Brain World

question on the part of a tyro agent, so he added, “I have the dream, the United Planets dream. I take the orders of those who are working it out in detail.”

Willy de Rudder said, “But why is Number One, of this planet Neu Reich, any different than the one you mentioned, Lenin? How do we know but that a worse one won’t come to power?”

Ronny said, still wearily, “It would seem that he’s an exception. You see, Willy, most dictatorships aren’t really one man affairs. They’re a team. Alexander the Great didn’t destroy the Persian Empire and take everything all the way to India; his team did. A team recruited largely, by the way, by his father, Philip, who was a real military genius. Caesar too had a devoted team, a competent one. Certainly, Napoleon did. He rallied around him some of the outstanding military, political and even scientific capabilities of his time.”

“But Number One?”

“Is unique. It would seem that he alone carries the whole Neu Reich program on his shoulders. Finish him and their dreams of expanding into this section of the galaxy and absorbing other planets—planets now in the loose confederation we call United Planets—would probably go under.”

“But not certainly?”

“Few things are certain, Willy. How’s your breathing?”

“Almost normal. As an agent of Section G will I often find myself in a position such as this—waiting to murder a man who is in no position to defend himself?”

“I wouldn’t know.” Ronny Bronston put down the telescope he’d had trained on the dictator below, and turned to his somewhat younger companion. He said definitely, “Willy, all the chips are down now. There’s a very good chance that we won’t get out of here. Once we hit Number One, the manure will be in the fan. So I might as well check you out now, in all decency, on the full story. If we do get out, you’ll no longer be a probationary agent, you’ll be a first grade agent—may the Holy Ultimate have mercy on your soul, assuming that there is any such thing as a Holy Ultimate, and I doubt it.”

“Go on,” Willy said, his voice a little tight. He had taken his eye away from the scope sight, with its victim beyond.

Ronny said, “Let’s make it very basic. When underspace was discovered and it became practical for intergalactic expansion on the part of mankind, things became chaotic beyond belief. Man exploded into the stars like, well, Commissioner Metaxa once called it lemmings. They took off from the mother planet, Earth, in all directions and for every reason known to man nor beast. Political reasons—they wanted a true Utopian society, a true Socialist, Communist or perhaps Anarchist society. Or like the Pilgrims of American history, a planet where they could practice their religion without outside interference. In short, go to hell in their own way.

Some went for crackpot reasons such as getting back to nature and giving up all technological progress. All right, so who cared? If a couple of thousand cloddies got together and went looking for an Earth-type world where they could revive ancient paganism, including witchcraft, what business was it of anybody else? A loose confederation, based on Mother Earth, was formed for interplanetary cooperation. United Planets, in short. Willy, what are Articles One and Two of the United Planets Charter?”

The other looked at him, his hood masking his frown. “Why, anybody knows that. Article One: The United Planets organization shall take no steps to interfere with the internal political, socio- economic, or religious institutions of its member planets. Article Two: No member planet of United Planets shall interfere with the internal political socio-economic or religious institutions of any other member planets.”

Ronny nodded. “Right. And those two articles are the very basis of United Planets. However, there came a new development. Over a century ago one of our Space Forces scouts picked up a derelict, drifting, blasted and burnt out alien spacecraft. It was obviously military in nature, had been destroyed in some interplanetary conflict and it contained the charred remains of a life form—obviously intelligent. It was about the size of a monkey but with a larger head, and it had the equivalent of hands capable of handling delicate tools.

“All of a sudden, the highest echelons of United Planets realized that mankind was in the clutch. No longer could we be philosophical about those segments of our race that were not advancing scientifically, technologically. Sooner or later, man in his expansion into the galaxy, would come up against this intelligent life form, or possibly the other life form with which it had waged interplanetary conflict.

“When our engineers examined that burnt out one-man spacescout, they were scared silly. It was too far gone for them to be able to figure out any of the devices aboard, but they could learn enough to know that the little monkey-like creature was backed by a technology as far ahead of us as we are of Neanderthal man.”

Willy said unhappily, “Well, maybe this intelligent alien life form would prove friendly.”

“Wizard,” Ronny said wryly. “And maybe not. Remember it was a military craft the critter was in and it had been destroyed in a fight. It was obvious that mankind could no longer refrain from progressing in science and technology as rapidly as possible. We could no longer tolerate, in United Planets, worlds with crackpot political, socioeconomic, or even religious systems that prevented all-out development.

“So Section G was secretly organized to subvert Articles One and Two of the Charter. By any method found necessary, we pushed the member worlds ahead, even in spite of themselves. If there was a planet with a feudalistic social system, we undermined it and made efforts to establish a capitalistic one, under which progress would be the faster. If there was a dictatorship, where a self-proclaimed elite held up progress the better to milk the man in the street, we subverted it. It there was some religion that held up progress, we undermined it.”

Willy de Rudder said unhappily, “Why keep it all secret? Why not just come right out and inform the whole United Planets confederation about these aliens, and urge them to cooperate in all-out advance? The danger is a common one.”

Ronny peered through the telescope again, checking the terrace of the chalet. Number One was beginning to eat.

“How’s your breathing?” he said.

“Just about normal.”

“We’ll wait a few more minutes,” Ronny decided. “To go on with it, we can’t just come out and make a plea for unity in the face of a common potential foe, because there is nothing that man hangs onto more fanatically than his religious, political and socio-economic beliefs. The Christians died in the Roman arenas rather than give up their God. When the advent of the atomic bomb came along, did the United States and Soviet Russia, of those days, unite in the face of mutual destruction? Hell, no. They went into an arms race. Better dead than Red, the Americans said, and the Russians had similar slogans. Socioeconomics? You get an advocate of capitalism and one of socialism together and they’ll argue till hell freezes over before one will give in. No, Willy, we had to do it behind their backs. And that was, and still is, the basic reason for the existence of Section G, though complications have come up recently.”

He took a deep breath. “At any rate, that’s why we’re here on the planet Neu Reich. Number One stands in the way. This world isn’t even a member of United Planets and he’s rattling his scabbard, threatening to take over some of the other humanity-settled worlds in this sector.”

He reached into a pocket of his coveralls and brought forth an odd looking cartridge. It was quite long and even the case was of plastic.

Ronny handed it over. “All right, Willy, this is it,” he told the other.

Willy de Rudder took the bullet. He said, “Only one? Suppose I miss?”

“In the first place, you’d never get a chance to get another shot at him. That gobblydygook gun is a single shot deal and he’ll be away and into the chalet before you could reload. But besides that, this plastic weapon was designed with only one shot in mind. The barrel is ruined after only one. You’d be hard put to hit anything with it. No, we get only one chance.”

Ronny took up the telescope again and trained it on the dictator below. Willy snuggled up against the stock of the gawky rifle and brought his eye to the scope.

Ronny said, “Okay. Hit him smack in the middle of the chest. Or, at least, aim for it. That cartridge will do the job.”

The long barreled plastic rifle had two triggers. De Rudder pressed the first one, the set trigger, then very carefully brought his finger back to the hair trigger behind. He took a deep breath, held it and gently squeezed. The gun hissed and, in spite of the manner in which the stock was padded, the marksman’s shoulder was thrown