George Zebrowski (14 page)

It had been the females who had seen what the Earthfolk were planning toward the end of the war, Gorgias thought bitterly, and it had been the horror of that telepathic vision which had contributed to the final collapse from within.

“… There was some variation among the planetary societies of the Cluster, but the basic model was usually military. In 4900, Gorgias the First united twenty worlds by force and shrewd alliances. By 5000 he had wiped out the original humanoids of the Cluster, leaving the hybrids dominant.…”

Lies. Gorgias the First had given his life to drive out Federation interests.

“ … Earth observers visiting the Empire during the following centuries came away with the impression that the hybrids were frantic workers, striving toward an impersonal future. Many historians insist that the war began as a mistake, but the Herculean reprisals were carried out with such fierce hatred of Earthpeoples that when war was finally declared in 5148, the Federation was forced into a
de facto
policy of extermination toward the enemy; nothing less was effective.…”

No one ever mentioned the Federation bases and armed, exploitative colonies which would not leave the Cluster after the formation of the Empire, refusing to accept Herculean law after centuries of existence within the Empire’s bounds.

“… and in battle it was virtually impossible to take a Herculean alive. The few who were captured usually found a way to kill themselves, often taking their guards with them.…”

What of the games played with prisoners, the systematic humiliations designed to drive them into senseless fury and suicide?

“… By 6200 the Empire was in ruins, following three quiet spells of about fifty years each. But many powerful renegades remained free, looting and destroying Federation colonies.…”

Gorgias felt a surge of pride for those lonely survivors who warred alone.

“… The greatest of these was Gorgias and his son of the same name. The father had been a young captain when the war ended, and he was never captured. Legend has it that he was nearly five hundred years old when he died in 6600, leaving his resources and spirit of resistance to his son, who is still free, it seems, and in possession of his father’s Whisper Ship.…”

Was there a hint of admiration in the commentator’s tone?

“… Gorgias’s son has been a terrorist in the name of vaguely defined political goals. Twenty years ago it was thought that some accident had overtaken the Whisper Ship, since its attacks had stopped suddenly. Hunters go out year after year, following each new attack, at great cost and without success. It seems certain Gorgias the Fourth is the last and most resourceful of the renegades. Many doubt that he will be easily killed or captured.”

“Five thousand Herculeans survived the death of their empire, fleeing from one Cluster planet to another as the worlds were sterilized. Today’s Herculeans are thinly scattered across fifty star systems in the Federation Snake, where they are outcasts. A half dozen popular names have been given to them. Unlike Gorgias, they are harmless folk now, busying themselves with a religious cult which has its center on Myraa’s World, a planet named after the Herculean woman who heads the revival.…”

Poor Myraa, he thought, living among shadows and delusions.

“… Romantic stories say that an army of Herculeans escaped into the Lesser Magellanic Cloud, one hundred seventy thousand light-years beyond the Galactic Rim.…”

I’ll find them someday, Gorgias promised himself.

“… It would be an impossible task to locate them among all those far stars. But even if the army existed, how effective a force could it be today? Would the surviving generation have any desire to carry on the fight?”

The army might be in stasis, he thought, ready and waiting for a leader to set it in motion.

“… A few modern strategists insist, however, that Gorgias draws power and supplies for his ship from a hidden base. An arsenal might be cached there, posing a danger if Gorgias could raise an army. Even a small force could do a lot of damage if it were equipped with some of the Empire’s legendary weapons.…”

All the weapons are real, he thought, and waiting.

“… The Whisper Ship is one of the old weapons, a virtually indestructible vessel which is said to be joined to the personality pattern of the owner, and destroys itself with terrible force upon his death, or if the link is broken through some other means.

“There is no list of weapons, some of which are thought to date back to mid-Empire. It is the survival of the weapons created toward the war’s end which continues to intrigue military historians.…”

The decisive weapon exists, Gorgias thought, but it had come too late to be useful. He had been looking for it since his father’s death, and one day he would find it.

