The Grand Wheel

TWELVE

Marguerite Dom was sitting alone in his little yellow room when an urgent signal came from the bridge. He switched on the chamber’s holbooth equipment and within a couple of seconds was holled into the ship’s control-room, his parallaxed image free to move about there.

They were nosing deeper into the Cave of Caspar, waiting for a message that would tell them exactly where the rendezvous was to be. So far, their instructions were no more precise than that.

The bridge captain turned to him as his hol image appeared. ‘The sensors have picked up a device approaching us fast, sir. We think it’s a weapon.’

Dom stepped forward, then stopped at the markers on the floor that informed him of the boundaries of his yellow room. He stepped back, fumbling in the air until his hand closed on a control stick. His image glided forward, crossing the bridge and halting by the captain’s side, from where he could view the bank of displays by which the ship was guided.

The oncoming object was expanding on the forward telescopic screen. It was a long, thin pipe, hurtling through space like a spear.

‘That doesn’t look Legit,’ he remarked.

The captain attended to an information terminal that at that moment flickered into life. ‘It’s just been identified as Hadranic, sir,’ he said, straightening. ‘An unmanned self-programmed missile.’

‘This far back?’

‘No doubt the Hadranics have despatched them in droves, just for nuisance value.’

They watched as the Disk of Hyke carried out its own automatic defensive action. Its first volley of countering missiles were easily evaded by the Hadranic pipe, which then returned to the attack, its memory locked on to the Wheel ship. The Disk of Hyke was then forced to take evasive manoeuvres of its own, and finally destroyed the missile with a second volley.

Dom sighed when it was all over. For a brief time it had looked as if the outcome might be in doubt. It augured ill if their wait in the Cave was to be a long one.

‘We are much too exposed here,’ he said. ‘Hadranic missiles, Legitimacy battle fleets – and a major battle liable to begin any moment!’ He pursed his lips fretfully. ‘We might be well advised to get down on a planet somewhere, out of harm’s way.’

‘You are aware, sir, of the peculiarity attaching to stars in the Cave?’ the captain asked.

Dom nodded. ‘ Indeed, I cannot help thinking it is in some way connected with the choice of venue. But I would say that the risk of being caught in a nova is not too great, and certainly less than the dangers we face here in free space.’ He turned to the navigator. ‘How close are we to that archaeological team?’

‘Quite close, sir. They sent out another narrowbeam ten hours ago.’

Dom wanted, if possible, to get a look at the alien randomness machine the very first narrowbeam they had picked up had mentioned. He was interested in any new scientific treatment of randomness, especially if it came from a nonhuman source. But that first transmission had been an all-package beam, carrying a host of messages relayed by Cave HQ. Since then the Disk of Hyke had been intercepting local narrowbeam traffic and trying to locate the planet where the machine lay, but it had proved difficult.

‘An archaeological site probably doesn’t have very much by way of defensive armament,’ he decided. ‘Let’s go over there, Captain, and take a look. If we do it quietly maybe we can take over for a while.’

His parallaxed image flicked out as the captain acknowledged the order.

As the raiding party lunged over the arid, ravaged terraces, its half-tracks sent up a wake of dust. The Grand Wheel maintained no regular militia, but it understood the use of force perfectly. A space-tensor blanket had been thrown over the Legitimacy camp to forestall a narrowbeam SOS, and in effect the site was already in Wheel hands.

From where he sat in the leading half-track, Marguerite Dom could see people emerging from their tents and staring at the approaching raiders in puzzlement. They would not have guessed, yet, what was afoot. Nor was ignorance all on their side. Behind Dom the Disk of Hyke towered over the desert for twenty-three decks, looking more than anything like a scaled-up nineteenth-century riverboat. Most people aboard did not know yet that the ship had landed, and probably would not know when it took off again, so complete was the Wheel transport’s internal life.

In the event, the archaeological camp was practically unarmed. Even when the Wheel insignia was recognized, there was little shooting. Dom’s men strode from tent to tent, making a brief survey of each, herding the team members into sullen groups where they looked on, half-resentful, half-perplexed.

Half an hour later Dom stepped into the tent containing the alien machine. The first thing that caught his eye, however, was not the machine itself but a youth of about sixteen who lolled in an armchair, his face slack and exhausted.

He paused, looking the boy up and down. ‘Who is this?’

He was answered by Haskand, the Wheel scientist he had assigned to examine the machine. ‘His name is Shane, sir. He plays some part in the research project.’

‘So young? What’s his speciality?’

‘What does this boy do?’ Haskand asked a thin man in a white gown who stood nervously by. Wishom did not answer, but another man, with stern steady eyes and wearing the cloak of a Legitimacy official, glided up to stand behind Shane’s chair, placing a proprietary hand on his shoulder.

‘I am Shane’s guardian,’ Hakandra said. ‘No one answers for him but me.’

