Get Off the Unicorn (2 page)

“Yes, Rowan?”

Abruptly she realized that her mental conversation with the Denebian had been heard by all the others. Her fleeting frown was replaced by the miraculous smile that always disconcerted Ackerman with its hint of suppressed passion. She looked at each of the men, bathing them in that smile.

“I want to be launched, slowly, over Jupiter's curve,” she said to Afra. Ackerman switched up the dynamos, Bill Powers punched for her special shell to be deposited on the launching rack. “Real slow, Afra. Then I'll want to draw heavy.” She took a deep breath. Like all Primes, she was unable to launch herself through space. Her initial trip from Altair to Callisto had almost driven her mad with agoraphobia. Only by the exercise of severe self-discipline was she able to take her specially opaque shell a short way off Callisto.

She took another deep breath and disappeared from the station. Then she was beside the launcher. She settled daintily into the shock couch of the shell. The moment the lock whistle shut off, she could feel the shell moving gently, gently away from Callisto. She could sense Afra's reassuring mental touch. Only when the shell had swung into position over Jupiter's great curve did she reply to the priority call coming from Earth Central.

Now what the Billy blue blazes are you doing, Rowan?
The voice of Reidinger, the FT & T Central Prime, cracked across the void.
Have you lost what's left of your precious mind?

She's doing me a favor,
Deneb said, unexpectedly joining them.

Who'n hell're you?
demanded Reidinger. Then, in shocked surprise,
Deneb! How'd you get out there?

Wishful thinking. Hey, push those germdogs to my pretty friend here, huh?

Now, wait a minute! You're going a little too far, Deneb. You can't burn out my best prime with an unbased send like this.

Oh, I'll pick up midway. Like those antibiotics this morning
.

Deneb, what's this business with antibiotics and germdogs? What're you cooking up out there in that heathenish hole?

Oh, we're merely fighting a few plagues with one hand and keeping thirty bogey ET's upstairs.
Deneb gave them a look with his vision at an enormous hospital, a continuous stream of airborne ambulances coming in: at crowded wards, grim-faced nurses and doctors, and uncomfortable high piles of sheeted still figures.

Well, I didn't realize. All right, you can have anything you want—within reason. But I want a full report,
said Reidinger.

And patrol squadrons?

Reidinger's tone changed to impatience.
You've obviously got an exaggerated idea of our capabilities. I can't mobilize patrol squadrons like that!
There was a mental snap of fingers.

Would you perhaps drop a little word in the C.O.C's ear? Those ET's may gobble Deneb tonight and go after Terra tomorrow.

I'll do what I can, of course, but you colonists agreed to the risks when you signed up. The ET's were probably hoping for a soft touch. You're showing them different. They'll give up and get—

You're all heart
, said Deneb.

Reidinger was silent for a moment. Then he said,
Germdogs sealed, Rowan; Pick 'em up and throw 'em out,
and signed off.

Rowan—that's a pretty name,
said Deneb.

Thanks,
she said absently. She had followed along Reidinger's initial push, and picked up the two personnel carriers as they materialized beside her shell. She pressed into the station dynamos and gathered strength. The generators whined and she pushed out. The carriers disappeared.

They're coming in, Rowan. Thanks a lot.

A passionate and tender kiss was blown to her across eighteen light-years of space. She tried to follow after the carriers and pick up his touch again, but he was no longer receiving.

She sank back in her couch. Deneb's sudden appearance had disconcerted her completely. All of the Primes were isolated in their high talents, but the Rowan was more alone than any of the others.

Siglen, the Altairian Prime who had discovered the Rowan as a child and carefully nursed her talent into its tremendous potential, was the oldest Prime of all. The Rowan, a scant twenty-three now, had never gotten anything from Siglen to comfort her except old-fashioned platitudes. Betelgeuse Prime David was madly in love with his T-2 wife and occupied with raising a brood of high-potential brats. Although Reidinger was always open to the Rowan, he also had to keep open every single minute to all the vast problems of the FT & T system. Capella was available but so mixed up herself that her touch aggravated the Rowan to the point of fury.

