The Last Starfighter (24 page)

He imitated the bite precisely, resigned to carrying on the charade to its eventual conclusion. Again the female beneath him giggled.

“Oh, Alex.”

She kissed him passionately before zipping up the sleeping bag the rest of the way. This occasioned a moment of panic on the Beta’s part since it temporarily obscured his vision. He twisted around inside the bag. To his relief his new position did not displease Maggie, and he was once more able to study the activity below.

There wasn’t much to see now. Both young humans had all but disappeared inside their own sleeping bag. He could still hear them quite clearly, though, thanks to his advanced audio sensing equipment.

“The other girls,” Blake whispered, “meant nothing to me. It was you I always wanted with me. You.
You!
” More kissing sounds, followed by the girl’s voice.

“Oh Jack, talk dirty to me!”

The Beta tried to interpret and organize this dialogue as Maggie pulled him deeper into the confines of the sleeping bag, shutting off his view a second time. Her hands were very active. The Beta allowed his human form to respond appropriately (
that
much programming was provided for, at least) while he made mental notes and recorded the information for future use.

“The other girls meant nothing to me,” he whispered. “It was you I always wanted with me. You.
You!
”

He then kissed Maggie and waited for the next reaction.

There was a reaction, all right, but not quite the one he’d anticipated.

The sleeping bag stopped moving as Maggie suddenly froze beneath him. He could feel the sudden tenseness in her and wondered frantically what he’d done wrong.

What now? He considered repeating the short speech and decided not to since the effect it had produced was not the one expected.

“What . . . other . . . girls . . .?” Maggie inquired through clenched teeth.

Definitely the wrong speech, the Beta decided. It was obvious some sort of reply was expected, but he was at a loss what to say. All he could think of to do was to plunge ahead and hope for the best.

So he said, “Should I talk dirty to you now?”

Evidently it was not an inspired choice, because a furious Maggie suddenly began fighting her way clear of the sleeping bag’s confines while trying to refasten her clothing at the same time. She was still working on the latter by the time she’d escaped the bag. She stood glaring down at him as she worked with buttons and straps, her feet sinking into the soft sand.

“What’s wrong?” the Beta inquired weakly. “What did I do, what did I
say?
”

Her fingers worked on her pants. “Well if you don’t know, I’m certainly not going to tell you!”

Human, he thought. How typically human. How was he expected to cope with such an absurd social fabric? How was anyone expected to handle a race that came forth with statements like that?

As far as the Beta was concerned, Maggie’s words closed the last circuit. He was out of patience, out of confidence, and out of control. He climbed out of the sleeping bag and confronted her, and he was at least as mad as she was and twice as frustrated.

“That’s it, that’s all I can stand! I give up! Let them requisition me for spare parts, let ’em recommission my logic function, let them assign me to quality management . . . I can’t take it anymore, I’ve had it!” Maggie stared back at him in astonishment.

The Beta finished it. “I’m not Alex Rogan!”

From his position in the bushes overlooking the beach, the state trooper monitored this exchange with interest. As he listened he quietly removed the pistol from the holster at his hip. It was not a standard-issue .38. In fact, it had no caliber at all, relying for its effectiveness on a silent pulse of contorted electrons.

That was appropriate, though, because nothing about the trooper was standard-issue. Not even its face, which was a latex-like material stretched over false muscles connected to his own. No electronic illusion this time, but a true mask.

Keeping its eyes on the target it raised the peculiar pistol and aimed carefully. The target was still unaware of its presence and it waited for a clear shot. The cluster of adolescent humans did not notice him either, engaged as they were in the performance of their primitive rituals farther down the beach.

Maggie finally found her voice and, with it, the only explanation she could come up with to explain Alex’s bizarre behavior.

“Alex, I thought we’d talked about this before. I thought we’d agreed between us that no matter what any of the other kids tried,
no drugs
.”

“I’m not functioning under the influence of hallucinogens, Maggie, or anything else. They’d have no effect on my system in any case. Nothing would, unless you spiked my receptors somehow.” A sound made him pause, followed by the sight of a half-glimpsed shape moving in the bushes above them. Its silhouette was human, its infrared image decidedly alien.