‘What’s wrong with him?’

Hakandra hesitated. ‘He is not well.’

Dom’s eyes strayed to the object of his visit: the alien device. The tent was crammed with modems, transformers and similar equipment, all of it wired up to the glistening drum.

‘I demand to know what the Grand Wheel is doing in the Cave of Caspar,’ Hakandra snapped. Then his eyes widened in alarm. ‘Has there been a coup?’

‘Be assured no such thing has happened,’ Dom smiled. ‘I am here on private business.’ He pointed to the drum. ‘I want to know all about that.’

‘Then this is treason. Attacking a Legitimacy installation, sabotaging the war effort—’

‘Do you know who I am?’ Dom asked caressingly.

‘No.’

‘I am Marguerite Dom, Chairman of the Grand Wheel.’

The Legitimacy people stiffened. The charisma of his name affected even them.

Dom stepped closer to the alien drum, peering at its glittering opaque surface. ‘I know you have a randomness machine of some kind here. There is no need for you to be silly or churlish about it. I might even be able to aid your investigations – wouldn’t that be nice for you? And besides, you are isolated here, unable to get any messages out. If you are obstinate I shall simply use any of a dozen perfectly effective interrogation devices, and that would spoil any spirit of accord between us.’

‘There was a civilization on this planet once,’ Wishom said. ‘This is a fermat of theirs that was found.’

‘Only a fermat?’

Shane gave a slack-mouthed giggle. ‘Liars!’ he exclaimed in a loud, cracked voice.

‘Quiet, Shane,’ Hakandra muttered.

Dom looked up from the alien machine. He came close to Shane, placing a hand on his brow. ‘He’s feverish,’ he observed. ‘He should be in the hospital tent.’ He looked gravely at the youth, as though at something of great beauty. ‘He has an interesting face – a rare quality, really striking. What is it about you that’s unusual, young man?’

With a suddenly savage gesture Hakandra knocked away Dom’s arm. ‘Leave him alone!’ he snarled. He placed both his hands on Shane’s shoulders and squeezed them hard. For a moment the two men confronted each other over the sick youth, their eyes meeting.

Shane gazed up at Dom. He began to ramble. ‘What are you doing here? You shouldn’t have come here. Nobody should come to the Cave. Lady never comes here. You’ll lose – lose – lose—’

Dom turned away as someone else entered the tent. It was Cheyne Scarne. Dom raised a questioning eyebrow.

‘I hitched a lift on one of the half-tracks,’ Scarne explained. ‘I wanted to see everything.’

‘Most commendable.’

Scarne stared at the tableau. He gestured to Shane. ‘What’s he talking about?’

‘We shall find out presently.’ Dom addressed Haskand. ‘I want to see this alien machine in operation. Judging by the set-up they’re obviously getting some kind of change out of it. Arrange it, will you?’

‘Shouldn’t we wait until I’ve studied their data notes?’

‘What for? Let’s see the show. If it is a fermat, maybe it will pay up.’

Haskand turned to Wishom. ‘Are you prepared to cooperate? I would appreciate it.’

Wishom looked dubious. He raised his eyebrows to Hakandra. After a moment’s deliberation the latter nodded.

‘I don’t know quite what your interest in this matter is, Chairman,’ he said, ‘but you plainly have the advantage over us, and I have no wish to be caught in any unpleasantness. Let me get Shane to his tent first.’

Dom had a sudden thought. ‘No. I want the lad to stay here until the experiment is over.’

He moved to the door, noting with satisfaction the look of guarded fury on Hakandra’s face.

‘Let me know if you need anything,’ he said finally to Haskand, and stepped past the two armed guards, beckoning Scarne to follow him.

They walked through the archaeologists’ camp. Just beyond its bounds were fresh mounds of earth and heaps of odd-looking artifacts. From the look of them, though, the digging and sifting machines had not been used for some time. A thick layer of dust had blown over them. Everything, Scarne guessed, had come to a stop because of the study of the randomness machine.

Dom spoke, his tone gloating. ‘They’re up to something,’ he said. ‘They are trying to hide whatever it is has to do with the boy. I have an instinct about him – see if I’m not right.’

A Wheel man climbed down from a parked half-track and spoke quietly to Dom, pointing to a small yellow tent that lay not far off. Dom instantly made for it.

‘That’s where their chief technician lives,’ he told Scarne. ‘All the data is there. Now we’ll really find out what they’ve been doing with that gadget.’

Inside the tent, one of Dom’s people was huddled over a reading machine to which was attached a transliteration modem. All around him were scattered tapes, papers and coils.

He looked up as Dom entered. ‘The Legits certainly lay some store by this device they’ve found, sir,’ he said. ‘They’ve been working all out on it.’

‘Well, what is it?’

‘They think it’s able to affect probability in some way, to increase or decrease it. But they don’t have it under control, that’s certain.’

