The Planner turned his great head away from Gann toward the black-robed knot of communicants of the Machine. "Deneb!" he barked. "Display it!" One of the acolytes spoke in soft, chiming tones to his linkbox. Instantly the lights in the great hall darkened, and on the vaulted ceiling a panorama sprang into light. The Planner craned his thick neck to stare searchingly upward. Every eye followed his.
It was as if the thousand yards of earth and rock above them had rolled back. They were gazing into the depths of space on what seemed to be a clear, moonless night—late in autumn, Gann judged by the position of the constellations; perhaps around midnight. Overhead were the great bright stars of the Summer Triangle, Altair to the south, Deneb and Vega to the north. The Milky Way banded the vault with a great irregular powder of stardust. Low on the horizon to the west red Antares glowed; to the east was Fomalhaut. . .
Abruptly the scene began to contract. It was as if they were rushing through space, straight toward the constellation Cygnus. Fomalhaut and Antares slipped out of sight with Sagittarius and Altair's constellation, the Eagle; so did the Pole Star and Cepheus below it; all that was left was Cygnus, the constellation of the Swan, hanging over their heads like a bright canopy.
A voice chimed, "Constellation Cygnus. Stars: Alpha Cygni, also known as Deneb, blue-white, first magnitude. Beta Cygni, also known as Albireo, double, components deep blue and orange. Gamma Cygni—"
The Planner's voice cut in raspingly: "Just Deneb, idiot! What about Deneb?"
The voice did not miss a beat. It chimed: "Deneb, distance four hundred light-years. Surface temperature eleven thousand degrees. Super-giant. Spectrographs composition, hydrogen, calcium—"
"Planets!" boomed the Planner irritably.
"No planets known," sang the invisible voice. Gann craned his neck; it came from one of the black-robed acolytes, but with their faces shrouded in the hoods he could not tell which.
The Planner was silent for a long time, staring upward. He said at last, "Has the Machine any evidence of physical connection between Deneb and the Starchild?"
"No evidence, sir," chanted the invisible voice at once. "Exceptions as follows: Possible connection between star Deneb and reported Church of the Star. Possible connection between star Deneb and star 61 Cygni in same constellation, 61 Cygni being one of the stars said Star-child threatened to, and did, extinguish. Neither of these items considered significant by the Machine."
The Planner grumbled. "Very well. Cancel." The display overhead winked out, the room lights sprang up. The Planner sat brooding for a moment, his eyes remote. He stared absently around the room, his gaze passing over Boysie Gann, over the spilled toys at his feet, over the faces of the guardsmen and Machine General Wheeler.
His eyes came to rest on the black-robed acolytes. Then he sighed and gestured to one of them. It was only the crook of a finger, but the figure in black at once came toward him, holding something in his hand. It was a length of golden cable extending from his linkbox. At its end was a golden eight-pronged plug.
Boysie Gann's eyes went wide.
If he was not insane—and no, he was not; for already the acolyte was stepping to the Planner's side, touching his forehead, sweeping back his sparse, unruly hair, baring the glittering plate that was set into his forehead—the Planner was about to undergo communion with the Machine!
The spectacle was fascinating—and frightening.
Heedless of the eyes on him, the Planner sat relaxed while the acolyte deftly slipped the golden plug into the receptors in the plate on his forehead.
At once the Planner's expression changed. His eyes closed. The fretful, angry look disappeared. There was a second's grimace, the teeth bared in rictus, the corners of the eyes wrinkling in deep furrows, the jaw set. It was like a momentary pang of agony... Or ecstasy.
It passed, and the Planner's face went blank again. His breathing began to grow more rapid. As the planted electrodes excited the secret centers of his brain, he began to show feeling. His face creased in a smile, then frowned, then smiled again, forgivingly. His lips began to move. Hoarse, inarticulate words whispered—slowly . . . then faster, faster. His plump body shook, his fingers worked. The black-robed acolyte calmly touched his arm, whispered in his ear.
The Planner calmed. His body relaxed again. His whispered voice stopped.
The acolyte waited for a second, nodded, removed the cable and stepped lightly away. The Planner opened his eyes and looked around.
To Boysie Gann, the change in the Planner was stranger than anything he had seen on the Reefs of Space. A glum, angry, harried man had accepted that moment of communication with the electronic joys of the Machine; a cheerful, energetic, buoyant one had emerged from it. The Planner opened his mouth and boomed laughter into the great hall. "Ha!" he shouted. "Ho! That's good!"
He sat up and pounded his great fist onto the quartz table. "We'll destroy them!" he cried. "Reef rats and Starchild—anyone who dares interfere with the Plan of Man. We'll crush them and their fanciful dreams forever. And you'll help in this, Boysie Gann, for you are the chosen instrument of the Plan in this great work!"
For a lunatic moment Gann thought of turning, running, fleeing—of leaping toward the Planner and letting the decapitation charge in his security collar end his problems forever. There was something wild and fearful in the great chuckling good humor with which the Planner bubbled now, something that terrified Gann. If the Machine could cause such personality change in its most favored of servants, Gann feared the Machine. Feared it! And that thought was in itself fearsome to him, for the Machine had always been the great good master whose judgments were infallible, who always rewarded good service, punished only the bad. Yet this particular reward seemed a very terrible punishment to Gann . . .
But all he said was "Yes, sir. I serve the Plan, sir!"
The Planner shouted with glee. "Serve it well, boy!" he cried. "Serve it with all your heart and mind—or you'll serve it with your eyes and arms and liver, in the Body Bank! We all serve the Plan, boy. In one way or another!" And he dismissed Gann with a good-humored wave of one fat arm and turned to General Wheeler. As the guards closed in on Gann and marched him out of the room he caught one glimpse of the general, staring toward him. The steel-gray eyes were cold and empty, but Gann could read their message.
Don't fail me, either, Gann, they said.
9
There had once been a time, thought Boysie Gann, when life was simple and his duty clear. In that dead, half-forgotten time—was it only months ago? it seemed like centuries—he had found, and loved, and won a girl named Julie Martinet. He remembered the night they met, remembered their long hours together, their endless promises, the bright hope of happiness they gave each other. He remembered the long white beach at the Togetherness center at Playa Blanca, and her kiss before he left. Warm, sweet, soft, loving, she had been everything a man could want. Her memory had followed Boysie Gann twenty billion miles out from the sun, and her absence had made that long voyage bleak.
Yet never had he been so far from her as in this room. He could, if he dared, reach out and touch the lips he had kissed at Playa Blanca. But the mind behind them was no longer the mind of the sweet, warm girl he had loved. The body was the body of Julie Martinet, but what inhabited it was Sister Delta Four.
Involuntarily he whispered: "Julie! Julie Martinet. . ."
She stood motionless, regarding him with grave dark eyes. He searched them for some hint of recognition, for the saving warmth of love that had filled them at Playa Blanca, but nothing was there.
She shook her hooded head. "I am Delta Four," she said, her voice a melodious chime. "I am to interrogate you for the Machine." She stood watching him, waiting for a response, her pale face half hidden by the deep folds of the cowl she wore. The luminous emblem on her black robes mocked him. It was a Keep Off sign that he dared not ignore.