“You look rather worried.” The senator smiled. “Is there something troubling you?”
Ralph shifted in his chair. “Maybe I’m a little paranoid,” he said. “After what happened in L.A.” It didn’t sound as ironic as he had intended it to sound.
“That was all most unfortunate. I really only wanted a little information from Gunther Ortiz. The only way to get it was for my psych-technicians to induce a memory flashback from his army experiences, and to identify the Alpha Fraction in his mind with his former enemies. No one, though, was prepared for the violence of the associations he had with that material. He broke loose and got away from us, with the results you saw. I’m very sorry about it all.”
“I bet.” Ralph pressed his fingers into the thick upholstery of the chair’s arms.
“Mr. Metric.” The world-famous head moved sadly from side to side. “I sense a great deal of hostility here. And it’s needless.” He pushed himself up from the chair. “Perhaps someone else can put your mind to rest. Come over here.”
The senator led him to a curtain, heavy with an intricate brocade, that was suspended from a curved track on the plane’s ceiling. “Still asleep?” said Muehlenfeldt, pulling the curtain aside. “No, I didn’t think you would be.”
He stood beside the senator without speaking as he gazed at Sarah. She was half-reclining on a small couch, one arm resting along its back. From a circular window she turned her face to them. An elegant dress of some glittery black stuff extended to her ankles, but left her tanned shoulders bare.
“Sarah’s my daughter, you know,” said Muehlenfeldt. “Since she was a little girl, she’s been a great one for secrets.”
Her eyes met Ralph’s, but no expression came into her face. She looks rich, he thought, feeling again the bitter sense of betrayal. Now that she’s in her proper environment.
The brocaded curtain moved along its overhead track, cutting the little space off from the rest again. Muehlenfeldt had withdrawn, leaving the two of them. Sarah drew her legs up so that Ralph could sit down on the end of the couch. When he had settled onto the cushion, he leaned forward with his arms on his knees and saw a long-stemmed wine glass that had fallen over and made a wet blot on the carpet. Sarah’s face had the partly hooded eyes of a joyless, infrequent drinker.
“I know what you’re thinking,” she announced flatly.
He looked over at her but said nothing.
“You think I fingered the Alpha Fraction. Got them all killed. You think I was working for my father all along.”
For a few seconds he watched her. “Yeah,” he said at last.
“Forget it,” she said. “He had us bugged all the time. Didn’t even need anybody on the inside.” She tilted her head, letting her hair fall across the top of the couch. “Believe that?”
“Maybe.” Who knows, he thought. Maybe it’s to the point now where it doesn’t even matter. “Is he really your father?”
“I don’t know. I’m not that wise a child.”
“Come on,” said Ralph. “Is he?”
She sighed. Her bare shoulders raised in a tired shrug. “Spencer used to tell me all those ideas of his, too. They might be true. I never knew my father very well. No rich kid ever does. If a being from another star took his place, I couldn’t tell you.”
Ralph nodded, wondering if the difference between the man and other men was due to the amounts of money and power he commanded, or to something even more alien than that. A part of himself, he knew, was watching Sarah, looking for that same difference in her.
“I just don’t know.” She sounded tired. “I was just about to a place where I thought I’d gotten away. From all this.” She lifted a hand to indicate the jet’s interior. “That’s why I left, went to L.A. in the first place, so long ago; even though I knew I could never make it into anybody else’s world. At best I could be free of any connections with here.” Her voice grew faint as she fell into some private reverie. “Billions of dollars and light-years away . . .”
He turned, leaned across the couch, and brought his hands to each side of her head. Her eyes stayed open as he kissed her, in a silver jet in the desert bright with light.
Then he let go of her, stood up, and drew aside the curtain enough to pass into the larger area. A dizzying confusion rolled through him. I still can’t tell, he thought. Maybe everybody’s from some other star.
“Ralph.” From some direction Muehlenfeldt appeared and put his arm around Ralph’s shoulder. The world-famous face of power and authority smiled pleasantly into his. “It was pure good luck that my men were able to get her out of there before that madman showed up and killed the others. Things aren’t working out the way I want them to. But you can help. You know what I’m talking about.”
“No.” Ralph shook his head. “I don’t.”
“That’s not necessary.” Muehlenfeldt steered him past the dark leather chairs. “There’s time for you to think about it. Then, when you’re ready to give me the info—well, I’m right here. Waiting for you.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” An eerie perception of words dissolving free of their meanings floated over him. The senator let go of him, a door opened, one of the men—guards?—drew him away.
A few moments later, he was standing on the sand beneath the jetliner, watching the metal steps glide back up into the glistening belly. A hard rock of anger fell through him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about!” he shouted at the closing door.
Chapter 12
Through the apartment window the bright desert stars were visible.
Ralph sat up on the couch in the front room and rubbed his taut face.
Sleep had eluded him for hours.
Maybe she’s telling the truth, he thought again. Maybe she didn’t betray the Alpha Fraction. Just a poor little rich girl, playing at revolutionary. Just to get back at her father. Only he turned out to be bigger and more dangerous than she could’ve guessed. He sorted through his fragmented thoughts again, wondering what sort of picture they would reveal if he could ever put them together in the right way. The senator, the jet, everything that had already happened—it all weaved in and out of his mind. He pressed his fingers to the corners of his eyes and wondered what time it was.
The room’s silence dissolved with the ringing of a telephone. For a moment he didn’t even recognize the sound. After several rings he stood up and went into the kitchen. He lifted the receiver from its mounting on the wall beside the refrigerator. “ ’Hello?” he said into it.
“Ralph—” The voice jumped into his ear, taut beneath an overlay of static. “Hey, is that you?”
He closed his eyes and felt the room sway a little. “No,” he murmured.
“You’re dead. I can’t take any more stuff like this.” It was Spencer’s voice on the other end of the line.
“No, I made it.” Spencer’s words came in a rush. “I got away from Gunther. But there’s somebody else after me now. Must be some of Muehlenfeldt’s people, about seven or eight of ’em. I’ve been running all this time. Don’t know how much longer—” He broke off, his voice replaced for a moment by the sound of deep, rapid breathing. “You’ve got to listen,” he spoke again. “They’ll find me any minute. It’s up to you. The Master Historical Program—I read it as it was printed out. After you unlocked it.”