“Frankly, Professor, all you’ve told me is a lot of scientific mumbo jumbo. There’s no guarantee that the machine won’t kill people again.”
Reddening, Leoh snapped back, “The machine didn’t kill anyone! A man murdered his opponents, deliberately.”
“In the machine.”
“Yes, but it can’t happen again!”
Shrugging, the newsman said, “All I’ve got to go on is your word.”
“My reputation as a scientist means something, I should think.”
Hector interrupted. “If the Acquatainian government is satisfied that the dueling machine’s safe.…”
The newsman laughed. “Both the government and the Professor claimed the machine was absolutely safe when it was first installed here. Two men died in this gadget, and who knows how many others have been killed in Szarno and other places?”
“But that…”
Turning back to Leoh, he asked, “How many people have been killed in dueling machines in the Commonwealth?”
“None!”
“You sure? I can check, you know.”
“Are you calling me a liar?”
“Look, it boils down to this: you told us the machine was safe, and two very important men were killed. Now you’re saying it’s safe again.…” He let the implication dangle.
“Out!” Leoh snapped. “Get out of here, or by all the ancient gods, old as I am…”
The newsman backed off a step. Then, “Suppose I am doubting you. Not your veracity, but your optimism about the machine’s being safe. Suppose I said you don’t really know that it’s safe, you’re just hoping that it is.”
Hector stepped between them. “Now wait… if you can’t.…”
“Suppose,” the newsman went on, ducking past Hector, “suppose I challenged you to a duel.”
“I’ve used this machine many times,” Leoh said.
“Okay, but I still challenge you.”
Suddenly Leoh felt absolutely calm. “Very well. I accept your challenge. And you can do whatever you want to during our duel to try to prove your point. But I insist on one condition: the tape of the duel must be made public knowledge immediately after the duel is finished.”
The newsman grinned. “Perfect.”
Leoh realized that this was what he had been after all along.
9
Odal sat in his cell-like room in the Kerak embassy, waiting for the phone message. The room was narrow and severe, with strictly functional furniture—a bed, a. desk and chair, a view screen. No decorations, plain military gray walls, no window.
Kor had explained the plan for Leoh’s destruction before Odal had boarded the ship for Acquatainia. Odal did not like the plan, but it seemed workable and it would surely remove Leoh from the scene.
The phone buzzed.
Odal leaned across the desk and touched the ON button. The newsman’s chubby face took form on the small screen.
“Well?” Odal demanded.
“He accepted the challenge. We duel in three days. And he wants the tape shown publicly, just as you thought he would.”
Odal smiled tightly. “Excellent.”
“Look, if I’m going to be made to look foolish on that tape,” the newsman said, “I think I ought to get more money.”
“I don’t handle the financial matters,” Odal said. “You’ll have to speak to the embassy accountant… after we see how well you play your part in the duel.”
Pouting, the newsman replied, “All right. But I’m going to be finished for life when that tape is shown.”
“We’ll take care of you,” Odal promised. Indeed, we’ll provide for you for the rest of your life.
Geri Dulaq walked briskly out of the sunlight of the university’s campus into the shadows of the dueling machine’s high-vaulted chamber.
“Hector, you sounded so worried on the phone…”
He took her hands in his. “I am. That’s why I wanted to talk to you. It’s… well, it’s happened again. First Ponte argues the Professor into a duel, and now this newsman. You think Ponte might be working for Kerak, so… I mean.…”
“Perhaps the newsman is too,” Geri finished for him.
Hector nodded. “And with Odal back… well, they’re brewing up something.…”
“Where is the Professor now?” Geri asked.
Pointing to the office behind the dueling machine chamber, Hector said, “In there. He doesn’t want to be disturbed… working on equations or something… about interstellar ships, I think.”
Geri looked surprised.
“Oh, he’s not worried about the duel,” Hector explained. “I told him all about Ponte… what you said, I mean. But he thinks the machine can’t be tampered with, so he’s not, uh, worried. And he beat Ponte pretty easily.”
Geri turned toward the massive, looming machine. “I’ve never been here before. It’s a little frightening.”
Hector put on a smile. “There’s nothing to be frightened about… that is, I mean, well, it’s only a machine. It can’t hurt you.”
“I know. It was Odal and Kanus’ hired monsters that killed father, not the machine itself.”
She walked along the long, curving, main control desk, looked over its banks of gauges and switches, ran a finger lightly across its plastisteel edge.
“Could you show me what it’s like?”
Hector blinked. “Huh?”
“In the dueling machine,” she said. “Can it be used for something else, other than duels? I’d like to see what it’s like to have your imagination made real.”
“Oh, but… well, you’re not… I mean, nobody’s supposed to ran it without… that is…”
“You do know how to run the machine, don’t you?” She looked right up into his eyes.
With a gulp, Hector managed a weak, “Oh sure…”
“Then can’t we use it together? Perhaps we can share a dream.”
Looking around, his hands suddenly clammy, Hector mumbled, “Well, uh, somebody’s supposed to be at the controls to, er, monitor the duel… I mean—”
“Just for a few little minutes?” Geri smiled her prettiest.
Hector melted. “Okay… I guess it’ll be all right. Just for a few minutes, that is.”
He walked with her to the farther booth and helped her put on the neurocontacts. Then he went back to the main desk and with shaky hands set the machine into action. He checked and double-checked all the controls, pushed the final switches, and dashed to the other booth, tripping as he entered it and banging noisily into the seat. He sat down, fumbled with the neurocontacts hastily, and then stared into the screen.
Nothing happened.
For a moment he was panic-stricken. Then the screen began to glow softly, colors shifted, green mostly, soft cool green with a hint of blue in it.…
And he found himself floating dreamily next to Geri in a world of green, with greenish light filtering down ever so softly from far above them.
“Hello,” Geri said.
He grinned at her. “Hi.”
“I’ve always wondered what it would be like to be able to live underwater, without any equipment, like a mermaid.”
Hector noticed, when she said that, hundreds of fish swimming lazily about them. As his eyes adjusted to the subdued lighting, he saw sculptured shapes of coral about them, colors that he had never seen before.
“Our castle,” Geri said, and she swam slowly toward one of the coral pinnacles and disappeared behind it.
Hector found himself sliding easily after her. The water seemed to offer no resistance to his movement. He was completely relaxed, completely at home. He saw her up ahead, gliding gracefully along, and pulled up beside her. A great silver fish crossed in front of them, and brilliantly hued plants swayed gently in the currents.