Again Atlan Read online

  Mercant studied me intensely. I realized that further denials would be quite useless. "Right," I admitted in a bored tone. "I called myself Olaf Peterson at the time. I was anxious to help you barbarians with your bumbling efforts to conquer space. It was painful to witness the trouble those problems caused your scientists and I used only data which are common knowledge among my people."

  I was amused by the shock to the attentively listening men in the room who became transfixed by my revelations. Mercant seemed to be equally amused. "Thank you for your frankness, Admiral!"

  "Not at all, sir. A man would be stupid to insist on lying when he's been found out."

  The Security Chief couldn't agree more and he abruptly changed the subject. "We believe you're a cosmic agent with a self-appointed mission. Our Arkonide friends Khrest and Thora know nothing about you. Evidently you've come to Earth by some unexplained accident."

  "Oh!" I exclaimed.

  Kosnow suppressed a little chuckle. His eyes brightened with a touch of malicious pleasure. He seemed to enjoy it when Mercant was rebuffed.

  "How old are you, Admiral?" the little man fired his next question.

  "I'll let you guess!" This question came dangerously close to my secret. The Defense Chief had chosen a very different approach. His fingers were nervously playing with an old ivory letter opener.

  "We'll find out," he promised affably. "You look remarkably young. I'd say about 35 years. How does this square with your long presence on Earth? Furthermore, according to our information, officers holding your high rank in the Arkonide fleet were never younger than 40. Nobody gets to be an admiral at 30!"

  "You're absolutely right," I said gravely. He quietly put down the letter opener. I knew already what was to follow. "You always carry a strange device on your body, Admiral. At your request we've refrained from opening your egg-shaped gadget. Do you still insist that it's not a weapon?"

  "Yes, sir!"

  "You've given us to understand that this device is necessary for safeguarding your health. Since we don't wish to harm you we've let you keep this instrument but we could change our mind about it, Admiral."

  Nobody had tried to intimidate me before but now Mercant held a fearful threat over my head. My thoughts turned to the mass of scars over my stomach which I owed to the cell-activator just referred to by Mercant. I shrouded myself in secrecy and the psychologists in the room seemed to feel uneasy about it. The Defense Chief was undeterred. I had a good hunch what he was aiming at and I became very uncomfortable by his threat.

  "I've conducted an investigation," he stated cursorily. "Assuming that this instrument is indeed essential to your life and must be continually carried on your body, it has been concluded that in the course of your stormy past you were several times compelled to swallow the micro-set. It is also a reasonable explanation for the surgical scars on your abdomen. This alone leads me to believe your claim that you cannot survive without your gadget. Of course this entails some momentous conclusions."

  "Is that so?" I asked ironically.

  "You've been on Earth much longer than you want to admit. We're going to investigate your history and under what other names you've lived in the past."

  "Why don't you do that, sir? But, it'll do you little good." He became a trifle impatient. "You ought to tell us the truth, Atlan. A man of your superior intelligence must know that it's perfectly senseless to balk at our inquiry. What do you expect to gain by it?"

  "I wish to go home," I said simply. "You know full well that we can't afford to grant your wish. Terra is considered to be destroyed and Perry Rhodan is presumed to be dead. If we permitted you to return to Arkon all mankind would be imperiled."

  "If your stories about the decline of the Arkonide Empire are true, I'll not betray you."

  "They won't respect your silence. Arkon is run by a robot autocrat. Moreover we find your promise of silence very hard to accept. How do you expect us to trust you if you stubbornly refuse to tell us the truth about yourself?"

  Allan D. Mercant was a very clever operator but he failed to realize that my word was more than a promise and I tried to teach him something about our ethics.

  "I regret that we don't know enough about the moral standards of Arkonide Fleet officers. At any rate, times have changed. If you tell us willingly who you are, where you came from, when you came and why, we can talk everything else over together. As it stands now we must consider you as an unknown factor that could be harmless or extremely hazardous."

  I was deeply convinced that logic was on his side. Yet I was not ready to divulge my secret. I probably would simply have met with their disbelief and it would have further aggravated my situation.

  Moreover this consideration was complicated by the fact that my deeply hurt pride prevented me from submitting to their demands. Just who did those Terranians think they were? My ancestors had known them as savages in the Stone Age and now they treated an Arkonide scientist and Fleet Commander like a criminal.

  I felt I was trapped in a dilemma. I was unable to overcome the deeply rooted weakness of my race. My extra-brain kept calling the Terranians enemies but my memory reminded me of the many friends I had found among them.

  "You're insulting me," I replied brusquely. "If you don't accept my word you'll have no other choice but to keep me in custody. I refuse to testify, which is my good right under your law."

  "Point zero, sir!" Lt.-Gen. Kosnow interjected

  I knew what he meant by this. The experienced agents of the Solar Defense had already learned from earlier questioning sessions that I clammed up emotionally at a certain point and Kosnow had always terminated the grilling when that point was reached.

