"But we only experienced one dream in one computer," Brother Joey objected.
"True, Brother, but if they could do it to one, they've probably done it to all."
"Sure can't hurt to check," Stroganoff explained, "and if we find out PEST has, Mirane and Notem-Modem will reprogram that computer."
"I do wonder what Master Eaves' thoughts will be, when he doth waken," Gwen mused.
"Probably the same," Rod grunted. "I have a notion he linked up with PEST out of pure self-interest." He turned to Chornoi. "How about you? Want to get off at Maxima?"
Chornoi was pale as ivory, but she shook her head. "I'd be no safer there than anywhere else, which is to say that I won't be safe anywhere." She shrugged. "Why not try Terra? It's the last place PEST would think to look for me."
Rod shook his head. "Sorry I got you into this, folks."
"We're not." Stroganoff smiled as he gazed into Mirane's eyes.
Whitey grinned. "And I'm suddenly looking forward to seeing Lona and Dar again. Might not have managed it ever, if it hadn't been for you. Talk about a surprise visit!"
"I've had a bit of a surprise, too." Brother Joey was gazing off into space. "I might have muddled along, wasting years without discovering my true vocation, but for this."
"Not cut out to make converts?" Rod sympathized.
"Oh, yes, but of a different sort. And on a much larger scale…"
"All that?"
Chornoi nodded. "A hundred security satellites, Major, in a hundred^lifferent orbits. They're really there—and each one's aimed with everything from lasers on up to a small tactical nuke."
"Well, our detectors say so, all right. But why? What're they afraid of?"
"Whatever shows up."
"From outside, or inside? Are those satellites supposed to keep invaders out, or the population in?"
"Yes."
Rod rolled his eyes up in exasperation.
"Wouldn't matter if we could get through the security net," Yorick pointed out. "Where could we land?"
Rod frowned at the blue-and-white globe floating in front of him on the viewscreen. "There must be some farmland, here and there—maybe even some parks!"
"The farms are run by robots," Chornoi said,"and every square foot of the parks is covered by a surveillance camera or two."
"Well, back to the original idea," Rod sighed. "Looks like we'll have to bluff it out."
That wasn't too hard, up till the actual landing. Whenever one of the satellites challenged the scoutship, it honestly and truthfully identified itself as an official government craft. It even handled spaceport clearance—being a spy ship, it could bypass Luna, where all commercial ships had to dock; shuttles took cargo and passengers down to Terra. It was a cumbersome system, but it did give PEST total control over who came to Terra, and who left.
Well, almost total. They really hadn't counted on enemies coming in on one of their own ships, and a spy ship at that. So the satellite net bucked the landing request to an actual human, a division head, and he gave the scoutship clearance to go directly to the spaceport PEST maintained on Terra for official use. It all went perfectly smoothly, even the landing—until they stepped out of the ship.
The little man in the gray tunic with the tan tabard stepped forward with a smile pasted on, holding out a hand—obviously a bureaucrat. "Welcome back, Agent Ea…" He stopped short, staring at the quartet stepping out of the scoutship.
Rod managed a sickly grin. "Uh, hi there."
The bureaucrat turned and snapped his fingers at a large man behind him. There were a half-dozen of them, all bulky, all with surly frowns on their faces, all in uniform. The one he'd indicated slipped a small, flat square out of a pocket and pointed it at the Gallowglasses.
The bureaucrat turned back to them, his face totally without expression."Where is the agent Wirlin Eaves?"
"Uh, afraid he couldn't make it." Rod swallowed. "Bit of a rough trip and all, you know. Vicious criminals on that planet Otranto, not to mention a couple of vampires and a wolfman, and a rampant dreamhouse computer…"
The bureaucrat turned to his henchman. "Do you have them? Good. Send for identification." He turned to the rest of the thugs and nodded at Rod. "Arrest them."
"Now, wait a minute!" Rod held up a hand. "You don't know anything about us! We're legitimate agents, all of us—except for my wife, maybe, and I didn't see any problem in bringing her along on a business trip. We just stumbled across this scoutship, and we needed a way to get home, and nobody else was using it, so…"
He swallowed, "...home."
"Uh, it was really too bad about Eaves, but he just couldn't make it."
The man with the flat square pressed a button into his ear and gazed off into space for a moment, then nodded. "Confirmed. The crop-haired woman is a renegade agent marked for execution."
"Crop-haired!" Chornoi squalled. "I'll crop your head, you foul-mouthed chauvinist!"
The man ignored her. "The other woman and the talkative man are tied for first place as Public Enemies—and the burly man is a major foe."
Yorick stared. "Why me?"
"I do not know," the bureaucrat snapped, "but my superiors must have had excellent reasons for so designating you."
"Don't worry about it," Rod assured Yorick, "the excellent reasons just haven't happened yet."
The bureaucrat stared at him, at a loss for a moment. But only a moment, then his mouth tightened in contempt, and he snapped his fingers at another flunky, one wearing a portable control console strapped to his waist and shoulders. The man threw a key and thumbed a toggle, and the air around the quartet seemed to thicken. A faint moire of colors, like the refractions on a soap bubble, swam about them in a sphere.
"A force field now surrounds you," the bureaucrat said. "My superiors have informed me that the four of you are very skilled at evading capture, but there is no method of escaping this globe of force."
Yorick took an experimental kick at the force field. His foot slowed and stopped, all within the space of an inch or three. Chornoi stared, then slammed a chop at the moire, but her hand bounced right back, clipping her in the nose. She howled in anger.
"I gotta see this to believe it!" Rod aimed a jab at the moire, straight from the shoulder. It felt as though his hand hit a mattress. The moire roiled on, unperturbed.
The bureaucrat actually smiled. It was a bare twitch of the lips, but it was a smile.
Gwen tested the field with her fingers, feeling it with a thoughtful frown.
The bureaucrat turned away, beckoning to the man with the console. "Come."
The operator followed him.
The force field scooped the company off their feet as though it were a snow shovel and rolled them down the hall, shouting and squalling.
The bureaucrat smiled again.
Gwen scrambled to her feet, flushed with anger, and scurried to keep up with the force field, one hand touching the unseen wall, scowling in concentration.
Rod saw, and shuddered.
Gwen reached out and hauled Chornoi to her feet with deceptive ease. "How can that gleaming slab make an invisible wall like to this?"
"Well, I don't know the details," Chornoi panted, "but roughly, it's a sort of transmitter. It projects a small magnetic field that triggers a localized warping of the gravitational field. It wraps itself around the tiny globe of electromagnetic force, then expands according to how much power the operator feeds into the trigger field."
Gwen nodded, then glared at the back of the operator's head for a few minutes. Finally, she closed her eyes—and the moire disappeared.
The operator jarred to a halt, fiddling frantically with sliders and pressure-pads. "My board died!"
The bureaucrat whirled about, staring, appalled. So did all his henchmen.