Get Off the Unicorn (34 page)

Two men had appeared at the top of the ramp. They both fired, the dull reports of trank pistols accentuated by her choked gasp.

“Not her. Shoot Orley. Shoot the man,” op Owen cried, but it was too late.

Even as the girl crumpled to the floor, Orley grabbed her. Grabbed and tore and beat at the source of the emotions which so disturbed him. Beat and tore and stamped as she had assaulted him.

Orley's body jerked as tranks hit him from several sides, but it took far too long for them to override the adrenal reactions of the overcharged telempath.

There was pain and pity as well as horror in Gillings' eyes when he came running onto the level. The police stood at a distance from the blood-spattered bodies.

“Gawd, couldn't someone have stopped him from getting her?” the copter pilot murmured, turning away from the shapeless bloodied thing half-covered by Orley's unconscious body.

“The door would have stopped Orley, but he,” Heis grimly pointed at op Owen, “opened it for him.”

“She teleported through the door,” op Owen said weakly. He had to lean against the wall. He was beginning to shudder uncontrollably. “She had to be stopped. Now. Here. Before she realized what she'd done. What she could do.” His knees buckled. “She teleported through the door!”

Unexpectedly, it was Gillings who came to his aid, a Gillings whose mind was no longer shielded but broadcasting compassion and awe, and understanding.

“So did you.”

The phrase barely registered in op Owen's mind when he passed out.

 

“That's all that remains of the late Solange Boshe,” Gillings said, tossing the file reel to the desk. “As much of her life as we've been able to piece together. Gypsies don't stay long anywhere.”

“There're some left?” Lester Welch asked, frowning at the three-inch condensation of fifteen years of a human life.

“Oh there are, I assure you,” Gillings replied, his tone souring slightly for the first time since he had entered the office. “The tape also has a lengthy interview with Bill Jones, the cousin the social worker located after Solange had recovered from the bronchial pneumonia. He had no idea,” Gillings hastily assured them, “that there is any reason other than a routine check on the whereabouts of a runaway county ward. He had a hunch,” Gillings grimaced, “that the family had gone on to Toronto. They had. He also thought that they had probably given the girl up for dead when she collapsed on the street. The Toronto report substantiates that. So I don't imagine it will surprise you, op Owen, that her tribe, according to Jones, are the only ones still making a living at fortune-telling, palm-reading, tea leaves and that bit.”

“Now, just a minute, Gillings,” Lester began, bristling. He subsided when he saw that his boss and the Commissioner were grinning at each other.

“So . . . just as you suspected, op Owen, she was a freak Talent. We know from the ward nurses that she watched your propaganda broadcasts during her hospitalization. We can assume that she was aware of the search either when Gil Gracie ‘found' the coat, or when the definite fix was made. It's not hard to guess her motivation in making the heist in the first place nor her instinctive desire to hide.” Gillings gave his head an abrupt violent jerk and stood up. He started to hold out his hand, remembered, and raised it in a farewell gesture. “You are continuing those broadcasts, aren't you?”

Lester Welch glared so balefully at the Commissioner that op Owen had to chuckle.

“With certain deletions, yes.”

“Good. Talent must be identified and trained. Trained young and well if they are to use their Talent properly.” Gillings stared op Owen in the eye. “The Boshe girl was bad, op Owen, bad clear through. Listen to what Jones said about her and you won't regret Tuesday too much. Sometimes the young are inflexible, too.”

“I agree, Commissioner,” Daffyd said, escorting the man to the door as calmly as if he hadn't heard what Gillings was thinking so clearly. “And we appreciate your help in the cover yarns that explained Tuesday's odd occurrences.”

“A case of mutual understanding,” Gillings said, his eyes glinting. “Oh, no need to see me out.
I
can open this door.”

That door was no sooner firmly shut behind him than Lester Welch turned on his superior.

“And just who was scratching whose back then?” he demanded. “Don't you dare come over innocent, either, Daffyd op Owen. Two days ago that man was your enemy, bristling with enough hate and distrust to antagonize me.”

“Remember what you said about Gillings Tuesday?”

“There's been an awful lot of idle comment around here lately.”

“Frank Gillings
is
telepathic.” Then he added as Lester was choking on the news. “And he doesn't want to be. So he's suppressed it. Naturally he'd be antagonistic.”

“Hah!”

“He's not too old, but he's not flexible enough to adapt to Talent, having denied it so long.”

“I'll buy that. But what was that parting shot—'
I
can open this door'?” Lester mimicked the Commissioner's deep voice.

