Look, if I’m going to be made to look foolish on that tape,” the newsman said, “I think I ought to get more money.”

  “I don’t handle the financial matters,” Odal said. “You’ll have to speak to the embassy accountant… after we see how well you play your part in the duel.”

  Pouting, the newsman replied, “All right. But I’m going to be finished for life when that tape is shown.”

  “We’ll take care of you,” Odal promised. Indeed, we’ll provide for you for the rest of your life.

  Geri Dulaq walked briskly out of the sunlight of the university’s campus into the shadows of the dueling machine’s high-vaulted chamber.

  “Hector, you sounded so worried on the phone…”

  He took her hands in his. “I am. That’s why I wanted to talk to you. It’s… well, it’s happened again. First Ponte argues the Professor into a duel, and now this newsman. You think Ponte might be working for Kerak, so… I mean.…”

  “Perhaps the newsman is too,” Geri finished for him.

  Hector nodded. “And with Odal back… well, they’re brewing up something.…”

  “Where is the Professor now?” Geri asked.

  Pointing to the office behind the dueling machine chamber, Hector said, “In there. He doesn’t want to be disturbed… working on equations or something… about interstellar ships, I think.”

  Geri looked surprised.

  “Oh, he’s not worried about the duel,” Hector explained. “I told him all about Ponte… what you said, I mean. But he thinks the machine can’t be tamp
ered with, so he’s not, uh, worried. And he beat Ponte pretty easily.”

  Geri turned toward the massive, looming machine. “I’ve never been here before. It’s a little frightening.”

  Hector put on a smile. “There’s nothing to be frightened about… that is, I mean, well, it’s only a machine. It can’t hurt you.”

  “I know. It was Odal and Kanus’ hired monsters that killed father, not the machine itself.”

  She walked along the long, curving, main control desk, looked over its banks of gauges and switches, ran a finger lightly across its plastisteel edge.

  “Could you show me what it’s like?”

  Hector blinked. “Huh?”

  “In the dueling machine,” she said. “Can it be used for something else, other than duels? I’d like to see what it’s like to have your imagination made real.”

  “Oh, but… well, you’re not… I mean, nobody’s supposed to ran it without… that is…”

  “You do know how to run the machine, don’t you?” She looked right up into his eyes.

  With a gulp, Hector managed a weak, “Oh sure…”

  “Then can’t we use it together? Perhaps we can share a dream.”

  Looking around, his hands suddenly clammy, Hector mumbled, “Well, uh, somebody’s supposed to be at the controls to, er, monitor the duel… I mean—”

  “Just for a few little minutes?” Geri smiled her prettiest.

  Hector melted. “Okay… I guess it’ll be all right. Just for a few minutes, that is.”

  He walked with her to the farther booth and helped her put on the neurocontacts. Then he went back to the main desk and with shaky hands set the machine into action. He checked and double-checked all the controls, pushed the final switches, and dashed to the other booth, tripping as he entered it and banging noisily into the seat. He sat down, fumbled with the neurocontacts hastily, and then stared into the screen.

  Nothing happened.

  For a moment he was panic-stricken. Then the screen began to glow softly, colors shifted, green mostly, soft cool green with a hint of blue in it.…

  And he found himself floating dreamily next to Geri in a world of green, with greenish light filtering down ever so softly from far above them.