There was a bustle in the outer office and it sounded like Miss Fink getting ready to leave, or maybe it was the new girl coming back with the supplies. In any case it was late, and he had to go now.

  Quickly, before he could change his mind, he ran full tilt at the window, his weight bursting through the glass, hurtled the twenty-three stories to the street below. Miss Fink heard the breaking glass and screamed, then screamed louder when she came into the room. Martin, complaining about the noise, followed her, but shut up when he saw what had happened. A bit of glass crunched under his shoes when he looked out of the window. The doll-like figure of Pachs was visible in the center of the gathering crowd, sprawled from sidewalk to street and bent at an awful angle as it followed the step of the curb.

  “Oh God, Mr. Martin, oh God look at this….” Miss Fink wailed.

  Martin went and stood next to her in front of the drawing board and looked at the page still pinned there. It was neatly done, well drawn and carefully inked.

  In the first panel was a self-portrait of Pachs working on a page, bent over this same drawing board. In the second panel he was sitting back and washing out his brush, in the third standing. In the fourth panel the artist stood before the window, nicely rendered in chiaroscuro with backlighting. Five was a forced perspective shot from above, down the vertical face of the building with the figure hurtling through the air toward the pavement below.

  In the last panel, in clear and horrible detail, the old man was bent broken and bloody over the wrecked fender of the car that was parked there: the spectators looked on, horrified.

  “Look at that, will you,” Martin said disgustedly, tapping the drawing with his thumb. “When he went out the window he missed the car by a good two yards. Didn’t I always tell you he was never any good at getting the details right?”

  SURVIVAL PLANET

  But this war was finished years before I was born! How can one robot torpedo—fired that long ago—still be of any interest?” Dall the Younger was overly persistent—it was extremely lucky for him that Ship-Commander Lian Stane, both by temperament and experience, had a tremendous reserve of patience.

  “It has been fifty years since the Greater Slavocracy was defeated—but that doesn’t mean eliminated,” Commander Stane said. He looked through the viewport of the ship, seeing ghostlike against the stars the pattern of the empire they had fought so long to destroy. “The Slavocracy expanded unchecked for over a thousand years. Its military defeat didn’t finish it, just made the separate worlds accessible to us. We are still in the middle of that reconstruction, guiding them away from a slave economy.”

  “That I know all about,” Dall the Younger broke in with a weary sigh. “I’ve been working on the planets since I came into the force. But what has that got to do with the Mosaic torpedo that we’re tracking? There must have been a billion of them made and fired during the war. How can a single one be of interest this much later?”

  “If you had read the tech reports,” Stane said, pointing to the thumb-thick folder on the chart table, “you would know all about it.” This advice was the closest the commander had ever come to censure. Dall the Younger had the good grace to flush slightly and listen with applied attention.

  “The Mosaic torpedo is a weapon of space war, in reality a robot-controlled spaceship. Once directed it seeks out its target, defends itself if necessary, then destroys itself and the ship it has been launched against by starting the uncontrollable cycle of binding-energy breakdown.”

  “I never realized that they were robot-operated,” Dall said. “I thought robots had an ingrained resistance to killing people?”

  “In-built rather than ingrained would be more accurate,” Stane said judiciously. “Robotic brains are just highly developed machines with no inherent moral sense. That is added afterward. It has been a long time since we built man-shaped robots with human-type brains. This is the age of the specialist, and robots can specialize far better than men ever could. The Mosaic torpedo brains have no moral sense—if anything they are psychotic, overwhelmed by a death wish. Though there are, of course, controls on how much they can kill. All the torpedoes ever used by either side had mass detectors to defuse them when they approached an object with planetary mass, since the reaction started by a torpedo could just as easily destroy a world as a ship. You can understand our interest when in the last months of the war, we picked up a torpedo fused only to detonate a planet.

  “All the data from its brain was filed and recently interpreted. The torpedo was aimed at the fourth planet of the star we are approaching now.”