  Mercant followed his example. He got up and tilted his slim head. "As you wish, Admiral. We'll have another talk this afternoon. By that time I should have more evidence available concerning your person. If I can prove that you were engaged in hostile activities here on Earth I'll put you before a court.—You better come clean, Atlan!"

  His abrupt change of tone made me wince. I could hardly blame him for becoming impolite and I seriously asked myself what I'd have done in his place. I probably would have treated a secretive alien with far less patience.

  Mercant left the room as Kosnow followed him with his eyes, turning to me after the door clicked into the lock. His lips were pinched in a worried expression. "You don't know Mercant," he implored me. "Why don't you start talking, for heaven's sake? Okay, we'll give you a few hours to think it over. Do you wish to meet the students in their final semester today?"

  I had trouble hiding my pleasure. During the past few weeks a custom had become established that I visited the large lecture hall of the Space Academy to answer questions of the young scientific community. I dealt mostly with problems of medical, biological, technical and colonial nature which had been encountered during the Arkonide policy of expansion.

  The engineers among the students wanted to know what propulsion systems and machinery had been used by us during that period and the astronauts expected me to confirm the accuracy of long and complicated calculations of hypertransitions.

  The building officers of the Strategic Space Fleet were anxious to learn how the Arkonide colonizers had handled alien populations.

  The discussions were highly stimulating and I was pleased to witness the avid interest in the past of my esteemed people.

  Therefore I assented to take part in today's lecture although I had other things in mind than using my photographic memory for the exclusive benefit of the Academy students.

  Since last week another factor, which I regarded as yet as unknown, had entered into my calculations. It was a human factor in the person of a young girl whose positive or negative reactions could be the key to the solution of my own equation. The girl was Marlis Gentner, a cosmobiology student who was not born on Earth.

  Marlis was the offspring of colonists who had come to Venus 60 years ago. Naturally she was proud of her forefathers who had to wrest from the jungles of
Venus everything they needed for their existence.

  I had already noticed that certain frictions existed between the new Venusians and the old Terranians. I considered such minor tensions normal and quite unavoidable. The history of my people had persistently shown that each colony strived for self-government after mastering its initial difficulties.

  The consequences were unpleasant for both sides in every case. Whereas the sociopolitical and economic problems invariably yielded satisfactorily to bilateral negotiations, it necessarily promoted a divergence of opinions up to the point of final mutual agreement.

  Marlis Gentner was a fervent advocate of justice. In her opinion the young state of Venus had been neglected in respect to its technological potentialities. I had not enlightened her that colonists were almost unalterably inclined to take this attitude. A perfectly satisfied colonist would have established an unthinkable precedent.

  A few days after I had first met her during one of our discussions she had publicly declared how strongly she resented my detention as unworthy.

  From then on we were drawn closer together and Marlis had shown signs of very human affection for me.

  Three days ago I had staked everything on one card and explained to her in a whisper where I had hidden a cache of my special equipment.

  When I arrived last month at Terrania, I had of course seen to it that I stashed away my vital equipment in a safe place but I had to leave a great part of my micro-aggregates behind when I was compelled to flee hastily in Rhodan's spaceship.

  If I succeeded in laying my hands on one particular piece of my equipment my days in prison would be numbered. Everything had been carefully figured out by me. There was no possibility of failure provided the unknown factor Marlis Gentner reacted positive.

  The two armored guards returned and pointed to the door behind which the elevator ascended to the roofport of the high-rise building.

  This was part of a routine I liked since it tended to lull—as all routines—the vigilance required of my guards. Even the eternally suspicious Tombe Gmuna didn't give it a second thought when he entered the forcefield next to me.

  We floated weightlessly up to where the rotary machine of the Solar Defense waited for us.

  The largest and most prestigious Space Academy of the Solar Imperium was located outside the spaceport.

  The shining roofs of the towering buildings were visible far to the east. Terrania; the 60-year-old capital of Terra and the small state of Solar planets, was already inhabited by 14 million people.

  It was an imposing city—I had to admit—which would take a ranking place in the Galaxy once it was known among the intelligent populace of the Milky Way. Up to now Perry Rhodan was still playing dead but this was bound to change very soon in my opinion.

  His bold ventures would lead sooner or later to Terra's discovery and I didn't care to be on Earth when that happened. My place was in the Crystal Palace of Arkon I, the foremost world of the known universe.

  As I climbed into the machine I had a fleeting thought of how valuable my discreet help could be for mankind. Should I have explained to the Defense agents that I, Atlan, had the honest intention to assist the ambitious Terranians on Arkon?

  It would have fallen on deaf ears and nobody would have believed my assurances in view of the official dogma that all Arkonides were degenerated. I refused to adhere to such heresy. I had to go home, come what may!

  3/ INVISIBLE QUARRY

  My discourse on Arkonide colonial policy and psychology of alien races had lasted two hours.

  Afterwards many students of diverse science branches had joined the debate. This was an hour of relaxation and pure enjoyment for me.

  Marlis Gentner, a tall willowy lass, who was normally so pert and eager, had failed to take part in the lively arguments and I had regarded her reticence as a positive sign. Of course I could have been wrong about this.