“I'm too old to learn new tricks, too, Les. I teleported through the roof door of that parking facility. He saw me do it. And
she
saw the memory of it in my mind. If she'd lived, she'd've picked my mind clean. And I didn't want her to die.”

Op Owen turned abruptly to the window, trying to let the tranquility of the scene restore his equilibrium. It did—until he saw Harold Orley plodding along the path with his guide. Instantly a white, wide-eyed, hair-streaked face was superimposed over the view.

The intercom beeped and he depressed the key for his sanity's sake.

“We've got a live one, boss,” and Sally Iselin's gay voice restored him. “A strong pre-cog with kinetic possibilities. And guess what?” Sally's excitement made her voice breathless. “He said the cop on his beat told him to come in. He doesn't want any more trouble with the cops so he . . .”

“Would his name be Bill Jones?”

“However did you know?”

“And that's no pre-cog, Sally,” op Owen said with a ghost of a laugh, aware he was beginning to look forward again. “A sure thing's no pre-cog, is it, Les?”

 

For those of you who have consistently asked for more Helva stories, here is “Honeymoon.” Only it's an un-story. I call it that because it cannot stand without a lot of explanation which really makes the minor incident that is the meat of the story much too top-heavy. You really ought to have read at least “The Ship Who Sang,” the story, if not the full novel, to understand what is left out.

I have often called Helva my alter ego. “The Ship Who Sang” is my favorite story; I still cannot reread it without weeping, for I wrote it in an unconscious attempt to ease my grief over the death of my father, the Colonel. The other yarns in the novel were therapy for other personal problems, none of which actually figure in the plots. So, although this tale should have been the starting point of a new volume about Niall Parollan and Helva, I don't really yet know if Helva will sing again. “Honeymoon” does tie up the one loose end which the majority of my readers have complained to me about.

 

 

Honeymoon

“M
AY
I
COME
aboard, Helva?”

Helva said yes without thinking because the traffic in technicians and Base officials attending to her refitting was constant. Then, she checked identity because while the voice was familiar, no technician would have couched such a formal request.

Rocco, Regulus representative for Mutant Minorities, was her unexpected caller. With the easy manner of one used to the protocol of brain-brawn ships, the Double M man saluted her behind the central column and sauntered into the lounge, looking about him with interest at the choice artifacts Niall had introduced, the circuit prints and cables draped about the control console, the pattern of dust and grit leading toward her engineering and cargo compartments.

“I've stopped apologizing for the mess,” Helva said, “but the galley's intact if you don't mind serving yourself while Niall's not here . . .”

“I'm here because he isn't, Helva,” Rocco said, refusing her hospitality with a courteous gesture and seating himself facing her panel.

“In which capacity? Double M, or Rocco?”

“Unofficially, but Rocco is always willing.” Then he hesitated, biting the corner of his lip while Helva waited, amused that the suave, fashionably attired troubleshooter for Double M was at a loss for words. He'd had no block a scant seven days ago when he'd been needling Chief Railly before she'd extended her Central Worlds contract. “Let's just say that I had an interesting conversation yesterday which leads me to beg the indulgence of a chat—an unofficial chat—with you.”

“On what subject?”

“Coercion?”

“Whose?” Helva was amused.

“Yours, primarily. Parollan's . . . well, that young man can take care of himself.”

Helva chuckled. “Now, Mr. Rocco, you
were
in Chief Railly's office that day.”

Rocco impatiently brushed that side. “Yes, I heard the official line. They got you to extend your original contract with them . . . which was almost legal.”

“Very legal, Rocco. I did some surreptitious checking myself. And I got them . . .”

Rocco held up his hand, peremptorily cutting her off. “Did or did not Railly deploy a detachment around you, effectively preventing you from lifting off if you'd so desired? And did or did not Parollan have to short out a perimeter fence to get to you?”

“There was a little misunderstanding . . .”

“Little?” Rocco's swarthy face darkened to emphasize that single explosion. “My dear Helva, I have my sources, too. Railly had the entire planetary security force, civilian
and
service, looking for Parollan.”

“I had Broley on my side.” Helva chuckled for the city shell person's cooperation had been involuntary. Broley still wasn't speaking to her because she hadn't opted for independent status and taken on one of the clients he had lined up for her.

“So you did. Do you now?”

“Oh, he'll sulk a while longer, I expect.”

Rocco hitched himself to the edge of the couch. “Now, look, Helva, I know what it says on paper but I also know that Parollan's resignation from the Service is still in effect. Oh, he's brawning you to Beta Corvi, but there isn't anything contractual after that.”

“So?”

