“Aye,” she whispered. “We deserve to be conquered.”
“But you aren’t,” he said. “The southerners hold Scotha now, and Terra will recognize them as the legal government — with you the queen, Gunli. You’ll be another vassal state of the Empire, yes, but with all your freedoms except the liberty to rob and kill other races. And trade with the rest of the Empire will bring you a greater and more enduring prosperity than war ever would.
“I suppose that the Empire is decadent. But there’s no reason why it can’t some day have a renaissance. When the vigorous new peoples such as yours are guided by the ancient wisdom of Terra, the Galaxy may see its greatest glory.”
She smiled at him. It was still a wan smile, but something of her old spirit was returning to her. “I don’t think the Empire is so far gone, Dominic,” she said. “Not when it has men like you.” She took his hands. “And what will you be doing now?”
He met her eyes, and there was a sudden loneliness within him. She was very beautiful.
But it could never work out. Best to leave now, before a bright memory grew tarnished with the day-to-day clashing of personalities utterly foreign to each other. She would forget him in time, find someone else, and he — well — “I have my work,” he said.
They looked up to the bright sky. Far above them, the first of the descending Imperial ships glittered in the sunlight like a falling star.
The Warriors from Nowhere
“Crime,” said Captain Dominic Flandry of the Terran Empire’s Naval Intelligence Corps, “is entirely a matter of degree. If you shoot your neighbor in order to steal his property, you are a murderer and a thief, and will be psychorevised and enslaved. If, however, you gather a band of lusty fellows, knock off a couple of million people, and take their planet, you are a great conqueror, a world hero, and your name goes down in the history books. Sooner or later, this inconsistency seeps into the national consciousness and causes a desire for universal peace. That is known as decadence, especially among historical philosophers who never had to do any of the actual fighting. The Empire is currently in the early stages of decadence, which is the most agreeable time to inhabit: peace and pleasure, and the society not yet rotted so far that chaos sets in. One might say the Empire is a banana just starting to show brown spots.”
He was not jailed for his remarks because he made them in private, sitting on the balcony of his lodge on Varrak’s southern continent and enjoying his usual noontime breakfast. His flamboyantly pajamaed legs were cocked up on the rail. Sighting over his coffee cup and between his feet, he saw the mountainside drop steeply down to a green sun-flooded wilderness. The light played over a lean, straight-boned face and a long hard body which made him look anything but a petty noble of a sated imperium. But his business — maintaining the status quo of a realm threatened by internal decay and outside aggression — was a strenuous one.
His current mistress, Ella, offered him a cigarette and he inhaled it into lighting. She was a stunning blonde whom he had bought a few weeks previously in the planet’s one city, Fort Lone . He gathered that she was of the old pioneer stock, semiaristocrats who had fallen on evil times and been sold for debt. With such people he sympathized, but there was nothing he could do about the system; and she could have worse owners than himself.
He took another sip of coffee, wiped his mustache, and drew a breath to resume his musings. An apologetic cough brought his head around, and he saw his valet, the only other being in the lodge. This was a slim humanoid from Shalmu, with a hairless green skin, prehensile tail, and impeccable manners. Flandry had christened him Chives and taught him several things which made him valuable in more matters than laying out a dress suit. “Pardon me, sir, Admiral Fenross is calling from the city.”
Flandry cursed and got up. “Fenross! What’s he doing on this planet? Tell him to — no, never mind, it’s anatomically impossible.” He sauntered into the study, frowning. There was no love lost between him and his superior, but Fenross wouldn’t call a man on furlough unless it was urgent.
The screen held a gaunt, sharp, red-haired face which dripped sweat past dark-shadowed eyes. “There you are! Put in your scrambler, combination 770.” When Flandry had adjusted the dials, the admiral said harshly: “Furlough canceled. Get busy at once.” With a sudden break in his voice: “Though God knows what you can do. But it means all our heads.”
Flandry sucked in his cheeks with a long drag of smoke. “What is it — sir?”
“The sack of Fort Lone was more than a raid—”
“What sack?”
“You don’t KNOW?”
“Haven’t tuned the telescreen for a week, sir. I wanted to rest.”
Fenross snarled something and said thickly, “Well, then, a barbarian horde streaked in yesterday, shot up all the defense posts, landed, and in three hours had put the place to the torch and looted all the available wealth. Also took about a thousand citizens, mostly women. They made a clean getaway before the nearest naval base was even alerted. No telling where they came from or where they went.”
Flandry cursed again, vividly. He knew the situation. The Taurian sector of the Empire was meant as a buffer; beyond it lay the wild stars, an unexplored jungle swarming with barbarian hordes who had gotten spaceships and atomic blasters too soon and used them only to plunder. There was always war on these marches, raids and punitive expeditions. But still — an attack on Varrak! He found it hard to believe.
“That’s not our department, sir, unless we’re wanted to track down just who did it,” he ventured. “The Navy does the fighting, I’m told. So why pick on me?”
“You and every other man in the sector. Listen, Flandry, the barbarians have made away with her Highness, the Lady Megan of Luna, princess of the blood and the Emperor’s favorite granddaughter!”
“Hmmm — so.” Not a muscle stirred in Flandry’s countenance, but he felt his belly grow tense and cold. “I … see. What clues have you got?”
“Not many. One officer did manage to hide in the ruins and take a solidographic film — just a few minutes’ worth. It may give us a lead; perhaps the xenological division can identify the raiders from it. But still—” Fenross paused, it obviously hurt him to say so, but he got it out: “We need you.”
“I should say you do, dear chief.” Modesty was not a failing of Flandry’s. “All right, I’ll flit directly over. Cheers.” He cut the circuit and went back onto the balcony. Chives was clearing away the breakfast dishes and Ella sat smoking. “So long, children. I’m on my way.”
The girl watched him with eyes like blued silver. “What is it, Nick?” she asked quietly.
Flandry’s mouth twisted. “I’m not sure yet, but I think I’ve just been condemned to death.”
It was like a scene from hell.
Against a tumbled, blazing background of ruin, the barbarians were raging in an armored swarm: huge burly men in helmet and cuirass, some carrying archaic swords. The picture was focused on a dais where a dozen young women were huddled, stripped alike of clothing and hope, the wildness of terror fading before despair. Some of them were being carried off toward a disc-shaped spaceship, others were still in the middle of the horde. They were being sold. Great gems, silver and gold, the loot of the city, were being tossed at the gnomish unhuman figure which squatted on the dais and handed down each purchase to a grinning conqueror.