Melome

'A strange description. Malnutrition would account for your size, but why should he think you dangerous? Sit, my friend, take some more wine, let us consider this. You may have gained more than you realize.'

Shakira brooded over the paper as Dumarest followed his suggestion. A few more minutes against what the other's fresh viewpoint could gain. Extra danger set against the possibility of winning gold from apparent dross.

'Proscribed,' murmured Shakira. 'Set apart. Outlawed. Banned. Incredible that a world should be so treated. But by whom? And how to enforce the proscription?'

Questions which hung in the air as he considered the matter. A silence broken by an imperious knocking at the door.

'Who is it?' Shakira's tone held anger though his face remained as placid as before. 'I gave orders that on no account should I be disturbed.' The paper fell to the table as the knocking was repeated. 'Who is there?'

The answer stepped through the opened panel, tall, thin, glowing in a scarlet robe. One adorned with the Seal of the Cyclan.

'Cyber Tron.' Pushed Shakira had fallen back to the support of the table. Now he stood, hands lifted, facing the intruder. 'What do you want here?'

'You know the answer to that.' Tron lifted his hand, the gun it held. One like that used by Valaban. 'Do not waste time calling for help. Those you set on guard have been taken care of.' The guard moved to point at Dumarest, the wide orifice aimed directly at his face. 'You are to come with me. Unless you obey me implicitly I shall fire. The shot will not kill you but your face will be ruined, your eyes. Even in the open a blind man cannot get far.'

And in the maze of the circus it would be impossible. Dumarest froze where he sat, hands on the table, one close to the glass holding his wine. Across the board Shakira faced the cyber, hands still lifted in his pathetic gesture of appeal or surrender. An act? One to cover his betrayal? The face remained a mask and gave no hint as to the answer.

Dumarest said, 'It seems you win, Cyber Tron. But I expected you earlier. What delayed you?'

'You will not move and you will not talk.' Tron's face, like Shakira's, did not change expression but his eyes revealed his pleasure. 'Disobey and I fire.'

A good moment and he relished it; the prediction had been correct. Now, even though the agent had failed, Dumarest was held fast in the trap. One now sealed tight by his own presence.

'You will lift both hands and place them on your head,' said Tron. 'You will make no other movement.' Then, as Dumarest made no move to obey, 'Do it or-'

'You will fire. I know. You told me.' Dumarest saw the tightening of the finger on the trigger and added, quickly, 'To shoot me would be proof of your inefficiency. A blind man needs help-who will give it? Can you trust them? Could you watch them? It would be far more logical to keep me functional.' Dumarest moved a finger closer to the glass of wine. A poor weapon but the only one available. 'There is always the possibility of error should you fire. How can you be certain as to the charge? The damage it could do? And what of the trauma of the wound?'

Arguments to ease the tension and so lessen the immediate danger, but ones which he knew weren't going to work. Tron was too determined. Dumarest looked at the gun, knowing that before he could move it would fire. That it was only a matter of seconds before it did.

'Efficiency is a matter of adjusting action to the relevant situation,' said Tron. 'Your points are valid but negated by the paramount need to ensure your captivity. Therefore-'

Shakira screamed.

It was a sound like grating metal, a nail dragged over a slate, loud, shocking, totally unexpected. As the cyber turned toward him Shakira stepped forward, hands high, voice pleading.

'No! Don't! Please don't! I beg you not to do it!'

Words which masked action, even as he spoke the fabric of his blouse ripped open from neck to waist to reveal a hand. Holding a gun.

A laser which fired as Dumarest snatched up the glass and threw it as Tron fired at the same time. A blast which tore at Shakira's face and sent him turning as the cyber fell with smoke pluming from the ruined pattern of his insignia.

'Shakira!' Dumarest rose from his examination of the dead man. 'How badly are you hurt?' He had tried to divert Tron's aim but knew he had failed. 'Shakira?'

The owner remained turned away, hands to his face, leaning against the edge of the table. Something cracked beneath Dumarest's foot as he stepped toward him and he looked at the fragment beneath his boot. One of several lying scattered around; scraps of flesh-coloured plastic holding a limited flexibility.

Dumarest knew what they had to be.

'A mask,' he said. 'You wear a mask.'

One shattered and ruined by the blast from the cyber's gun, but what other damage had been done? Shakira turned away as Dumarest reached him.

'Please. The mask is damaged, true, but I have another. In the bottom drawer of my desk. Be so good as to face the wall while I don it.'

'I'll do that.' Dumarest reached again for the shielding hands. 'But only after I've seen what injuries you have.'

A moment and they were exposed, ugly welts scored on flesh but harmless enough. The mask had taken the brunt of the shot, shattering like an eggshell but saving the wearer. One now revealed for what he was.

'You are disgusted,' said Shakira. 'I can read it in your eyes.'

'No. You see what you expect to find. I'm concerned, not disgusted.' Then, as the other made no comment, Dumarest added in a burst of sudden anger, 'What kind of a man do you take me for? You saved my life-what the hell do I care what you look like?'

'You are kind. The other mask?'

'You don't need it.'

'For you, no, but for others? And I must maintain the habit of wearing it. Help yourself to wine, Earl. I shall not be long.'

It still held the color of blood and the acrid taste of defeat, but now a new dimension had been added, one of alien scope.

Dumarest sat, drinking, remembering how Shakira had looked when the last of the ruined mask had been discarded. The bald, rounded head, the protruding eyes, the noseless face, the mouth, the jaw-against him Elagonya was beautiful.

But there had been more than a distortion of the familiar, the visage had held inhuman facets as had the eyes as if an alien form of life had been so disfigured as to ape the human frame.

'Pour me wine, Earl.' Shakira had returned, his face seemingly as it had been, but more stiff now as if the mask were an earlier model, made before he had recognized the necessity of falsifying a smile. 'Thank you.' He drank and set down his glass. 'We each have secrets, Earl. Do we agree never to divulge them?'

'Of course.' Dumarest looked at the dead cyber. 'And him?'

'He will be disposed of.'

'In the sump?' Dumarest guessed the answer. 'He will be missed and others will come after him.'

'When they do I shall tell them of the tragic accident which took so many lives. Valaban's, the cyber's, yours.' Shakira picked up his glass and took a sip of wine. 'A good story, my friend, and there will be those to swear to its truth. And they will not lie.'

Primed and conditioned by the sensitives Shakira controlled. The powers he owned which could delude the test of machines. Dumarest relaxed even as he wondered why Shakira should go to so much trouble. He had been made a part of the circus and the circus took care of its own, but was that the real answer?

'More wine?' Shakira poured and sipped his own. 'We have much in common, Earl, you and I. When I was very young I never guessed how different to others I was. My family was wealthy and kept me apart. I grew up attended by those I thought normal. It was only later, when I left home, I realized what a hell the universe could be.'

He made the familiar gesture, hands lifting to hover as if in appeal or surrender, but now Dumarest knew it to be neither. The lifting of the hands and arms was to give clearance to the other hands hidden beneath the blouse.