“Maggie, get down!”

The Beta lunged at her as the assassin fired, caught a single burst in his side just beneath the left arm. Cloth and imitation skin disintegrated. The shot would have killed Alex Rogan or any other organic instantly. It only scorched the Beta’s lining.

He tried to turn to get a better view of the assailant while shielding Maggie at the same time. Any other night Maggie would have enjoyed the tussle and would gladly have let Alex come out on top, but just then she was more than a little confused and unwilling to continue without a much better explanation of his behavior.

One thing she noticed immediately, however. It struck her even more forcibly than his inexplicable actions.

“Alex, have you been working out?”

“Have I what?” Electronic eyes searched the vegetation surrounding the parking lot.

She pushed against him, trying to get up. He didn’t budge. Strong as she was, she couldn’t move him an inch. It was like pushing against iron.

“When did you get so strong? Damn it, Alex, let me up!”

“I can’t, and stop squirming. They’re shooting at us.”

Either it didn’t register or else she didn’t believe him. When they seized on a thought and made it their own, the Beta had learned, humans were impossible to persuade. It was part of the same biological equation that made Alex Rogan a potentially great Starfighter but kept Earth classified among the immature worlds.

“What are you talking about, Alex? I swear, I don’t understand you anymore.”

“I told you,” the Beta snapped as he tried to get a fix on the assassin’s position. It had to be moving now, wondering why its first shot hadn’t turned its target into a motionless mass of smoldering flesh. Confusion would buy the Beta some time. “I’m not Alex. I’m a duplicate of him, a simulacrum, a Beta unit.”

“Your elevator’s not going all the way to the top, is what,” she said, gaping at him.

“I’m an exact duplicate of Alex. I’m covering for him here while he tries to help the League against the Ko-Dan armada and Xur’s renegades. It’s my job, and it’s required by regulations. You can’t just yank some primitive off his world without replacing the resultant hole in the social fabric. It could be damaging to local development, especially when it involves someone who shows unusual promise of influencing his society, like Alex.”

Maggie listened to all this quietly, said by way of reply, “Huh?”

Exasperated beyond words, the Beta pulled open his shirt. Maggie watched uneasily, wondering what his intentions were, wondering how to cope if she had to with a drug-crazed boyfriend who might say or do anything.

However, those thoughts vanished when that same boyfriend followed the opening of his shirt with the opening of his chest. There was no blood, and after flinching in horror for a split second she found herself staring at a metal surface spotted with small ports and windows. Behind the transparencies, lights glowed steadily or winked on and off according to some alien pattern.

“Look, I’m a robot. Get it? How detailed a picture do I have to draw for you, you dumb human adolescent?”

“Gggg-gggg!”

The Beta spoke calmly as he refastened his artificial skin and clothing. “That is not in my vocabulary, but somehow I get the feeling it means I’m not making much progress. It doesn’t matter. Just keep down. I don’t want you killed by a shot meant for me.”

There would be no second shot, however. The ZZ-Designate had seen and heard enough. It rose and bolted for the stolen police car. The Beta detected the retreat. The assassin’s gait was quite human, but just stiff enough to confirm what was already suspected.

“There it goes!”

He took off in pursuit, cursing the slippery sand that slowed him while wishing Centauri hadn’t been too damn cheap to spring for installation of the optional levitation unit. No point in bewailing that omission now.

“Alex!” Maggie was struggling to follow. After-images of the Beta’s internal lights lingered like ghostly fireflies on her retinas. She stumbled up the slope toward the half-buried steps made out of old railroad ties. “Alex, or whatever you are . . . wait for me!”

The assassin was having its own problems. Not only had it been sent on a futile hunt, at great difficulty and expense, but its quarry had turned out to be a modern Beta Unit—and quite capable of killing it, the alien knew. What mattered now was reporting back to command and informing them that the switch had been made. As to the location of the real target, that wasn’t the assassin’s problem any longer.

But it had to make that report.