Reidinger had tried to ease her devastating loneliness by sending up T-3's and T-4's like Afra, but she had never taken to any of them. The only male T-2 ever discovered in the Nine-Star League had been a confirmed homosexual. Ackerman was a nice, barely talented guy, devoted to his wife. And now, on Deneb, a T-1 had emerged, out of nowhere—and so very, very far away.

Afra, take me home now,
she said, very tired.

Afra brought the shell down with infinite care.

After the others had left the station, the Rowan lay for a long while on her couch in the personnel carrier. In her unsleeping consciousness, she was aware that the station was closing down, that Ackerman and the others had left for their homes until Callisto once more came out from behind Jupiter's titan bulk. Everyone had some place to go, except the Rowan who made it all possible. The bitter, screaming loneliness that overcame her during her off hours welled up—the frustration of being unable to go off-planet past Afra's sharply limited range—alone, alone with her two-edged talent. Murky green and black swamped her mind until she remembered the blown kiss. Suddenly, completely, she fell into her first restful sleep in two weeks.

 

Rowan.
It was Deneb's touch that roused her.
Rowan, please wake up.

Hmmmm?
Her sleepy response was reluctant.

Our guests are getting rougher . . . since the germdogs . . . whipped up a broad spectrum antibiotic . . . that phase . . . of their attack failed . . . so now they're . . . pounding us . . . with missiles . . . give my regards to your space-lawyer friend . . . Reidinger.

You're playing pitch with missiles?
The Rowan came awake hurriedly. She could feel Deneb's contact cutting in and out as he interrupted himself to catch incoming missiles and fling them back.

I need backup help, sweetheart, like you and . . . any twin sisters . . . you happen . . . to have . . . handy. Buzz over . . . here, will you?

Buzz? What? I can't go there!

Why not?

I can't! I can't!
The Rowan moaned, twisting against the web of the couch.

But I've got . . . to . . . have . . . help
, he said and faded away.

Reidinger!
The Rowan's call was a scream.

Rowan, I don't care if you are a T-1. There are certain limits to my patience and you've stretched every blasted one of them, you little white-haired ape!

His answer scorched her. She blocked automatically but clung to his touch.
Someone has got to help Deneb!
she cried, transmitting the Mayday.

What? He's joking!

How could he, about a thing like that!

Did you see the missiles? Did he show you what he was actually doing?

No, but I felt him thrusting. And since when does one of us distrust another when he asks for help.

Since when?
Reidinger's reply crackled across space
. Since Eve handed Adam a rosy round fruit and said “eat.” And exactly since Deneb's never been integrated into the prime network. We can't be sure who or what he is—or exactly where he is. I don't like this taking everything at his word. Try and get him back for me to hear.

I can't reach him! He's too busy lobbing missiles spaceward.

That's a hot one! Look, he can tap any other potentials on his own planet. That's all the help he needs
.

But . . .

But me no buts and leave me alone. I'll play cupid only so far. Meanwhile I've got a company—a league—to hold together.
Reidinger signed off with a backlash that stung. The Rowan lay in her couch, bewildered by Reidinger's response. He was always busy, always gruff. But he had never been stupidly unreasonable. While out there, Deneb was growing weaker . . .

Callisto was clear of Jupiter and the station was operating again. Incoming cargoes were piling up on the launchers. But there was no outgoing traffic. Tension and worry hung over the station.

“There must be something we can do for him . . . something,” the Rowan said, choked with tears.

Afra looked down at her sadly and compassionately, and patted her frail shoulder.

“What? Not even you can reach all the way out to him. Patrol Squadrons are needed by what you've said, but
we
can't send them. Did you ask him if he's tried to find help on his own planet?”

