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  But, if the bubble imploded, so would the cabins. It would take ten or more bars to implode the bubble, because it was spherical and sturdy—but when it happened, it would be virtually instant. One moment we would be alive and nervous; the next we would be crushed, more or less literally to pulp. We were surely approaching the limit now. That notion insinuated itself right into my consciousness and knocked the props from under my courage, leaving me a coward.

  Then I thought of Megan, now alone in the next chamber, and was horrified for her as well. Even if we survived this ordeal, she would not be mine. She had left me for the soundest of all her reasons: the philosophical. She accepted the necessity of what was to be termed the Tyrancy but could not support it personally. So she had freed me to do what I had to do—and left me desolate. What the fear of implosion did to my physical courage, the knowledge of my loss of Megan did to my emotional courage.

  Shelia knew. She had invisible antennae that resonated to human distress, and she knew me as well as an executive secretary of fifteen years could. “Hope—here,” she said in the darkness.

  I got to my knees and leaned over her wheel and armrest. Her arms came up to enclose me, to draw my head to her bosom. She held me there and stroked my hair while I sobbed.

  “It had to be, it had to be ...” she murmured over and over. Of course, she was right; this was a necessary pass. But a necessary thing is not necessarily a pleasant thing.

  Then there was illumination of a sort, and I lifted my head and looked at her face. “Helse,” I said.

  “I always come to you when you need me,” she replied.

  “You always do,” I agreed.

  Helse was my first love. She had been sixteen, I fifteen when we met, thirty-five years before. She had taught me love. She had died on the eve of our wedding, helping me survive. Death had changed her only in this: She had not aged from that moment. She was always sixteen, for me. Always lovely, always understanding. Always there for me, in the recess of reality.

  And I was always fifteen, for her. Always the innocent, loving her and grateful for her kindness.

  “If I am to die,” I said, “this is the way I would do it.”

  “It has to be,” she agreed.

  I got to my feet and reached my arms down around her and lifted her out of the chair. I set her on the bed, her head on the pillow, and gently, methodically stripped her of her clothing. My subsequent experience advised me that there were women more thoroughly endowed than Helse, and I had possessed more than one of them, but none was ever better formed for my taste than she. I kissed her bare breasts, and she held my head to them. “It has to be,” she murmured again.

  I removed my suit, then undressed myself. Then I took her, and she was what she had always been for me, my ultimate delight. I kissed her, she clung to me, her face was wet with her tears or mine, and her tongue met mine as her legs lifted to wrap around mine. I bit her on her right ear as I pumped my essence into her, and she sighed and convulsed against me and relaxed at last. We lay embracing, the sweat of our exertion between us, and my delight in her body remained, though my sexual passion had passed. “It has been so long,” I murmured in her ear.

  “So long,” she agreed.

  There was a sound from the chair. “Shield coming on,” Coral announced.

  We clung to each other as the bubble passed from the free-fall of falling to the free-fall of null-gee. Technical experts say there is no distinction between them, but we more ordinary folk know that there is. We felt the change—and the enormous relief of knowing that if we had not imploded yet, we were not going to, for we would descend no farther.

  “I must leave you before the light returns,” Helse told me. She took my head in her hands and kissed me once more, deeply. “It has to be.”

  “It has to be,” I agreed. I knew what happened when I forced her to overstay her leave. She could become a corpse or a skeleton—or worse. Helse’s terms had to be honored.

  Quickly I got up and dressed her and myself. I lifted her to the chair. Then, in an accident of timing that was fortunate indeed, the light returned.

  I blinked, and she blinked, adjusting. She was Shelia, my paralyzed secretary. Her hair was mussed and her clothing was in a certain disarray, but the rigors of the bubble-situation could account for that.

  She brought forth a handkerchief. “Sir, there is a smudge on your face,” she said.

  I brought my face down, and she wiped it carefully. She had done the same for me on other occasions, making sure I was presentable before a public appearance.

  But this was more than that. “Shelia,” I said. “I—”

  “You had a vision,” she said. “I understand.”

  She surely understood—but there are limits. “It was never my intent to—”

  “I know who Helse is,” she reminded me firmly.

  “But—”

  “She comes to you when you most need her, bringing what you need.”

  “That is true. However—”

  “Did you feel her legs move?”

  I stiffened in a kind of shock. Helse’s legs had moved! They had enclosed my body at the essential moment.

  Shelia’s legs had been paralyzed since her childhood. Never since I had known her had she moved them. I knew that electro and chemical therapy had maintained their structure, but the nerves simply were not there. This was no psychological thing; it was not physically possible for her to move them, even a trifle, unless she picked them up with her hands.

  Helse’s arms had clasped my upper torso. Her legs had spread and lifted themselves. That could have been my fancy of the moment, of course; if I could summon her likeness from eternity, I could summon her motion.

  But how had Shelia known?

  I stared at her, bemused. Her eyes were bright with tears not of sorrow. “They moved,” I agreed. Then I kissed her.

  She returned the kiss, then, womanlike, chastised me. “You’re smudged again—right after I got you clean.”

