Not a good approach. Calm military voice gets icier, explains all over again that our galactic odyssey is at its end. By now everybody else has crowded into the cabin. Nick Ludwig, yawning, demands to know the story. I tell him. Ludwig chews on knuckles and groans. Steen Steen says, “They can’t make us do anything. We’re safe here. If they try to land without permission, the robots will blow them up.”
Jan tells him patiently, “We’d be crazy to defy a Navy ship. Anyway, what good would it do? We’re stuck here until we get ultradrive transport out.”
Dr. Schein, meanwhile, is speaking in low, earnest voice to Pride of Space. Impossible to hear conversation because of general hubbub. When he turns away from audio, he looks old, gray, beaten.
“Somebody go and find Dihn Ruuu,” he says. “We’ve got to leave. Galaxy Central has its clamps on us at last.”
“Don’t give in!” Steen Steen cries. “We’re free agents! The era of slavery is over!”
Dr. Schein ignores him. “Nick,” he says, “get the ship ready. We’re going upstairs.”
Dihn Ruuu arrived; we explained things; and the robot arranged for our quick exit from McBurney IV. We left as we had come, with our engines cut off, and went eerily whistling upward in the grip of the same powerful force that had drawn us down. The robots who were controlling our ascent inserted us neatly into the orbit of the Pride of Space and let go; we switched to our own power, matched velocities with the big star-ship, and let ourselves be pulled into the custody of the Galaxy Central Navy. The sight of Dihn Ruuu brought the whole crew out to gape, up to and including the commander.
Commander Leonidas turned out to be a crisp, dapper little man of about fifty, with pale blue eyes and a warm, sympathetic nature. He made it very clear as soon as we were on board that he was simply doing his job, nothing personal in it.
“I’ve never had to arrest archaeologists before. What were you people doing — smuggling on the side?”
“We have done nothing but legitimate research!” snapped Dr. Horkkk, furious as always.
“Well, maybe so,” Commander Leonidas said, shrugging. “But somebody at Galaxy Central is upset about you. Pick you up at once, that’s what I was told! No delay! Tolerate no opposition! As if I was catching a bunch of sposhing mutineers.”
“What you are doing,” said Dr. Horkkk in his thinnest and nastiest of voices, “is preventing us from completing one of the greatest scientific accomplishments of the past ten thousand years.”
“Really, now? I hadn’t realized—”
“By your interference,” Dr. Horkkk went on, “you interrupt our journey just as we are about to solve the final mystery of the Mirt Korp Ahm, the High Ones, as you call them. You snatch us away at the moment of greatest accomplishment. The stupidity of the military mind is a universal curse that—”
Commander Leonidas’ sunny expression was beginning to darken, and I could see that if Dr. Horkkk kept it up, we’d finish the voyage in irons. Mirrik and Pilazinool saw it too, and tactfully moved in on Dr. Horkkk from opposite sides, pinning him between them and shutting him up.
Absolute dejection was what we all felt. We couldn’t understand what Galaxy Central was up to, but it was utterly clear that we were going to be hauled away from our work, forced to defend our actions before the bureaucrats, and probably prevented permanently from seeing the planet of the High Ones. By the time we got everything straightened out, some other expedition would have been assigned to that plum.
The Commander produced a little data viewer and said, “If you don’t mind, I’d like to take a personnel inventory. As I call your name, would you kindly acknowledge? Dr. Milton Schein?”
“Yes.”
“Pilazinool of Shilamak?”
“Yes.”
He went right through the list. Naturally, 408b of Bellatrix XIV did not reply. On the other hand, one robot of alien design had been added to the group but wasn’t on Commander Leonidas’ roster. Dr. Schein explained impatiently that 408b had been killed in an accident last December, that the robot was a High Ones product that we had picked up at the same time, and that Galaxy Central knew all this anyway, since he had passed it along via TP during our stop at Al-debaran IX.
“Aldebaran IX?” Commander Leonidas repeated blankly. “Your dossier doesn’t include any messages sent from Aldebaran IX.”
“In early February,” said Dr. Schein. “We went there after leaving the asteroid in the 1145591 system where—”
“Hold it,” the Navy man cut in. “Galaxy Central asserts that you were last heard from on a planet called Higby V, where you’re supposed to be conducting an excavation of some old ruins. You left Higby V without authorization and disappeared. That was in violation of your agreement with Galaxy Central, and therefore—”
Dr. Schein broke in, “We left Higby V to go to 1145591, and from there we went to Aldebaran IX, where I sent a complete TP report to Galaxy Central.”
“Not as far as anyone told me, Doctor.”
“There’s been a mistake,” Dr. Schein suggested. “A computer error — a data transposition — a dropped bit. This whole arrest order must be erroneous.”
Commander Leonidas looked troubled. Also puzzled.
Pilazinool said quietly, “Commander, precisely how did you trace us to McBurney IV?”
“I didn’t trace you anywhere. I was ordered to come here and pick you up. Presumably Galaxy Central knew you were here.”
“Galaxy Central did know,” said Pilazinool, “because Dr. Schein sent word from Aldebaran that we were coming here. At the same time, he received full authorization from Galaxy Central to make this trip. If Galaxy Central lost track of us after Higby V, as you claim it says, how could Galaxy Central possibly know we had gone to McBurney’s Star?”
Commander Leonidas had to admit the logic of that.
He fumbled through the text of his arrest order, looking for a solution to the inconsistency, and didn’t find one. Leave it to the galactic bureaucracy: the right hands know not what the left hands are doing. Or tentacles, as the case may be.
Pilazinool said, “Do you have TP personnel on this ship?”
“Yes,” said Commander Leonidas.
“I think,” said Pilazinool, “you’d do well to put through a call to someone at Galaxy Central right now and get things straightened out.”
“That might be a good idea,” the Commander agreed.
Getting anything straightened out with Galaxy Central is a slow business. Everybody important went off to the TP section, and a few frantic hours followed. What finally emerged was the realization that one officious vidj at Galaxy Central, remembering that we had promised to ship the globe there as part of the agreement letting us go on to 1145591, realized the globe hadn’t showed up. He called Higby V and found that we were gone, globe and all. If he had bothered to run a routine data-tank recap, he’d have found that we had sent word from Aldebaran that it had been necessary to take the globe with us. Instead, jumping two or three notches in the sequence of events, this particular blenking feeb had cleverly ordered a computer search of all ultraspace transit vouchers for the past six months, in order to find us, and thus turned up the fact that we had gone from 1145591 to Aldebaran and from Aldebaran to McBurney’s Star. We had Galaxy Central’s permission to do all this, but he didn’t check the correspondence tank, just the transit data. Whereupon this dreary zoob erroneously concluded that we were unlawfully running all over space on Galaxy Central’s thumb, as well as taking valuable property in defiance of an agreement, and decided to put a stop to this squandering of public stash by arresting us instantly. Hence the order to Commander Leonidas to put the yank on us at McBurney IV.
I repeat all this devious foolishness because it gives a beautiful illustration of how catastrophes can sometimes turn out pretty well. By the time Dr. Schein got finished making TP calls to Galaxy Central, you see, he had accomplished more than getting that dumb arrest order blotted. He had explained, to someone very high in the hierarchy, all about Dihn Ruuu, the Mirt Korp Ahm, and the hidden world of Mirt. And, since Commander Leonidas and his ultraspace cruiser are now conveniently in orbit around McBurney IV, it will not be necessary for us to wait weeks and weeks to arrange our transport to Mirt.