  “Anything on the record about this planet?” Dall asked.

  “Nothing; it is an unexplored system at least as far as our records are concerned. But the Greater Slavocracy knew enough about this planet to want to destroy it. We are here to find out why.”

  Dall the Younger furrowed his brow, chewing at the idea. “Is that the only reason?” he finally asked. “Since we stopped them from wiping out this planet, that would be the end of it, I should think.”

  “It’s thinking like that that shows why you are the low ranker on this ship,” Gunner Arnild snapped as he came in. Arnild had managed to grow old in a very short-lived service, losing in the process his patience for everything except his computers and guns. “Shall I suggest some of the possibilities that have occurred even to me? Firstly—any enemy of the Slavocracy could be a friend of ours. Or conversely, there may be an enemy here that threatens the entire human race, and we may need to set off a Mosaic ourselves to finish the job the Slavers started. Then again, the Slavers may have had something here—like a research center that they would rather have destroyed than let us see. Wouldn’t you say that any one of these would make the planet worth investigating?”

  “We shall be in the atmosphere within twenty hours,” Dall said as he vanished through the lower hatch. “I have to check the lubrication on the drive gears.”

  “You’re too easy on the kid,” Gunner Arnild said, staring moodily at the approaching star, already dimmed by the forward filters.

  “And you’re too hard,” Stane told him. “So I guess it evens out. You forget he never fought the Slavers.”

  Skimming the outer edges of the atmosphere of the fourth planet, the scout ship hurled itself through the measured length of a helical orbit, then fled back into the safety of space while the ship’s robot brain digested and made copies of the camera and detector instrument recordings. The duplicates were stored in a message torp, and only when the torp had started back to base did Commander Stane bother personally to examine the results of their survey.

  “We’re dispensable now,” he said, relaxing. “So the best thing we can do is to drop down and see what we can stir up.” Arnild grunted agreement, his index fingers unconsciously pressing invisible triggers. They leaned over the graphs and photographs spread out on the table. Dall peered between their shoulders and flipped through the photographs they tossed aside. He was first to speak.

  “Nothing much there, really. Plenty of water, a big island continent—and not much else.”

  “Nothing else is detectable,” Stane added, ticking off the graphs one by one. “No detectable radiation, no large masses of metal either above or below ground, no stored energy. No reason for us to be here.”

  “But we are,” Arnild growled testily. “So let’s touch down and find out more firsthand. Here’s a good spot!” He tapped a photograph, then pushed it into the enlarger.

  “Could be a primitive hut city, people walking around, smoke.”

  “Those could be sheep in the fields,” Dall broke in eagerly. “And boats pulled up on the shore. We’ll find out something here.”

  “I’m sure we will,” Commander Stane said. “Strap in for landing.”

  Lightly and soundlessly the ship fell out of the sky, curving in a gentle arc that terminated at the edge of a grove of tall trees, on a hill above the city. The motors whined to a stop and the ship was silent.

  “Report positive on the atmosphere,” Dall said, checking off the analyzer dials.

  “Stay at the guns, Arnild,” Commander Stane said. “Keep us covered, but don’t shoot unless I tell you to.”

  “Or unless you’re dead,” Arnild said with complete lack of emotion.

  “Or unless I’m dead,” Stane answered him, in the same toneless voice. “In which case you will assume command.”

  He and Dall buckled on planet kits, cycled through the lock, and sealed it behind them. The air was dry and pleasantly warm, filled with the freshness of growing plants.

  “Really smells good after that canned stuff,” Dall said.

  “You have a great capacity for stating the obvious.” Ar-nild’s voice rasped even more than usual when heard through the bone conductor phones. “Can you see what’s going on in the village?”

  Dall fumbled his binoculars out. Commander Stane had been using his since they left the ship. “Nothing moving,” Stane said. “Send an Eye down there.”

