The Stainless Steel Rat Gets Drafted

Chapter 18

We lay like this for an uncomfortable number of hours. Until the door was unlocked and a burly MP came in with our dinner trays. His brow farrowed as he looked down at us. I could almost see the feeble thoughts trickling through his sluggish synapses. Got food. Feed prisoners. Prisoners gagged. No can eat… Just about the time his thought processes reached this stage he turned and called over his shoulder.

"Sergeant. Got kind of a problem here."

"You got a problem if you are bothering me for no reason," the sergeant said as he stamped in.

"Look, sarge. I got this food to feed the prisoners. But they're gagged and can't eat…"

"All right, all right - I can figure that one out for myself." He dug out his keys, unlocked my chains, and turned to Morton. I emitted a muffled groan through my gag and stretched my sore fingers and struggled to sit up. The sergeant gave me a kick and I groaned harder. He was smiling as he left. I pulled off the gag and threw it at the closing door. Then pulled over the tray because, despite everything, I was feeling hungry. Until I looked at it and pushed it away.

"Hotpups," Morton said, spitting out bits of cloth. "I could smell it when they brought the trays in." He sipped some water from his cup and I joined him in that. "A toast," I said, clanking his cup with mine. "To military justice."

"I wish I could be as tough as you, Jim."

"Not tough. Just whistling in the dark. Because I just don't see any way out of this one. If I still had my lockpick we might have a slim chance."

"That's the message the general gave me?"

"That's it. We can't do much now except sit and wait for morning."

I said this aloud not to depress Morton any more, surely an impossibility, but for the ears of anyone listening to planted bugs. There might be optic bugs as well, so I wandered about the cell and looked carefully but did not see any. So I had to risk it. I ate some of my hotpup, washing down the loathsome mouthfuls with glugs of water, while at the same time picking up the discarded chains as silently as I could, balling them around my fist. The dim MP would be back for the trays and he might be off guard.

I was flat against the wall, armored fist ready, the next time the key rattled in the lock. The door opened a fingers width and the MP sergeant called out.

"You, behind the door. Drop those chains now or you ain't going to live to be shot in the morning." I muttered a curse and buried them across the room and went and sat by the back wall. It was a well-concealed optic bug.

"What time is it, sergeant?" Morton asked.

"Sixteen-hundred hours." He held his gun ready while the other MPs removed the trays and chains, "I got to go to the toilet."

"Not until twenty-hundred. General's orders."

"Tell the general that I am already potty trained," I shouted at the closing door. To think that I actually had had his neck in my hands. If they hadn't hit me - would I have gone the full three seconds and killed him? I just didn't know. But if I hadn't been ready then - I felt that I was surely ready for it now.

They took us down the hall later, one at a time and heavily guarded, then locked us in for the night. With the lights on. I don't know if Morton slept, but with the general bashing about I had had even the thin mattress felt good. I crashed and didn't open my eyes again until the familiar rattle at the door roused me.

"Oh-six hundred and here is your last meal," the sergeant said with great pleasure.

"Hotpups again?"

"How did you ever guess!"

"Take them away. I'll die cursing you. Your name will be the last thing on my lips."

If he was impressed by my threat he didn't show it. He dropped the trays onto the floor and stamped out.

"Two hours to go," Morton said, and a tear glistened in his eye. "My family doesn't know where I am. They'll never know what happened to me. I was running away when I was caught."

What could I say? What could I do? For the first time in my short and fairly happy life I felt a sensation of absolute despair. Two hours to go. And no way out.

What was that smell? I sniffed and coughed. It was very pungent - and strong enough to cut through my morbid gloom. I coughed again, then saw a wisp of smoke rising from the floor in the corner of the room. Morton had his back turned to it and seemed unaware. I watched, astonished, as a smoking line appeared in the floor, extended, turned. Then I could see that there was a rough circle of dark fumes coming from the wood. Morton looked around coughing.

"What…?" he said—just as the circle of wooden flooring dropped away. From the darkness below a man's gray head emerged.

"Don't touch the edges of the opening," Stirner said. "It is a very strong acid."

There were shouts and running feet in the hall. I dragged Morton to his feet, huried him forward.

"They are watching us - can hear everything we say!" I shouted. "Fast!"

Stirner popped down out of sight and I pushed Morton after him. Jumped into the opening myself as the lock rattled on the door.

I hit and fell sideways and rolled and cursed because I had almost crushed Morton. He was still dazed, unresponding. Stirner was pulling at his arm, trying to move him toward another hole in the floor of this room. I picked Morton up bodily and carried him to the opening, dropped him through. There was a shriek and a thud. Stirner went after him, wisely using the ladder placed there.

Heavy footsteps sounded in the room above. I jumped, grabbed the edge of the opening, hung and dropped. Into a half-lit basement.

"This way," a girl called out, holding open a door in the far wall.

Stirner was struggling with Morton, trying to lift him. I pushed him aside, got a grip and threw Morton over my shoulder. And ran. The girl closed the door behind us and locked it, then turned to follow Stirner. I staggered after them as fast as I could. Out another door that was also locked behind us, down a hall and through more doors.

