The Crystal Seas

Chapter ONE

It was all about to start again. Richard Blade was feeling tense, not frightened-he had been beyond that for many years. In twenty years as a secret agent and then several more years of travels into Dimension X; he had seen and done nearly everything a man could do. There was nothing left in this world and little in any other that could actually frighten him. But a trip into Dimension X was a trip into the unknown, and Blade was always keyed up to an extra pitch of alertness when facing the unknown. He had to be. Otherwise he would have been dead a good many times, both on earth and in the «somewhere else» of Dimension X.

That «somewhere else» was still a mystery, even after the years of time and the millions of pounds that had gone into Project Dimension X. Its existence had been discovered the day Blade's brain was linked to Lord Leighton's computer. That computer had been almost a moron, compared to the brilliant scientist's latest creation. But it had served to fling Blade-somewhere. And after Blade's long ordeal of survival, in the «somewhere else,» the computer had also served to bring him back.

The discovery of Dimension X completely eclipsed Leighton's original project of linking a human and a computer intelligence. Being able to penetrate other dimensions and bring back their knowledge and perhaps resources to England was obviously an enormous breakthrough. So what had started out as an eccentric genius's private fancy suddenly became a Frankenstein's monster. Everybody seemed to want to get in on the act. Eventually Project Dimension X settled down to focus on four key people.

There was Blade, the only living man able to travel into Dimension X and return alive and sane, one of the most perfect physical and mental specimens alive. He only hoped that he could stay that way under the strain of successive trips into Dimension X. The one now only a few minutes away would be his sixteenth.

There was Lord Leighton. No doubt the scientist was waiting now in the main chamber of the complex far below the Tower of London, among the looming gray bulks of his computers. A hunchbacked, polio-twisted body, which looked like the caricature of a mad scientist's, housed one of the greatest scientific brains in history. It also housed one of the most irascible and ill-mannered dispositions, but anybody who had to work with Leighton for more than two days either got used to that or fled. The key men of Project Dimension X could not afford to flee.

There was the Prime Minister, who kept money in the project's budget and inquisitive politicians out. He kept his eye on the «big picture» and his band firmly on the administrative reins to keep Lord Leighton from galloping off in all directions at once. This administrative hold was badly needed.

And there was J, walking beside Blade at this moment, down the long, gleaming corridor in the underground complex. Blade stole a glance at J. The man looked older each time they met, but he still hadn't lost the appearance of an upper-grade civil servant. Under that near-perfect natural disguise lurked one of the great spymasters of modern times, a man held in respect and sometimes awe or fear on both sides of the Iron Curtain. As head of MI6, he had recruited Richard Blade from Oxford more than twenty years ago. As head of MI6, he had been Blade's guide and mentor and almost father-figure during those twenty years. Still as head of MI6, he did for Richard Blade and Project Dimension X all the things that scientists or politicians couldn't do. The strain had shown on him; that was obvious. But he was the sort of man who would not abandon his post as long as he was alive.

Beyond these four key men spread out a net of lesser figures-several hundred of them. Project Dimension X had tentacles reaching out in all directions, the brain children of various people. Lord Leighton was the most important of these, but he wasn't the only one.

There were a number of projects. One aimed at finding a way to send Blade to a specific dimension, rather than simply firing him off blindly into the unknown. Another project aimed at finding other people able to make the trip into Dimension X. That project had not, as yet, been successful. But nonetheless there was already still another project planned-for training those new people, if and when they were found.

There were psychologists who evaluated Blade's reactions. There were scientists working on large-scale transporting of materials from Dimension X. There were electronics experts who maintained the electronic surveillance system in the complex. There were security men guarding the project from the curious or the hostile. And there was paperwork piling up like Mount Vesuvius! Blade did his share of that, but he had never been a desk man. His place had always been out in the field.

Blade and J were now approaching the final door into the central computer chambers its electronic devices scanned them, compared their characteristics with those of people permitted to enter, and decided they were who they were supposed to be. The heavy bronze-hued door slid open silently. The two men passed on into the heart of the complex.

Leighton was nowhere in sight. But with the sureness of long experience, the two men made their way through the maze of chambers carved out of the rock. They passed white-coated technicians watching consoles and monitors that rose high overhead toward the bare gray rock of the ceilings. Some nodded or smiled in greeting; others were too busy with the work at hand. There was a tension in the air that one could almost cut with a knife. There always was when the sequence had begun for hurling Blade off into Dimension X. He had gone fifteen times, and come back fifteen times. But only a very insensitive or stupid man wouldn't wonder if this might be the time something went wrong.

The last door slid open. They were in the central chamber, with Leighton's master controls and Leighton himself. The scientist bustled over to meet them, moving his warped body across the polished stone floor with surprising speed and agility.

«Are you trying for a controlled return this time?» Blade asked the scientist.

Leighton shook his white-fringed head. «Hardly. The gear hasn't been adequately tested yet, not by any means.» Blade wondered about that, since Leighton's idea of a «hasty testing program» was three or four hundred complex experiments. However, there was never any point in arguing with the scientist on something in his own field. Leighton regarded anybody who did so as a fool, and he did not suffer fools gladly.