  The Eye whooshed away from the ship and they could follow its slow swing through the village below. There were about a hundred huts, simple pole-and-thatch affairs, and the Eye carefully investigated every one.

  “No one there,” Arnild said, as he watched the monitor screen. “The animals are gone too, the ones from the aerial pic.”

  “The people can’t have vanished,” Dall said. “There are empty fields in every direction, completely without cover. And I can see smoke from their fires.”

  “The smoke’s there, the people aren’t,” Arnild said testily. “Walk down and look for yourself.”

  The Eye lifted up from the village and drifted back toward the ship. It swung around the trees and came to a sudden stop in midair.

  “Hold it!” Arnild’s voice snapped in their ears. “The huts are empty. But there’s someone in the tree you’re standing next to. About ten meters over your heads!”

  Both men controlled a natural reaction to look up. They moved out a bit, where they would be safe from anything dropped from above.

  “Far enough,” Arnild said. “I’m shifting the Eye for a better look.” They could hear the faint drone of the Eye’s motors as it changed position.

  “It’s a girl. Wearing some kind of fur outfit. No weapons that I can see, but some kind of a pouch hanging from her waist. She’s just clutching onto the tree with her eyes closed. Looks like she’s afraid of falling.”

  The men on the ground could see her dimly now, a huddled shape against the straight trunk.

  “Don’t bring the Eye any closer,” Commander Stane said. “But turn the speaker on. Hook my phone into the circuit.”

  “You’re plugged in.”

  “We are friends…. Come down…. We will not hurt you.” The words boomed down from the floating speaker above their heads.

  “She heard it, but maybe she can’t understand Esperanto,” Arnild said. “She just hugged the tree harder while you were talking.”

  Commander Stane had had a good command of Slaver during the war; he groped in his memory for the words, doing a quick translation. He repeated the same phrase, only this time in the tongue of their defeated enemies.

  “That did something, Commander,” Arnild reported. “She jumped so hard she almost fell off. Then scooted up a couple of branches higher before she grabbed on again.”

  “Let me get her down, sir,” Dall asked. “I’ll take some rope and climb up after her. It’s the only way. Like getting a cat out of a tree.”

  Stane pushed the thought around. “It looks like the best answer.” he finally said. “Get the lightweight two-hundred-meter line and the climbing irons out of the ship. Don’t take too long. It’ll be getting dark soon.”

  The irons chunked into the wood and Dall climbed carefully up to the lower limbs. Above him the girl stirred and he had a quick glimpse of the white patch of her face as she looked down at him. He started climbing again until Arnild’s voice snapped at him.

  “Hold it! She’s climbing higher. Staying above you.”

  “What’ll I do, Commander?” Dall asked, settling himself in the fork of one of the big branches. He felt exhilarated by the climb, his skin tingling slightly with sweat. He snapped open his collar and breathed deeply.

  “Keep going. She can’t climb any higher than the top of the tree.”

  The climbing was easier now, the branches smaller and closer together. He went slowly so as not to frighten the girl into a misstep. The ground was out of sight, far below. They were alone in their own world of leaves and swaying boughs. The silver tube of the hovering Eye the only reminder of the watchers from the ship. Dall stopped to tie a loop in the end of the rope, doing it carefully so the knot would hold. For the first time since they had started on this mission he felt as if he was doing a full part. The two old warhorses weren’t bad shipmates, but they oppressed him with the years of their experience. But this was something he could do best and whistled softly through his teeth with the thought.

  It would have been possible for the girl to have climbed higher; the branches could have held her weight. But for some reason she had retreated out along a branch. There was another close to it, with good handholds, and he shuffled slowly after her.

  “No reason to be afraid,” he said cheerfully, and smiled. “Just want to get you down safely and back to your friends. Why don’t you grab onto this rope?”