“… One of the reasons for the utter destruction of New Anatolia, home world of the Empire, was that it had been the source of a frightening line of weaponry. The Herculean armorers had to be destroyed with their factories to shorten the war, to prevent them from releasing a weapon which might have turned the conflict in their favor.…”

There were still a few places where he had not searched. It
must
exist, he thought.

“… Although an amnesty has been offered a number of times, Gorgias has not responded.…”

And I never will
,
you fool
. The amnesty was only an effort to gain control of the Whisper Ship.

“… The cult on Myraa’s World deludes itself with a yearning for what is called personality fusion — a supposed step on the way to an omega point of mental development, the practical end of an observer-oriented, integrated science, so-called. The theorizing is often inarticulate, shot through with winged words, talk of a hyperpersonal society and an emergence into a new reality, as if one could waken from one dream into another. Needless to say, these claims are considered to be mere posturings, dubious at best. The cult is open only to Herculeans, but there are only a few hundred survivors on the planet, so the cult does not seem to have attracted very many from its own potential members.

“Myraa’s World is far out on the Galactic Rim, off the main Federation Snake of worlds. Many stellar mappers consider the planet to be one of a chain of widely spaced bridge stars linking the spiral arms of our galaxy with the Magellanic Clouds, which are throw-offs from our main system. It has been suggested by students of Herculean civilization that Gorgias sometimes visits the planet, but there has never been any evidence for this, despite numerous stakeouts.

“Today’s hunters are led by Rafael Kurbi, noted psychologist and historian, who has published works on the Herculean problem. He considers most histories of the war distorted and inaccurate. He argues that the enemy’s so-called madness was only apparent, a function, perhaps, of their high but normal metabolic rate, and their social structure which rewarded certain values once quite appropriate. Since we live more slowly, Herculean behavior seemed compulsive. And he insists that Herculean actions after the opening of hostilities cannot be viewed as typical. Earth’s past displays just as much madness. He is fond of citing vast quantities of Earth history, mostly prespaceflight and sunspace-bound, to support his views, which have gained some influence in recent years.…”

Gorgias found himself almost sympathizing with Kurbi.

“… Still, the majority of Kurbi’s peers do not take his ideas seriously. They cite the ecological catastrophe of New Mars, which had to be evacuated after a large asteroid struck the planet, bringing on a sudden ice age. Opinion is somewhat divided, however, about whether Gorgias engineered this disaster by diverting the asteroid into a collision with the planet, or took credit for a natural event.…”

The effect of such disagreements had been to slow the search for him, so they were useful. Gorgias wondered if Kurbi realized that the Federation had fought the great war out of envy, fearful that the Cluster worlds would come to dominate the Federation Snake in science and culture. Was he blind to the fact that Federation biologists had branded Herculeans as freaks, a mistake to be wiped out?

“… Against this colorful background, Marko Ruggerio is writing his newest work, a percussive cantata on ethical themes from the Earth-Herculean War. We’ll introduce him in a moment. The performance is scheduled for the great city auditorium on Wolfe IV, a quarter-klick-high structure of plastimet, complete with perfect acoustics and environs controls. The cantata is strongly influenced by the reconciliationist sentiments of personages like Rafael Kurbi. And now let me introduce Marko Ruggerio.

“ ‘Maestro, when do you expect to premiere your new project?’

“‘A year, most likely.’

“ ‘Do you have any special expectations about the work?’

“ ‘Yes — I think it possible that Gorgias may come forward after the performance.’

“ ‘Isn’t that a bit optimistic?’

“ ‘Not at all. Beauty hath power to soothe the savage beast, as they say. Seriously, I think he’s tired.’

“ ‘How can you know that?’