Blade realized that Leighton was going on. «Besides, you gentlemen up there»-he jerked a gnarled thumb toward the ceiling-«have neglected to establish a priority system for controlled returns. Where the devil do you want him to go? If you don't say anything on the subject, you know perfectly well he's going back to the Dimension of the Ice Dragons and the Menel. I don't care what you gentlemen think, the discovery of a nonhuman sapient race is the most important thing to come out of this project to date!»

«I'm quite aware of that,» said J. Blade thought his voice was a little chillier than usual. Obviously the old man was in no mood for an argument with Lord Leighton just before Blade went off into Dimension X. «But keep in mind that there are only so many of us gentlemen. Each of us can spend only so much time chasing all the hares you keep starting. So inevitably some things don't get done when you would like them to be done. If you could restrain yourself from asking for any new subprojects for about two years. .» J laughed. «But that would be like asking the sun to stop in the sky.»

«Joshua managed it,» put in Blade.

«I know,» said J, with another laugh. «But that was a miracle. And it would take another miracle to keep Lord Leighton's brain from coming up with more ideas for two years.»

Leighton laughed in his turn. «It most certainly would. But let's not keep Richard waiting while we argue.»

That was a notion Blade heartily supported. Now that the moment was actually approaching, the strain on him was, as always, close to its peak.

And as always, the routine of preparing himself relieved most of the strain. It was so familiar, so monotonous, so apparently pointless-and therefore so refreshingly normal, so much like ordinary life in Home Dimension.

It might not be pointless, of course. There was no way of knowing what would happen if he didn't smear foulsmelling black paste over every inch of skin. It was supposed to prevent electrical burns and other possible nastinesses from the jolt of current passing through him at the moment of transfer into Dimension X. Perhaps it did. Perhaps if he ever left out this step, he would wind up in Dimension X dead and charred as black as an over-fried chicken wing.

So Blade played it safe. He stripped himself to the skin, smeared himself with the black goo, and pulled on a loincloth. Then he stepped out of the changing booth and walked over to the main chair. One or two wires might have been added or taken away since the project began, but otherwise the chair looked the same. A black metal chair with black rubber padding on the seat and back, it stood on a thick rubber mat inside a glass booth. It always looked and always would look too much like an electric chair.

Blade sat down. Lord Leighton bustled about him, attaching the scores of cobra-headed electrodes to every part of his body. The cords of the electrodes ran off like a horde of multicolored snakes into the great computer. Blade looked up at it. The monstrous consoles in their gray, crackled finish loomed as high as ever, frowning ominously down on him in the dim light of the chamber.

It always seemed that Leighton would go on attaching electrodes until there was no more of Blade's skin to take them. It was always something of a surprise to Blade when Leighton stopped. But it always happened, sooner or later, and Leighton always stepped back to admire his work for a moment.

By this time J had parked himself on the small chair in the corner reserved for him. A mask of self-control had descended on his lined face as he watched Blade get ready to go into danger again. Blade knew that J loved him like a son, but both of them were caught in a net of duties that they could not give up-not without harm to England, and not until there was someone else to do each of their jobs.

Blade did not have to wait much longer. The big clock on the master control panel worked itself around to zero. The sequence-indicator lights all lighted up like a Christmas tree. The main sequence was in the computer's banks, ready to respond to the impulse from the master switch.

Lord Leighton's clawed hand hovered over the master switch, and his surprisingly bright, dark eyes looked questioningly at Blade.

Blade nodded.

«Good luck, Richard,» said J.

Blade nodded again. In this moment his throat was almost always too dry to talk. And his eyes were on Leighton's hand, now descending to pull down the switch. It slid down its polished slot and clicked into place.

As it did, the red lights on the panel suddenly began to swell and rapidly grow brighter, burning into Blade's eyes like miniature suns. In seconds the whole chamber was flooded with red light, pulsing and savage. Blade looked down at himself, saw the red light reflected in shimmering patterns from the glossy black grease on his skin. Or was it his skin that had turned glossy black? He stretched out an arm to look at it. It rose effortlessly. He stood up. Dimly, half lost in the red glare, he saw Lord Leighton and J shrinking away from him, transformed into dwarfed, apelike figures.

He drew himself to his full height. Now he felt himself expanding and growing like a giant. Not like a balloon-every bit of him was as solid as it had been before. His hand touched the rock ceiling. There was a moment of pressure, then the rock seemed to explode away from around his body in red-glowing fragments and go whizzing away into- blackness.

He rose up through the earth until his head broke the surface, and kept on rising. The earth gaped where he broke through, then closed behind him. He flexed his legs and leaped upward. His legs pulled free of the rock and earth. Now he stood in the Tower of London. Already his head was above the top of the flagpole on the White Tower, and as he turned from side to side to look over London, he continued to grow.

Black and shining, Blade grew, until he could see London spread out below him, lit with a hell-red glow from horizon to horizon. God-like, he stretched his arms out to embrace the city and seemed to hear it roar and pulse in response. Then the red light faded, and the city vanished. Blade stood alone in the blackness-the gigantic, terrible, blackness-knowing that this time he had been pushed beyond the normal human limits-into where?