  The girl just shuddered and backed away. She was young and good to look at, dressed only in a short fur kilt. Her hair was long, but had been combed and caught at the back of her head with a thong. The only thing that appeared alien about her was her fear. As he came closer he could see she was drenched with it. Her legs and hands shook with a steady vibration. Her teeth were clamped into her whitened lips and a thin trickle of blood reached to her chin. He hadn’t thought

  it possible that human eyes could have stared so widely, have been so filled with desperation.

  “You don’t have to be afraid,” he repeated, stopping just out of reach. The branch was thin and springy. If he tried to grab her they might both be bounced off it. He didn’t want any accidents to happen now. Slowly pulling the rope from the coil, Dall tied it about his waist, then made a loop around the next branch. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the girl stir and look around wildly.

  “Friends!” he said, trying to calm her. He translated into Slaver; she had seemed to understand that before.

  “Noi’r venn!”

  Her mouth opened wide and her legs contracted. The scream was terrible and more like a tortured animal’s than a human voice. It confused him and he made a desperate grab. It was too late.

  She didn’t fall. With all her strength she hurled herself from the limb, jumping toward the certain death she preferred to his touch. For a heartbeat she seemed to hang, contorted and fear-crazed, at the apex of her leap, before gravity clutched hold and pulled her crashing down through the leaves. Then Dall was falling too, grabbing for nonexistent handholds.

  The safety line he had tied held fast. In a half daze he worked his way back to the trunk and fumbled loose the knots. With quivering precision he made his way back to the ground. It took a long time, and a blanket was drawn over the deformed thing in the grass before he reached it. He didn’t have to ask if she was dead.

  “I tried to stop her. I did my best.” There was a slight touch of shrillness to Dall’s voice.

  “Of course,” Commander Stane told him, as he spread out the contents of the girl’s waist pouch. “We were watching with the Eye. There was no way to stop her when she decided to jump.”

  “No need to talk Slaver to her either,” Arnild said, coming out of the ship. He was going to add something, but he caught Commander Stane’s direct look and shut his mouth. Dall saw too.

  “I forgot!” the young man said, looking back and forth at their expressionless faces. “I just remembered she had understood Slaver. I didn’t think it would frighten her. It was a mistake maybe, but anyone can make a mistake! I didn’t want her to die… .”

  He clamped his trembling jaws shut with an effort, and turned away.

  “You better get some food started,” Commander Stane told him. As soon as the port had closed he pointed to the girl’s body. “Bury her under the trees. I’ll help you.”

  It was a brief meal; none of them were very hungry. Stane sat at the chart table afterward, pushing the hard green fruit around with his forefinger. “This is what she was doing in the tree, why she couldn’t pull the vanishing act like the others. Picking fruit. She had nothing else in the pouch. Our landing next to the tree and trapping her was pure accident.” He glanced at Dall’s face, then turned quickly away.

  “It’s too dark to see now. Do we wait for morning?” Arnild asked. He had a handgun disassembled on the table, adjusting and oiling the parts.

  Commander Stane nodded. “It can’t do any harm—and it’s better than stumbling around in the dark. Leave an Eye with an infrared projector and pickup over the village and make a recording. Maybe we can find out where they all went.”

  “I’ll stay at the Eye controls,” Dall said suddenly. “I’m not… sleepy. I might find something out.”

  The commander hesitated for a moment, then agreed.

  “Wake me if you see anything. Otherwise, get us up at dawn.”

  The night was quiet and nothing moved in the silent village of huts. Dall watched, tired but not sleepy, dozed a little until the alarm woke them all. At first light he and Commander

  Stane walked down the hill, an Eye floating ahead to cover them. Arnild stayed behind in the locked ship, at the controls.

  “Over this way, sir,” Dall said. “Something I found during the night when I was making sweeps with the Eye.”

  The pit edges had been softened and rounded by the weather; large trees grew on the slopes. At the bottom, projecting from a pool of water, were the remains of rusted machinery.

  “I think they’re excavation machines,” Dall said. “Though it’s hard to tell, they’ve been down there so long.”