Back inside the stolen land vehicle, he fumbled with the primitive controls and finally succeeded in activating the smelly internal combustion engine. The police cruiser screeched backward, stopped, then roared out of the parking lot.

Without hesitating, the Beta jumped into the nearest available vehicle. This happened to be Jack Blake’s precious pickup. Information raced through storage chips located in the Beta’s torso.

Truck, land vehicle, activation of: turn this bit of metal, engine function on, push this level, push down on this pedal.

The pickup burned rubber as it swung around in a curve that left it facing the exit. As the Beta prepared to shift into drive, the door on the passenger side opened.

“Wait!” Maggie yelled as the truck started forward.

“Let me go! If that assassin reports in to Xur and the Ko-Dan that I’m not Alex and that he isn’t here, then Alex is in big trouble. Stay here!”

“I’m not staying anywhere until I find out what’s going on!” She pulled herself up into the cab and dared the machine in the driver’s seat to throw her out. “And I am
not
a dumb human adolescent, tinman!”

“Stubborn, then,” said the Beta. There was no time for arguing. No time for anything except running down the assassin before it could file its report. “You may not like what you find out.”

“I don’t like it already.”

He nodded, and sent the big pickup thundering toward the access road leading to the highway.

The sound of the pickup pulling out of the lot galvanized Jack Blake into action. The assassin’s pistol had done its work silently, and even the Beta’s shouts and Maggie’s replies hadn’t been loud or violent enough to draw his attention away from the heated activity of the moment. But the sound of that particular engine was as near and dear to him as his own heartbeat.

He tried to throw himself clear of the sleeping bag, only to find himself held in check by a pair of clutching hands.

“Jack,” the sultry voice beneath him moaned, “Jack, for God’s sake, not
now!
”

“Dammit, Cindy, let go of me!”

“That’s not what you were saying a minute ago.”

“Let me go, Cindy!” It was amazing how strong those perfectly manicured fingers had suddenly become. He tried to stand. The bag rolled. Cindy started laughing as they headed for the lake, Jack Blake’s piteous cries fading as his mouth filled with sand.

“Hey! Come back! Scratch that paint and you’re dead, Rogan! You hear me, you’re dead . . . Cindy, let
go
of me!”

Activity of a different kind reigned aboard the ships of the Ko-Dan armada. Final preparations were underway. The crews worked in silence, speaking only to give or acknowledge commands. This was to be a landmark day in the history of the Empire, and they were privileged to be a part of it. Their names would be writ large in the history of Ko-Dan expansion and conquest. No soldier could wish for more.

In the command room a subofficer turned from his console. “All ships are at battle ready, Commander. Probes indicate there has been inadequate reestablishment of the energy shield around Rylos. We are ready to break through.”

Xur smiled, spoke the single word uppermost in his mind for many years. “Invade.”

Next to him one of the senior Ko-Dan aides spoke to Kril. “Commander, the Xurian ships have not yet answered the invasion code.”

Kril considered. “That’s odd. They were supposed to wait for our call while concealed on one of the large asteroids in this area. They are to precede the armada in the hope that they can convince the government to surrender peacefully and accept Xur as regent.”

“That is how I understand it to be also, Commander. The lack of a reply suggests some difficulty.”

“What difficulty?” Xur’s interruption was an unpardonable discourtesy which the weary Kril accepted silently. “The Frontier is nothing but an empty phrase now that the shield has been destroyed. As I said, the moon of Galan is eclipsed. The Starfighters are dead. Invade!”

Kril thought further. If anything went wrong, he was the one who would have to answer with his eyes to the Imperial War Staff, not this Rylan harlequin.

“We should wait for word from your people, Xur. It would be best if Rylos could be taken without fighting. It would make the other members of the League see the hopelessness of resistance.”

“Where is your love of battle?”

“My love is for my Emperor, for my family and for those who serve under me, Xur. And for conquest, yes, but at the cheapest price obtainable. As for attacking at the moment of the Galan eclipse, surely you can forego that juvenile dramatic gesture?”

“I will forego nothing! This was planned and timed to the minute. I will tolerate no delay.”