“Helva, I don't mean for you to be left high and dry. Especially with an incredible extension of debt which you must work off. And with Chief Railly overtly your enemy because of Parollan. Now that guy may have been a brawn-brain ship supervisor for the last twelve years, and bloody good at it from what I hear, but that doesn't mean he's going to be a good brawn. By anything left holy, Helva, it's a long way from telling to doing.”

“Do you remember my last brawn, Teron of Acthion, that well-trained, physically stalwart twithead?”

Rocco gave a long sigh that ended with a grudging grin. “Okay, so he was a dud that BB School turned out by mistake. You can go too far in the opposite direction.” Obviously Rocco felt she had with Parollan. “Seriously, Helva, that contract extension makes my skin crawl. You're committed to repaying almost 600,000 credits . . . by the latest figuring.”

“You do have good sources, Rocco.”

He grinned again, maliciously. “In Double M, I've got to. Look, there's a lot more to this whole affair than the fact that in a scant ten years you paid off your original indebtedness to Central Worlds for your early childhood care, the initial shell, education, the surgery needed to fit you into this ship, maintenance, and so forth.”

“I paid off partly due to Niall Parollan, remember?”

“Granted, granted.”

“And when this cycle-variant drive we're taking back to Beta Corvi gets approved, we'll be out of debt in next to no time.”

“Not when, Helva.
If
. If wishes were horses, beggars would ride. I saw the reports on that cycle-variant drive, Helva. I heard what happened to the manned test ship.”

Helva snorted with contempt. “Ham-handed fools.”

Rocco would not be diverted. “I don't mean the fact that they inadvertently cycled the power source too high, Helva, I mean that curious discharge that is worrying the nuclear boys juiceless.”

“Why do you think we're taking it back to Beta Corvi?”

“And thank the gods that
you
are.” Rocco recrossed his neatly booted legs in a nervous fashion. “Whatever that particular force is, it's bloody dangerous.
And
no one seems to know why or how.”

“They'll tell me.” At least, she amended privately, she thought they would. If only because the use to which humans put their minor form of stabilized energy amused them. (And what did you do on Beta Corvi for an encore, Helva?) She was far from happy about having to go back to Beta Corvi, but the ends justified the means . . . she hoped.

To have a warp drive in her bowels! To soar when she'd been forced to plod in a plebeian fashion. And the hell with Rocco's “if” . . . although the if was a valid consideration. Still, she trusted the Corviki: she'd
been
a Corviki.

“Look, Rocco, that drive is worth a great deal of hassling and stress. Niall knows it. I know it.”

“Why?”

“The cycle-variant is faster than light drive, it's warp. By being able to stabilize an unstable isotope at just the moment it is releasing its tremendous quantity of energy, the cycle-variant drive captures all that energy because the isotope doesn't dwindle downscale to a useless half-life. It remains at the constant high-energy peak. That output is controlled in its cycle of peak energy, and the rate of thrust—the speed of the ship powered that way—is determined by the ratio of cycles used at any given time. True, you can't lift off-planet on c-v drive, and a ship has to be structurally reinforced.”

“And that odd trail of particles?” Rocco asked sardonically. “Those unknown thingies that have thrown communications haywire, loused up astrogational equipment, not to mention the solar phenomena recorded in the systems through which that test ship ran?”

Helva was silent. She was less certain of how the Beta Corviki could cope with those emissions. Unless there'd been a simple perversion of the data?

“Then there's the old philosophical question: Is this trip
really
necessary? Is man ready for this sort of progress?”

“Rocco! I'd thought better of you.” Helva was surprised as well as scornful. “ ‘If man were meant to fly, he'd've been given wings.' “

Rocco regarded Helva with great tolerance and some sadness. “Helva, in my job, I become painfully aware that some progress costs too much in terms of human adjustment, or emotional, psychological, or even physiological stress.”

“On the pro side, look at the exploration potential for a hundred different minorities.”

Rocco sighed. “I suppose we're committed to progress at any cost. Onward and upward for bigger, better, faster, smaller, tougher. However, back to my original topic, your coercion.”

“There isn't any, Rocco.”

“Oh? Have you any idea, Helva, how many circuits lead into this?”

“I know of a few, but I think you're going to tell me.”

“Setting aside your understandable yearning to be the fastest virgin in the Galaxy—and you'll need the speed with Parollan aboard . . .”

“Tsk, tsk, jealous?”

“Or Parollan's wish to prove himself a better brawn than the prototype, we have dear Chief Railly, all set for that jump onto Central Worlds Council.”

“Is that why he's been on our backs like a leech?”