“He needs Prime help and—”

“You're all tied to your little worlds with the umbilical cord of space-fear,” Afra finished for her, a blunt summation of the problem that made her wince for her devastating inability.

Kerrist! The radar warning!
Ackerman's mental shout startled both of them.

Instantly the Rowan linked her mind to his as Ackerman plunged toward the little-used radar screen. As she probed into space, she found the intruder, a highly powered projectile, arrowing in from behind Uranus. Guiltily she flushed, for she ought to have detected it away beyond the radar's range.

There was no time to run up the idling dynamos. The projectile was coming in too fast.

I want a wide-open mind from everyone on this moon!
The Rowan's broadcast was inescapable. She felt the surge of power as forty-eight talents on Callisto, including Ackerman's ten-year-old son, lowered their shields. She picked up their power—from the least 12 to Afra's sturdy 4—sent her touch racing out beyond Jupiter, and reached the alien bomb. She had to wrestle for a moment with the totally unfamiliar molecular structure of its constituents. Then, with her augmented energy, it was easy enough to deactivate the trigger and then scatter the fissionables from the warhead into Jupiter's seething mass.

She released the others who had joined her and fell back into the couch.

“How in hell did that thing find us?” Afra asked from the chair in which he had slumped.

She shook her head wearily. Without the dynamos, there had been no surge of power to act as the initial carrier wave for her touch. Even with the help of the others—and all of them put together didn't add up to one-third the strength of another Prime—it had been a wearying exercise. She thought of Deneb—alone, without an FT & T Station to assist him—doing this again, and again, and again—and her heart twisted.

Warm up the dynamos, Brian—there'll be more of those missiles.

Afra looked up, startled.

Prime Rowan of Callisto Station alerting Earth Prime Reidinger and all other primes! Prepare for possible attack by fissionable projectiles of alien origin. Alert all radar watch stations and patrol forces.
She lost her official calm and added angrily,
We've got to help Deneb now—we've got to! It's no longer an isolated aggression against an outlying colony. It's a concerted attack on our heart world. It's an attack on every prime in the nine-star league
.

Rowan!
Before Reidinger got more than her name into her mind, she opened to him and showed the five new projectiles driving toward Callisto.
For the love of little apples!
Reidinger's mind radiated incredulity.
What has our little man been stirring up?

Shall we find out?
Rowan asked with deadly sweetness.

Reidinger transmitted impatience, fury, misery and then shock as he gathered her intention.

Your plan won't work. It's impossible. We can't merge minds to fight. All of us are too egocentric. Too unstable. We'd burn out, fighting each other.

You, me, Altair, Betelgeuse and Capella. We can do it. If I can deactivate one of those hell missiles with only forty-eight minor talents and no power for help, five primes plus full power ought to be able to turn the trick. We can knock the missiles off. Then we can merge with Deneb to help him, that'll make six of us. Show me the ET who could stand up to such a counter-assault!

Look girl,
Reidinger replied, almost pleading,
We don't have his measure. We can't just merge—He could split us apart, or we could burn him up. We don't know him. We can't gauge a telepath of unknown ability.

You'd better catch that missile coming at you
, she said calmly.
I can't handle more than ten at a time and keep up a sensible conversation.

She felt Reidinger's resistance to her plan weakening. She pushed the advantage.
If Deneb's been handling a planet-wide barrage, that's a pretty good indication of his strength. I'll handle the ego-merge because I damned well want to. Besides, there isn't any other course open to us now, is there?

We could launch patrol squadrons.

We should have done that the first time he asked. It's too late now.

Their conversation was taking the briefest possible time and yet more missiles were coming in. All the Prime stations were under bombardment.

All right,
Reidinger said in angry resignation, and contacted the other Primes.

No, no, no! You'll burn her out—burn her out, poor thing!
Old Siglen from Altair babbled.
Let us stick to our last—we dare not expose ourselves, no, no, no! The ET's would attack us then.