"We are safe for the moment," Stirner said, closing and securing a final door. "The cellars are quite extensive and all of the doors have been locked. Is your friend injured?"

"Glunk …" Morton said when I stood him on his feet. "Just dazed, I think. I want to thank… "

"Discussions later, if you please. We have to get you away from here as soon as possible. I must leave you on the other side of this door, so you will follow Sharla here. The street outside is filled with the people who have gathered as ordered for the ceremony of killing. They have all been told that you are coming so they are all very happy to be of help in such an unusual matter as this. "

"Be careftil. There was an optical spying device in the room where we were held. They saw you and will be looking for you."

"I will not be seen. Goodbye."

He opened the door and was gone, vanished in the crowd outside. Our guide motioned us forward and held the door open. I took Morton's arm, he was still woozy, and we went after her.

It was strange and utterly unbelievable. There were thousands of people jammed into the street: men, women and children. And not one of them looked our way or appeared to take any notice of us at all. Yet when we stepped toward them they pressed tight against each other to make room for us to pass, moving apart again as soon as we had gone by. It was all done in silence. We walked through a continually opening and closing clear space, just large enough to let us get by.

I heard shouts in the distance - and shots! The crowd stirred and murmured at this, then they were silent again. We moved on. The crowd was in motion now as well, stirring and reforming. I realized it was deliberate, so that anyone watching from the windows above would not see us making our escape.

On the other side of the street a door opened as we approached, was locked behind us by a motherly-looking gray-haired woman.

"This is Librarian Grene," our guide, Sharla, said. "She is the one who organized your escape."

"Thank you for our lives," I said, which is about as thankful as you can get.

"You are still not safe," she said. "I searched the library for all the books that I could find on prisoners and escapes. Then, with the aid of our engineers adapted the formula we have just used. But I do not know what to advise next. The plan that I found in this book just carried to this point, I am sorry to say."

"Don't be - it was perfect!" Morton said. "You and your people have done incredibly well. And it just so happens that my friend Jim is the galaxy champion of escapes. I'm sure he will know what to do next."

"Do you?" the librarian asked.

"Of course!" I said with newfound enthusiasm. "We are well away from the enemy, in hiding - so they will never catch us now. How big is this city?" Grene pursed her lips and thought.

"An interesting question. On a north to south axis I would say the total diameter is…"

"No, wait! Not physically big - I mean how many inhabitants?"

"In the last population census there were six hundred and eighty-three thousand people resident in the greater Bellegarrique area."

"Then we are more than safe for the moment. I know these military types, know exactly what they will do. First they will run about in great confusion and shoot off guns. Then one of the bright ones will take charge, undoubtedly our old friend Zennor. He will have the roads blocked and try to seal off the city. Then he will start a house-to-house search. Starting right here in the nearest buildings."

"You must flee!" Sharla said with a lovely concerned gasp. I took the opportunity to pat her hand in my most reassuring manner. She had delicately smooth skin, I just happened to notice. I dragged my thoughts back to the escape.

"We shall flee, but in a controlled manner, not in panic, They will also be sending patrols to the surrounding area as soon as someone thinks of it. So the plan is this. Change out of these uniforms, join the people outside, leave the immediate area as soon as possible, find a safe place to stay outside the search area in the outermost part of the city, after dark leave the city completely."

"How wonderful!" Sharla said, eyes glowing beautifully. I was beginning to like this planet. "I will get clothes for you now." She hurried from the room before I could ask her how she planned to do that.

Her solution was a simple one - on local terms. She returned quite quickly with two men.

"These two seemed to be about your size. I asked them to give you their clothes."

"We are privileged to do this," the smaller one said and his companion beamed approval. "Shall we change."

"Not change," I said. "We'll take the clothes, thank you, but hide or destroy the uniforms. If you were found wearing them you would be shot."

They were stunned at this news. "That cannot be true!" the librarian gasped.

"It's all too true. I told you that I knew the military mind very well…"

There was a rapid knocking on the door and Sharla opened it before I could stop her. But it was Stirner gasping and wide-eyed.

"Are you all right?" I asked and he nodded.

"I was not seen, I came by a different route. But the strangers have beaten people, hurt them for no reason. There were explosions of weapons. Some are injured, none dead that I know."

"They must be stopped," I said. "And I know how to do it. We must get back to the dam, to the generating plant, Sergeant Blogh and the company will still be there. We have to get there before they leave. Tonight, because it will be too dangerous by daylight. Now - let's get moving. Find a safer place to lie up until dark."

"I don't understand," Stirner said.

"I do," Morton said, his newfound freedom having restored his intelligence. "It's that talking bird, isn't it? We hid it in that ammunition box—"

"Under the canteens of booze. Another reason to hurry before they drink all the way down and find the false bottom. When you heard that bird talk to me it was transmitting the voice of my dear friend. Captain Varod of the League Navy. A power for good in this evil galaxy. He is paid to keep the peace. He doesn't know where we are - yet. But he knew we were going offplanet. So that bird must contain some kind of signaling device or he would not have forced it on us."

"To the bird and salvation!" Morton cried.

"The bird, the bird!" we shouted together happily while the others stared at us as though we had gone mad.