  I had seen her face bob up now and then like a pale flower among the many other heads and on such occasions it seemed to me that she observed me with the critical eyes of a psychoanalyst.

  When I thought of her I had a warm feeling of tenderness and I almost felt ashamed to make her betray her people.

  She obviously suffered the growing pains of all pioneers and it bothered my conscience to leave her in

  the dark. Moreover there could be no thought of an intimate relationship between us.

  She was young, beautiful and intelligent. Compared to her I was ancient and I had no right to entangle the young Venusian on the threshold of life in my uncertain fate.

  As I answered the debating points of the Academy scholars my logical extra-sense maintained that nothing had happened as yet and that I wouldn't take advantage of the help Marlis could give me by using it to the detriment of mankind. I merely wanted to return home and escape from my humiliating incarceration. No more and no less.

  10 minutes after 12 o'clock Lt. Gmuna put an end to the endless deliberations. I stood in a throng of students who either silently listened or heatedly aired the problem of whether a scientifically and technologically superior nation had any right at all to subordinate the inhabitants of primitive worlds in a pattern of colonization.

  The pro's and cons fired the controversy. It was stimulating to see how these Young people wrestled with a theme which had been the subject of investigation by the leading lights of the old Arkonide empire.

  My growing restlessness made me nervous and jumpy. I had to pull myself together to answer all questions clearly and to the point. Otherwise Gmuna would have become suspicious.

  Before long I noticed that Marlis had moved next to me. Of course Gmuna was unable to prevent my being frequently jostled in the course of the stormy conversation. It was the irrepressible habit of the students to get as close as possible to the fascinating stranger from the faraway Galaxy.

  Suddenly my glance crossed Marlis' big dark eyes that looked like an unfathomable mountain lake with a fire burning deep inside. Her eyes were still searching and questioning. I could see she was struggling with herself and I took it as proof that she had the desired objects in her possession.

  I could give her only a fleeting look. Gmuna was busy pushing the inquisitive students back again and the girl quickly used the opportunity. I heard her soft voice speaking in a subdued whisper. "Will you write to me?"

  I nodded ever so slightly. The tension was almost unbearable. Mercant had insisted on interrogating me once more this afternoon and I was afraid that it might come to a very unpleasant showdown.

  "Stand back or this will be the last lecture you get!" Gmuna shouted at the top of his voice.

  "I'll get in touch with you," I replied quickly.

  "Can I be sure that you won't fight against my people?"

  "I give you my word, Marlis. Please understand that I must go home!"

  "We'll meet in Port Venus. I'll break off my studies. Agreed?"

  A lump formed in my throat and nearly choked me. Suddenly all tension left her and she openly smiled at me. A flat, 8-inch-long container protruded from under her briefcase. I seized it too hastily but nobody noticed what I had done.

  I quickly slipped the flat case under my loose blouse and felt the two suction cups attach themselves

  through my shirt to the skin.

  I stood again with seeming indifference in the crowd which was slowly thinning out.

  Lt. Gmuna came back. He was still furious and I gave him a quiet smile. Marlis had vanished. She probably had done more for mankind than she could conceive at the moment. Now I was determined not to go back inside my energy fence.

  The possibilities my emergency equipment opened to me were still limited. Once I returned to the hermetically sealed house my light-wave deflector would be of no use to me.

  "Please, let's go," Gmuna said rather loudly. "Starting tomorrow I'll block off your place. I can't allow this to go on like that."

  When I started to laugh he expressed his annoyance. "You know exactly that everybody feels sym
pathy for you. Don't do anything foolish. I'll really have the hall locked up tomorrow."

  Gmuna had no inkling that his decision had come too late. I looked around once more to see Marlis but she was nowhere to be found. She probably already suffered agonizing remorse. I regretted that I hadn't had a chance to boost her confidence in a frank and long conversation after her daring deed. She knew me only from our impersonal discussions.

  Gmuna steered me to the exit where the two guards waited.

  We entered the elevator behind the instrument panel of the well-equipped lecture hall. I glanced at the television cameras which relayed my lectures to the listeners outside the hall which seated only 1000 persons.

  We went up to the roofport where Gmuna had parked the helicopter. I was very calm and planned the best way to escape.

  "The students will ask you for your autograph on the roof," my extra-sense predicted. I almost nodded. This had always been the custom. The students were a very resourceful bunch and they usually found ways to outsmart the Defense agents.

  When we stepped out of the elevator, all I could see on the concrete roofport was a mass of more than 1000 students who had come to get a glimpse of the famous mystery man.

  They were the overflow of students who could not be admitted to the lecture hall. Naturally they were not content with watching me only on television since they were anxious to participate in the question and answer session. Now they would enable me to make my break.

  Gmuna's guards shielded me with their shockguns held before them in their outstretched arms but they were unable to push back the crowd of young people who had come from all the continents of Terra and the populated planets. Before Gmuna could do anything about it, we were surrounded by an enthusiastic shouting mob.