Multx finally blurted out, "What has happened to you?"
"We've changed," Berx said solemnly, adding, "but perhaps for the better."
"But why are you here, brothers?" he asked them. "You have been fugitives for more than a year. By rights, I should have you arrested. Or I could be arrested just by being here with you."
"That won't happen, my brother," Erx told him. "No one will ever know of this conversation. As long as our friendship has been, you can count on that."
"We are here because we need you to do something for us," Berx said.
"You mean you need my help?"
"In a way, yes," Berx said.
Multx replied, "But I cannot help you. You are wanted men. Plus, who knows what hijinks you've been up to since we last met."
"We bear only the truth, brother," Erx said. "We cannot bear anything else."
"Please," Berx said. "Just listen to us…"
Multx hesitated a moment, but finally relented. "Only because our friendship is older than the stars," he said.
The two visitors proceeded to tell him everything that had happened to them since they last saw him.
The story of the Home Planets. The invasion of the Two Arm. How Hawk Hunter learned about the deceit that had created the foundation of the Second and Fourth Empires. They also told how they had joined Hunter in his quest to topple O'Nay's Empire. Multx sat speechless as he listened to the fantastic tales.
At the end, he leaned forward in his hovering chair. He was obviously more confused than before.
"My brothers," he said, "in all my years, I have never heard of such things. I am certain that you believe them. But is it wise to align yourselves with Hawk Hunter in these uncertain times? I know you are close to him. You were the ones who plucked him off that backward planet Fools 6 in the first place, after he saved your lives. And don't get me wrong. I have no problem with him, either. He saved my ship and my crew, too. But my brothers, the man is a cosmic oddity. How can we be certain that what he is advocating is anything more than what goes through that crafty mind of his? He probably has designs on the Empire himself!"
Erx told Multx sternly, "The greatest charlatan in the universe would not have endured what Hunter has, just to pull off some grand joke. He has put his own life on the line many times since we've known him. He has a passion than burns brighter than a nova. Look at the proof: he has more than half the Galaxy looking for him, yet he started an invasion of the Empire. So true he is to his cause—"
"See, my brothers? You admit he is a criminal," Multx cut in.
"He is a rebel," Berx corrected him. "And these days, there is a difference."
Multx drank more wine. His round face screwed up in disgust. "Those horrible beings of which you spoke? And Hunter's claim that the three brothers were raised from the dead? It goes against the greatest science of the Galaxy. Such things should not be happening."
"Believe us, brother," Erx said. "Much stranger things have been happening lately."
Multx sipped his wine again. "But overthrowing the Empire? I'm sorry, in all my years, never did I think I'd hear seditious trash from you two."
Erx and Berx shook their heads. It was hard to blame Multx for not believing them. They needed to play their trump card.
"If we could prove to you that our cause is righteous," Erx said. "Would you do as we asked?"
Before he could reply, Berx waved his hand in a circular motion a few feet from Multx's nose.
Suddenly a small cumulus cloud appeared, billowing and growing larger by the second. A great wind then blew through the grand room, serving to part the small storm. Within it, Multx was astonished to see an entirely new existence. A place of emerald grass, gently rolling hills, and a cobalt sky. Rivers and fruit trees everywhere. More important, for the first time in a long time, Multx actually felt joy enter in his heart. It was overwhelming — at least until Berx waved his hand again and the vision faded.
Shaking, his fingers barely able to grip his wineglass, Multx now looked at his friends with new and growing trepidation— and it had nothing to do with their criminal status.
"Oh my God," he whispered. "You've become magicians. Conjurers. Wizards…"
"No," Erx said. "We have simply become enlightened. And through no design of our own. We've just showed you the place we've been to, and it is by returning from it that we've been changed."
"You expect me to believe that you've been to the place in that vision?" Multx asked them. "That place seemed like Paradise itself!"
"Think about it, brother," Berx said. "The entire Galaxy has been looking for us. Twelve ships — including six stolen Star-crashers — and 40,000 men. Where could we have hidden? In this day of being able to sniff out every last fiber of a human being, of being able look into the past and drag a stray radio signal into the present. In this day of tracking just about anything that is constructed of more than two atoms. Just where do you think we could have gone that no one — absolutely no one — could've found us?"
Multx was stumped for a moment. "You really went… there?"
Both nodded. Then they drew a bit closer to him. They were in a hurry.
"Brother Multx, we are messengers," Erx told him. "And part of the news we carry is grim. But with your help, certain disaster might be avoided. Or at least its effects lessened."
"But we are also here to present you with an opportunity," Berx went on. "An opportunity to be a hero of great caliber again. To once more prove your courage is beyond all measure. When the history of the man is finally written, your name will appear among the pantheon of heroes. All you have to do is one thing…"
Multx was stunned by these strong words. "What nonsense is this?" he asked. "I am simply a flicker of light in a sea of stars these days. The Imperial Court doesn't even remember that I exist anymore!"
"They don't have to," Erx told him calmly. "We know you exist. Just do as we ask, and you will regain your stature and more. Much more."
Multx collapsed back into his floating chair. He wanted nothing more than to rehabilitate his image.
But frankly, his two old friends were frightening him. Their appearance, their glow, the vision they'd just created and then taken away. They had changed in ways he wasn't sure he wanted to contemplate.
Still…
He looked out at the grand waterfall. At that moment, he hated every drop of water falling over its side and splashing onto the fake lake below. Every drop, every day, day after day, going nowhere but down. Just about anything would be better than this.
"Brothers," he finally said, "tell me what it is you want me to do."
Erx and Berx both smiled with relief. Then Erx touched Multx's forehead, leaving a drop of oil there.
"You will know soon enough, brother," he said. Then they faded away.
14
FBI agent Lisa Lee returned to her office after lunch to find her secretary looking a bit flustered.
At first Lisa thought Gloria was upset at her because she'd failed to bring her back a Coke as she'd promised. Their office was on the third floor of the tiny Betavilie police station— Lisa was the FBI field agent for this part of Ohio — and even though they'd been here nearly eight months, a few kinks remained. Getting the soda machine on the first floor to work was just one of them.
While still a sleepy little town, Betavilie was also a very famous place these days. It was here that the three visitors from outer space first arrived almost a year ago. It was they who passed on the knowledge that Planet America, as well as the other thirty-five worlds in the Home Planets system, was really part of a long-neglected prison camp in the sky set up thousands of years before by the very evil Second Empire. This celestial prison was trapped inside a time bubble that retarded technical advancement but allowed the unknowing inmates to live a civilized if antiquated way of life. Planet America had cars and factories and highways and railroads. It had cops and firefighters, priests and politicians. Post offices, sports teams, grammar schools, high schools, and colleges could all be found here. The tiny planet consisted of one large landmass that began in the east with cities like Boston, New York, Charleston, and Miami, and went right across to California, where the other West Coast states also lay. Across a very narrow sea was New York again. It was an artificial world, recreated in the image of the place that its first inhabitants had been forced from 4,000 years before. The people of Planet America were the descendants of those original deportees from Earth.