  With the same color as before. Shelia’s lipstick. But the body I had held had been Helse’s.

  I gave up the effort to explain or apologize. Either nothing had happened between Shelia and me, or it was something so significant as to be beyond our understanding.

  But there was something else. I had separated from Megan. Never during the years of our marriage had I touched any member of my staff in any way other than proper or professional. I had touched another woman outside that number, but that had been a special situation and, I think, did not represent a dilution of my marriage. I had been faithful to Megan. But now I had broken from her—and what I had just done represented my recognition of that fact. Helse had come to me, to show me that my marriage was over. I had known it intellectually, but now I knew it in my gut.

  I still longed for Megan, and knew I would always love her. But our relationship had been sundered, as it had had to be.

  “It had to be,” I murmured.

  “It had to be,” Shelia repeated.

  “Ship has rendezvoused,” Emerald reported. “If you will board now ...”

  I realized that I had not returned to my suit. Fortunately Emerald could not see me as I stood outside the pickup range of the transceiver. Actually, knowledge of what I had done wouldn’t have fazed Emerald one whit; she, too, understood me. “On our way,” I said.

  CHAPTER 2

  BEAUTIFUL DREAMER

  We were aboard the flagship: Coral, Ebony, Shelia, and I. Emerald was establishing a Naval cordon around Pineleaf Bubble and all that region, to insure that no farther acts of mayhem occurred. Megan would be safe, and my daughter, Hopie. I had never discussed it with Megan, because our separation had come upon us so abruptly, but I knew Hopie would remain with her. My sister, Spirit, was in the state of Golden, where she had gone to organize the Constitutional Convention that had just put me in power; she would join me as soon as she could.

  My limited personal staff was understanding and loyal, as Shelia had just demonstrate
d, but none of these women were politicians. I knew I needed competent advice in a hurry. Had the election been honored, I would have assumed the presidency and designated selected officers from my party in the conventional fashion. But the election had been voided, and now I had taken power outside the normal framework of government. That made it an entirely different game, and I wasn’t sure I understood the rules. I was certain to blunder and quite possibly get myself killed if I did not take precisely the correct steps, quickly.

  “Sir,” Shelia said, summoning my attention. We were at the moment in an officer’s dayroom, designated a temporary headquarters. Coral was taking a shower, having gotten grimy when squeezing into the obscure engineer’s compartment, restoring the shield and reviving the unconscious engineer. Ebony was sorting through a bundle of my clothing she had had the foresight to take from my former apartment, knowing I would not return. She would see that I had a decent suit to wear for whatever occasion occurred. Shelia remained my liaison with the rest of the planet, fielding a continual hailstorm of messages and disposing of all but the most critical. When she alerted me, I snapped to.

  “Admiral Emerald Mondy has the budget expert on the screen,” she said.

  Oh, yes. I had asked for the most knowledgeable expert on the budget, in that manner signaling my commitment to the cause that had brought me power. That had been scarcely an hour ago, yet it seemed like days. “I, uh, guess I’d better, um, talk to him,” I mumbled uncertainly. I had no idea what to say to the man—or woman—I had asked for.

  “Hope Hubris will interview Senator Stonebridge immediately,” Shelia said smoothly.

  A face came on the dayroom’s large screen. I recognized it, of course; no person spends twenty years in the Jupiter political arena without becoming familiar with the prime movers of the society. Stonebridge had been a leading financier until tapped by President Kenson to be Budget Director, and in the time he had held that office, the finances of Jupiter had been disciplined. When Kenson retired, Stonebridge had run successfully for the Senate and become the leading critic of President Tocsin’s financial policies. I had no doubt of his expertise; had my wits been more about me, I would have realized at the outset that he was the one to consult. I had, however, never dealt with him personally.

  “Senator, you know my situation,” I said, collecting my wits so as to put on a good front.

  “Yes, Mr. President,” he agreed.

  I grimaced. “I’m not sure I’m president. I have assumed power outside the framework of—”

  He smiled. “If you will provide the appropriate title, then.”

  I pondered the matter of a title, and my mind went blank. I spread my hands. “I suppose you had better stick with what you have. Now I am committed to balance the budget, but I am no budgetary expert. If you will advise me how to—”

  “Mr. President, I can’t do that.”

  I was startled. “You—?”

  “You must provide me with a context. What are your priorities? Do you plan new taxes? What stress do you place on military preparedness? On social welfare? I can make suggestions, but I have to know my mandates.”

  I shook my head ruefully. “Senator, I don’t even have a government yet!”

  “Perhaps you had better consult me at a later date,” he suggested delicately.

  I made a gesture of submission. “At a later date,” I agreed.

  The connection broke. Then Emerald entered the dayroom. “You haven’t changed, sir,” she said, like a mother addressing an errant child.

  “My wife and sister aren’t here,” I replied, knowing that she would understand what I meant. I had never claimed to be expert at organization; the women in my life had always run things for me. In the Navy, Emerald herself had served in that capacity.