Dom became very thoughtful. ‘What makes them think it can do that?’

‘There’s a new nova about thirty light years from here. They think the machine triggered it.’

Dom sat down as if in sudden surprise. ‘Well!’

‘It seems they were hoping to learn how to control the nova process here in the Cave. As you can imagine, sitting on top of a potential nova is something that drives the Legits crazy.’

Dom uttered a short, sharp laugh.

The scientist indicated the spread mass of tapes. ‘They don’t really have a clue how or why it works, though, and objectively a chance result like a nova would be difficult to confirm. These records only deal with uninterpreted responses the machine makes to specified inputs. It’s what they use to register those responses that’s interesting, and probably more important.’

He paused. ‘Well, go on,’ Dom murmured.

‘The Legits have been developing something they’ve managed to keep secret from us—’

He stopped as a high-pitched howl came from the direction of the research tent.

They looked at one another. ‘What was that?’ Scarne said.

‘It sounded like that youth,’ Dom answered.

Scarne bolted and ran towards the sounds of torment. Behind him, he heard Dom’s feet, pounding at a slower pace. The howling had died down by the time he reached the tent. He burst in to be greeted by a weird scene. The alien drum was blazing, throwing off an eerie light. The youth Shane was sprawled in his chair, his face ashen, mumbling into a microphone which Hakandra held to his lips.

Wishom, also, was bending over the boy, directing questions at him in a clipped, fussy voice.

‘It was like the last time,’ Shane said in faint, resigned tones. ‘As if tragedy was about to break now, in the next minute, and couldn’t be avoided – awful tragedy. Only nothing ever happens.’ He struggled upright. ‘That’s what it is,’ he said contemptuously. ‘A tragedy machine. Only you haven’t got it to work right yet.’

‘What,’ Dom interrupted, ‘is going on?’

Haskand sidled close to him. ‘The machine has some peculiar effect on the youngster. He was in quite a state. It shook me up, I can tell you.’

‘I knew there was something!’ Dom exclaimed softly.

He stepped to Shane, looking at him with concern. ‘Poor boy,’ he murmured.

He straightened to confront Hakandra. ‘And you have a considerable amount of explaining to do.’

Hakandra snapped shut his recorder. ‘To the Grand Wheel? Hardly. It is you who will be called to account when this charade is over.’

‘You mean when forces arrive to investigate what has happened here, I presume? I doubt that they will, until after we have left. We should be able to arrange for your usual reports to go out.’

The scientist who had been studying Wishom’s data entered the tent. He stared hard at Shane, then turned to Dom.

‘This is what I was about to tell you, sir. The boy is some sort of psychic sensitive. He can sense probabilities with his mind. When the machine goes into operation, it creates some sort of field which registers with him. He’s their instrumentation.’

‘He can sense probabilities?’ Dom echoed.

‘Yes, sir.’

‘You mean he’s a randomatician?’

‘I think it’s a little more than that.’

‘Why were you brought into the Cave?’ Dom asked Shane. ‘To study the machine?’

Hakandra hushed the boy, but he spoke up nevertheless. ‘I know when a star is about to blow,’ he said. ‘Usually, anyway. I give warning. At least,’ his mouth twisted wryly, ‘that’s what I used to do.’

‘But the nova process occurs at random here. Even randomaticians can’t predict it for a specific star.’

Shane shrugged.

‘Are there others like you?’ Dom asked after a pause.

‘A few.’

I want him, Dom thought. The Wheel had long suspected there was some such faculty in human beings. Gamblers and card players sometimes felt it – the certainty that the next card would be a particular card. But it was a certainty that occurred so seldom that it was easily put down to delusion. If the Legitimacy really had developed it, then they had a powerful weapon to use against the Wheel.

Equally, it could form a valuable adjunct to Wheel capabilities – something as useful, perhaps, as the luck equations.

‘Why were you screaming?’

Shane twisted up his face. ‘It hurts. It hurts so much. My talent is like a delicate flower. The machine bruises it, crushes it. It hurts.’

‘A talent for poetry, too,’ Dom murmured.

He faced Hakandra again. ‘It is plain you have been mistreating this unfortunate youth. I am taking him into my care, for his own good.’

‘No!’ Hakandra clasped his arms around Shane, his face suddenly desperate. ‘He belongs to me – to the Legitimacy!’

‘You do not know how to behave to a tender boy. You will do him permanent damage.’ Dom beckoned the two guards who stood by the door. They tore Shane from Hakandra’s grasp.

‘This is blatant kidnapping,’ the Legitimacy official stormed. ‘You won’t get away with it, Chairman. This is something that simply won’t be tolerated!’

The glare from the randomness machine had died down. Dom cast one last glance at Hakandra before he left.

‘Investigate the machine as best you can. Give me a daily report.’

Hakandra stood with clenched fists as Dom led Shane away.