“You didn't know? Tsk! Tsk on you, Helva. Yesiree ma'am! Since the civilian branch has blown it with their manned ship, think of all the glory accruing to one Chief Railly for getting the drive approved, of getting
you
, the very valuable and very well known 834 to extend her contract, thanks to his masterful handling of the negotiations.”

Helva made a rude noise. “Parollan masterminded it.”

“Undoubtedly he did, but Railly gets the official credit. Not only does Railly have a finger in your pie to be gold-plated; Dobrinon has first whack at the biggest Xeno plum in psychological history; Breslaw is frankly starry-eyed with visions of commanding the warp-drive squadrons.”

“Rocco? What's in it for you?”

“Me?” Rocco made his eyes innocently wide.

“I'd've thought you'd be flogging me, too, to rescue the four I left behind me. —Oh, so that's it. Yes, they would be classed as mutant minorities.”

“That's the kindest designation.” Rocco cleared his throat.

“Yes, there was a lot of unfavorable publicity about them. I'd've thought the news value long since exhausted.”

“It wasn't so much publicity, Helva,” said Rocco, again biting the corner of his lip thoughtfully. One booted toe swung up and down. “No, society just doesn't like its members opting out of its grasp, particularly into a total alien form.”

“Not to mention leaving their bodies behind.” Helva had always wondered what had happened to the empty husks of Kurla Ster, Solar Prane, Chaddress of Turo, and . . . Ansra Colmer. But not so much that she could bring herself to ask. When she and the rest of the dramatic troupe had, presented
Romeo and Juliet
to the Beta Corvi—in exchange for the stabilization of isotopes—they had had to use “envelopes” suitable to the methane-ammonia atmosphere of the planet. A timer had been rigged in the transfer helmets to insure that that consciousness returned to its proper environment. After the final performance, four people had not returned and were encapsuled in the Beta Corvi envelope. For very good and understandable reasons, or so Xenologist Dobrinon would like her to believe.

“There has been considerable pressure, you know,” Rocco was saying, “on both SPRIM and Double M to investigate their defection/emigration/temptation . . .” He shrugged at the euphemisms employed. “Or at least to bring back conclusive evidence that they are happy in their new lives.”

“I know two who are—three. Solar Prane has a new body; Kurla couldn't care less about hers so long as it was near his; Chaddress had nothing to look forward to in retirement, and Ansra Colmer . . .”

Rocco eyed Helva keenly, expectantly. “And Ansra Colmer . . .”

“Oh, the Corviki knew how to handle her.”

“Hmmm.”

“But aren't you slightly in conflict with yourself, Rocco? I mean,
you
class shell people as mutant minorities, though strictly speaking I'm a cyborg—”

“Yes, Helva,” Rocco sounded purposefully pathetic, “the boot does pinch.” His foot in fact was swinging, which was an unconscious gesture that would intrigue the good Dobrinon. “I cannot reconcile coercing you to find out if the . . . flitting four were in any way coerced.”

“I quite appreciate your dilemma, so I'll lift you off one horn. I do not, not even after all your interesting disclosures, consider myself coerced. Ah ah,” for Rocco began to protest. “Pressured? Possibly, but I've been conditioned to a fine sense of responsibility, you see. I brought the equations for that nardy drive back to Regulus, and I inadvertently misplaced four passengers who were, you must admit, essentially my responsibility to convey thither and hither safely. I'd like some peace of mind on both counts.”

“I'll forego knowing about our lost souls if you'll forego that drive.”

“No way. I want that drive. How else can we pay off my indebtedness?”

“I'll call foul for you?”

“Rocco, I'm surprised. Shocked! This cannot be the incorruptible . . .”

“Damn it, Helva, I want you out of that contract and out away from Parollan. He's dangerous!” Rocco was on his feet and pacing.

“Good heavens! Why?”

“He's got a fixation on you, a brawn fixation.”

“Who told you that? Broley? Oh, fardles, Rocco! Because he had the Asurans extrapolate a solido of me from my genetic background?”

“You knew?”

“He had a set made of every BB ship he supervised.”

Rocco pointed a finger at her. “You're different.”

“Quite likely. He's
my
brawn. Bluntly, Rocco, you're making a tempest in a teacup.”

“A fixation could be dangerous to you in space, Helva, in a man of Parollan's sexual appetite.”

“That fixation reached critical . . . and passed. That's why Niall became my brawn. He's far more aware of the inherent dangers of a brawn fixation than you are, Rocco. Or Broley.”

Rocco affected a shrug, but Helva suspected he was unconvinced.

“All right, Helva, we're back to Square One and I'll rephrase my initial question: Do you want what you now have, or were you
made
to want it?”

“Hey, Helva,” Niall said into the com-unit, “let the lift down.”