  “Sir, I don’t think you can afford to wait until Spirit gets here,” Emerald said. “I would help you if I could, but I don’t know the civilian sector, and I think it would be best to keep the military sector subordinate. As it is, we have all we can do to keep the peace during the interim.”

  “Keep the peace?” I asked blankly.

  “There is armed rebellion in some sectors. We can sit on it only so long without your direct input. Also, the other planets are getting restive. I suggest that you get your house in order within the hour, sir.”

  “But I hardly know where to start!” I wailed.

  She nodded, knowing my problem. “I think, sir, that you need a very special consultation. Take half an hour; he will put you straight.”

  “Who will put me straight?”

  She stepped into me, took my head in her hands, and kissed me. I was abruptly aware of how attractive she remained to me, despite the passage of twenty years. “The Beautiful Dreamer,” she murmured so that only I could hear. Then she turned around and departed, leaving me stunned.

  Shelia wheeled up to me. “Are you all right, sir?”

  “I—”

  “You still have feeling for her? It’s obvious that she still loves you.”

  “All true,” I agreed. “I retain feeling for every woman I have had, in whatever fashion, and they for me.” I touched her hand momentarily. “But this is something else.”

  “Did she give you a name, sir? I can connect—”

  “You can’t connect me to this party,” I said. “He is—like Helse, in one respect.”

  She paused, and I could almost see the synapses connecting in her head. Shelia had made it her business to know every business and personal connection I had, so that when I asked for “What’shisname in Ybor” she could have him on the screen in a moment without asking for clarification. Now she was sifting, computer-like, through my Naval contacts that predated her tenure, knowing that this was the most likely area of Emerald’s suggestion. Her face paled. “Lieutenant Commander Repro?” she whispered.

  “The same. The one whose dream of grandeur I implemented.”

  She paused again, and I knew she was assessing the implications. She had helped me animate Helse, but that had been a special case. She could not do the same for a dead man.

  It was Ebony who came to the rescue. From the collection of my things she brought out a device with five steel balls. “If you take this into the chapel, sir,” she said, holding it out, “I don’t think God would object.”

  I took the device into the chapel chamber adjoining the dayroom. This was a nondenominational place intended for prayer of whatever nature desired. Indeed I did not think God would object if I sought communion with the dead here.

  I set the little structure on the table. It was a framework like a cube with five steel balls suspended by paired threads from the top beams.

  The balls hung in a row, almost touching each other. When one at the end was swung into the next, the shock was transmitted through the line until the ball at the far end swung out, leaving the four others virtually stationary. Friction made it imperfect, of course, but it remained a nice demonstration of a physical principle. I had amused myself for many hours, swinging those balls by ones, twos, and threes, noting how perfectly the pattern transmitted to the far side.

  This device had belonged originally to Lieutenant Commander Repro, who had used it to illustrate his thesis that every force had its impact and its reaction. He had conceived the notion of an ideal military unit, staffed by the most capable, yet unknown, officers. He was a drug addict, and the Navy had not taken him seriously. But I had become his ideal commander, because of my talent in understanding people, and with his help I had formed that ideal cadre, and in due course we had swept the pirates out of the Belt. Success hath its price in the Navy, and that price had been my forced retirement and his death, but the unit we had formed remained and now governed the Navy itself. That, of course, was the true root of my present power: the Navy was backing me.

  I had had a rule: every member of my unit had his song. It had to be bestowed on him by the group, in the manner of the migrant workers. My song was Worried Man Blues; Repro’s song was Beautifu1 Dreamer
. He had not been beautiful physically, and perhaps not mentally; he had been wasting away from the ravages of his addiction. But his dream had been beautiful, and its legacy remained—and was now ready to expand to planetary scale. owed what I was emotionally to Helse, and what I was politically to Megan, but I owed what I had been militarily to the Dreamer. In that sense I was his dream.

  I lifted an end ball and let it go. It swung to impact on the next, and the far ball swung out. The far one swung back, knocking the near one out, not quite as far, and so on, back and forth, until the inefficiency of the system caused all five balls to be swinging gently in unison. I watched, feeling myself being mesmerized by that process.

  I lifted two balls and let them go. Two swung out opposite, and back, and two near balls again, and on, until again the swings diminished into uniform motion. Then three balls, so that only two remained stationary in the center, and the center ball was always in motion, swinging back and forth, as it were picking up the two on one side and then the other. Fascinating!

  Then I lifted two from the near side, one from the far side, and let them go simultaneously. Sure enough, one rebounded on the near side and two on the far side, their impetuses passing through each other unscathed. This always fascinated me most. Every force did have its reaction, regardless of the other forces operating.

  I hummed, hearing the words clearly in my mind:

  Beautiful Dreamer, wake unto me ...

  And he was there, sitting across from me. “You steal my song, Worry?”

  “I steal your dream,” I replied. “I can’t handle it alone. I need your guidance.”

  “Where do you stand?”

  “I have assumed power over Jupiter, politically. I must balance the budget. But I don’t know how to start.”