Waverly shoved away from his temporary desk and went impatiently away to find Kuryakin and argue it out with him.
The small, three bed ward was hushed and quiet. Waverly and Kuryakin stood near, but not too near, the bed where Solo lay unconscious. Two male agents chosen for bulk and muscle lounged unobtrusively but alert in the far corners.
Susan Harvey stood by the bed, holding one limp wrist and nodding to herself in satisfaction.
"Almost ready," she said, moving briskly to the trolley where instruments stood ready. She took up a hypodermic. "The sedation is almost gone. This should wake him up right away. I can't tell you exactly what to do in advance, because I don't know what's going to happen. The only advice I can offer is to stay calm, try to reassure him if he seems to need it, and don't use violence unless it is absolutely necessary. Now!" She went back to the bedside, made the injection swiftly, then withdrew a little, to stand and watch like the rest.
The man on the bed stirred, rolled his head, sighed heavily, then opened his eyes. He stared at the roof, then his eyes came sideways, saw Susan, focused on her. He broke into a strained smile.
"I know this bit," he said, in a voice dusty from long disuse. "I'm supposed to say, where am I?"
"Who are you?" she asked, in counter question, and his smile dimmed.
"You have a point. I am Napoleon Solo, late of the United Network Command—" he stopped suddenly, a curious look on his face. He shook his head, but not as a negative, more like a man who expects it to hurt and is wondering why it doesn't. Susan Harvey made a guess.
"You're all right now," she said. "It's gone. I've taken it out." And she made a slight gesture to the top of her own head. Solo stared and the struggle to believe her was apparent in his face. Then relief, a visible sag and audible sigh of relief.
"I don't know who you are, or how you knew, but I owe you much. To have that damned twitch, that infernal sub-audible whisper, gone! It's been a kind of refined hell to know that at all times, no matter what I did, she was listening, right there inside my own head. . You're sure?"
"Oh yes, quite sure. Several hours ago. You are safely back inside U.N.C.L.E. Headquarters now, Mr. Solo. I am Dr. Harvey, of the resident medical staff."
"I'm glad to meet you. I wish it could have been under happier circumstances, or sooner. Right now I have to report to Mr. Waverly. It's urgent!
"Look around," she invited, and moved back a step. Solo hoisted up on an elbow and moved his head.
"Mr. Waverly!" He inclined his head a fraction, then grinned as he saw Kuryakin. "You too, Illya. I'm glad to see you can stand being shot. I've been trying to forget that bit of nightmare for some time. Was I dreaming, or did you shoot me, just a while ago?"
"No dream. But those were anaesthetic darts, for a purpose. Yours were real bullets, Napoleon!"
"I know." Solo compressed his jaw sadly. "I didn't have much choice. I tell you, you've no idea just what brain washing is until you've had a she-devil actually sitting inside your skull repeating her commands. It's enough to drive a man mad."
"Did it succeed, Mr. Solo?" Waverly's voice was quiet but firm.
"I don't think so, sir, but I'm ready to take any tests you like. In the meanwhile, there's something you need to know." He sat up in the bed now, threw back the sheet and swung his legs to the floor. The beefy agents moved closer, just in case, but he never even noticed them. "Louise is setting up one of the most deadly rackets you can imagine. You know, I take it, how the modules work?"
"Not exactly." Waverly was curious but very much on his guard.
"It's really very simple. Louise explained it all to me when I was in no position to argue. You see, she kept one half of the module pair to act as command. That's fitted into a power-transmitter with a microphone. There are various settings. On one certain setting she can talk into my head and I can't hear at all, not consciously. It's pitched subliminal. It's deadly!"
"Not any more," Susan reminded him, and he gave a quick laugh.
"It's going to take me a while to adjust to that again. Now—to get at the real devilment. With those modules Louise was experimenting with the remote control of various creatures, so I gather, but her big aim was to enslave people. She grows people." He said it flatly, waiting for the reaction. It took a while to come, and him some time to explain.
"You mean—" Susan's voice shook as she tried to appear scientific, "that woman can actually grow complete human copies? Androids?"
"That's exactly it. And perfect, they are. Beautiful. But brainless. No, not brainless, that's not the word. Mindless. Just waiting to be trained. As she puts it, an empty book, waiting to be written in."
"That doesn't entirely surprise me," Kuryakin put in, quietly. "I saw those laboratories, in Paris. You will recall, Mr. Waverly, I reported that there were embryologists on the staff. You can see why, now."
"Good Heavens!" Waverly caught his breath. Solo grinned.
"Seems like a dream now, Illya, but that was some scrap we had. But I did shoot you, surely? I remember that bit."
"You missed." Kuryakin moved forward, shoved his fringe aside to show the almost healed scar. "I've told you a hundred times, Napoleon, that you tend to pull off to the right with that Luger of yours in a snap shot."
"Yeah!" Solo shook his head ruefully. "I'll have to watch that."
"This is no time for badinage—" Waverly began, testily, but the Russian halted him with a gesture.
"Just a minute, sir. Napoleon, did you drop that pencil-camera by accident? Really?"
"No. I planted it. And the diagram, as best I could. It wasn't too easy to get those pictures, let me tell you, but that fiendish woman has to sleep sometime."
"You did very well, Mr. Solo. Please go on with your account. You spoke of a master plan?"
"That's right, sir. On the surface, it sounds nothing. Louise is selling slaves, of her own make. She guarantees to deliver the perfect slave, servant, assistant, companion, call them what you like. At a price. A quarter of a million dollars each, cash on the nail. Each one fitted with a skull unit, the matching half of which is supplied to the new owner."
"That is certainly gruesome." Waverly shivered. "But not a very great threat to us. Is it?"
"Not, as I said, on the surface. But there's more. So far she has made her sales pitch to the various regional heads of Thrush. And she has managed to con them into a further refinement. She operates on them, just as she did on me, and inserts a command module to match the slave module. The con is that the big Thrush now has a perfect slave, utterly obedient and absolutely reliable, that will respond to the master's every wish, be in total contact at all times, and through which the master can literally 'be' wherever the slave is. The ideal snoop."
"Just a minute!" Kuryakin became agitated, and Solo grinned.