“ ‘My compassion tells me so.’ ”

Gorgias turned on the picture and looked at the two men. Ruggerio bore the face of a weakling, with protruding front teeth and bushy eyebrows — a man who would try to gain credit for his mediocre talents by attaching them to great issues. The interviewer wore a vacant grin, and looked a bit tired from reading the background material that had been prepared for him. They were both fools; but one was an important fool who would make himself useful. Gorgias turned off the recording.

The year was over. Marko Ruggerio was here in the city. Tomorrow evening he would climb to the summit of his career. Exotics from six worlds would try to seduce him after the concert. Everyone was preparing to feel greatly edified and proud of his or her Federation citizenship.

A year ago, disguised as an immigrant seaman from Sirius, Gorgias had bought a ticket for the concert. It had not been difficult, since he shared ancestry with the Sirians, going back to ancient Asia on Earth. One had to be very early for these cultural events, he had learned.

He turned on the screen and gazed out into the dark ocean. Fish fled from his light. A crab marched across the sandy bottom and hid behind a large rock.

Gorgias waited.

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THE GREAT ARENA breathed with the voices of a quarter-million people. Rivers of speech circled the black hole of the dark stage that would soon focus the massed attention of the audience. A few stars were visible through the dome as clouds pushed in from the sea.

Gorgias sat in the end seat of the last row, next to the eastern exit. The small viewer on his right armrest, where he would see close-ups of the soloists, was still dark. Billions of Federation citizens were waiting at home, on every world in the subspace net.

He had dressed in the one-piece, close-fitting black jumpsuit once worn by soldiers of the Empire, complete with markings of rank, even on the thick black ceremonial cape. No one would notice his mockery among the great variety of attires.

In the early morning hours, he had swum ashore with his boots and cape tied in a bundle on his back. The breakers had been heavy, knocking him over a few times before he reached dry land. He had checked into a cheap hotel in the dock area, and had spent the day watching local video programs.

Just before taking his seat in the arena, he had placed a small pulse projector below one of the rotating lenses in the ribbon of pickup cameras which would be set in motion when the concert began. Even he would be unable to predict from which direction the invisible beam would strike.

It was strange to sit among so many beings. He was an intruder at a strange ritual. Was his uneasiness visible? He was grateful for the dim lighting. He looked up and glimpsed a star just as a cloud covered it. Another revealed itself, and it seemed friendly in its remoteness. Sight of stars and gray jumpspace was the most familiar part of his life. Yet surely he was not so different from these people around him. For a moment he was a citizen of New Bosporus, with friends, position and decisions to make.

A dark-haired woman was looking up at him from two rows down, a faint smile on her lips. She turned away when he did not respond.

He looked at his timer. The light in the outer lock of the submerged ship would go on in one and a half standard hours, to aid him when he swam out from shore. He made an effort to imagine what could go wrong.

“Use your imagination,” his father had told him. “Examine the wild ideas. Sudden, half-formed suspicions may save your life. But never underestimate the simple, ordinary approach; it might work better than the elaborate. Be elaborate, then be simple — don’t be either for long.”

The whirl of voices died. The lights dimmed into darkness, leaving only starlight.

The stage burst into sight, transfixed by a circle of beams, revealing a hundred performers sitting at their instruments.

Some sat at consoles, tilted panels sprouting oversize push-buttons and giant levers. The only novel instruments on the platform were the massive percussion batteries, dating back thousands of years to Old Earth and the First Sunspace Confederation. Two of the drums were taller than the performers who would operate the overhead hammers. Around the consoles stood celesta, xylophones, six grand pianos, giant triangles, massive bells, clickers, iron anvils and two gargantuan wooden blocks with mallets swinging freely on chains — all linked to the consoles through amplification sensors.

The fifty male performers were dressed in black one-piece suits; the females were dressed in white.

Slowly, varicolored beams bathed the stage, splashing the musicians with a rainbow, until the kaleidoscope of transformations ended in a deep blue haze. Gorgias felt the hush of expectation in the audience.

Drums rolled through the stillness before creation — storminess struggling up from an abyss, weakening the restraining silence.…