Authors: Keith Laumer
"Ussh!"
Lucael whispered.
"I'm sure that
matters need not come to that," Ussh said unctiously. "Doubtless His
Excellency, on further consideration, will wish to withdraw his
objection."
The Emperor-elect, who
had slumped rather vaguely on his throne as the Groaci spoke, sat up alertly.
"Very well; on
with the executions. We'll make a note to send for a fresh set of Terries more
amenable to reason—"
"To protest this
unwarranted assumption of authority," Jith whispered urgently in his own
language to Ussh. 'To remind you—Special Appointee or otherwise—that I am
ranking Groacian official here!"
"I see no reason
to coddle Terran spies," the other replied in Lumbagan. "This is
Groac's opportunity to get in on the ground floor; why annoy His Imperial
Highness with minor quibbles on technical points?"
"To point out that
once these natives begin lopping alien heads, Groaci organ clusters may be next
to roll!"
Retief's companion was
staring at nothing with his eyes half closed. Ussh stirred uneasily, looked
around the ornate room.
"It appears that I
now confront an intellect equal or superior to my own," Lucael murmured.
"He sensed my touch and instantly erected barriers, the strength of which
I cannot assess."
"Enough!" the
enthroned Lumbagan spoke up abruptly, as if returning from a reverie.
"Captain!" He pointed a limber digit at the guard chief. "Escort
the condemned to the courtyard, and give your marksmen some unscheduled target
practice! No need to finish them off in a hurry; just keep peppering away until
they stop twitching."
"Time to
move," Retief said. "Luke—stay out of sight and keep an eye on Ussh.
No matter what happens, stay tuned to him—and don't tip your hand
prematurely."
"What's your plan,
Retief? I'm not at all sure I can control him—"
"No time for
plans; we'll have to play it by ear," Retief said, and thrust the door
wide.
"Hold everything,
gentlemen," he said as all eyes turned toward him. "There are new
dispatches just in from the home front that cast a different complexion on
matters."
For a moment, total
silence gripped the chamber. Then:
"Seize him!"
Ussh snarled. When the guards failed to move, he repeated the order, in a shout
this time.
"Don't slip out of
character, Ussh," Retief said. "You're just a Groaci VHHP, remember?
The troops work for His Putative Highness the Emperor-to-be."
"Retief!"
Pouncetrifle blurted hastily in Terran. "Run for it, man! The official
comset is in my quarters, at the back of the wardrobe under my golf clubs! Send
out a code three-oh-two—"
"Silence!"
the Imperial candidate yelled, and hesitated.
"Uh—what about it,
Your Highness?" Colonel Suash said hesitantly, still standing fast.
"Is it your Imperial command to nab this foreigner?"
The would-be emperor's
mouth sagged slightly open. His expression was that of someone lost in thought.
"His
Highness," Ussh said, and paused. He seemed to be struggling silently with
himself.
"Looking for just
the right word, Ussh?" Retief inquired amiably. He turned to the colonel.
"Relax, Suash," he said. "As you can see, His Highness is having
second thoughts on a number of matters."
"Take. . . ."
the emperor said. Retief took a swift step toward Ussh, who recoiled.
"Stand back, Terran!" he hissed.
"Your
Highness?" said Colonel Suash, staring up at the musing figure on the
throne.
"Ughhrrr,"
the royal claimant said, gazing vacantly into space.
"Ah—Your
Highness?" Suash repeated. "In the, uh, absence of any new orders, I
presume I carry out the executions?"
"Just a minute,
Colonel," Retief said. "You Lumbagans don't take orders from
foreigners, do you?"
"Not on your
second-best toupee I don't," the officer snapped. "So don't try to
give me any!"
"By no means,
Colonel. I'm referring to Swarmmaster Ussh, who represents himself as a Special
Appointee of the Groacian High Council."
"I don't take
orders from him either!"
"No," Retief
said, and pointed to the throne, "but His Would-be Highness does."
"Wha—?" The
officer half drew his dress sword and turned to the emperor-elect. "Do you
mind if I chop this foreigner down right here, Your Highness, for that crack he
just made about you?"
"Ungunggunggg,"
the enthroned Lumbagan mumbled. His head lolled on his shoulder; his mouth hung
slackly open. Abruptly, he closed it, pulled himself upright.
"We were just, ah,
pondering our next pronouncement," he said briskly, as Retief took another
step toward Ussh, who stood frozen, two eyes canted tautly toward the throne,
the other three hanging limp. At the Terran's advance, he spun to face him.
"Now, Colonel. . .
." The emperor-to-be paused, mouth open.
"Yes, Your
Highness?" The colonel watched in dismay as his ruler-presumptive's
expression relaxed into vacuity.
"You might as well
address your remarks to Ussh," Retief advised the officer. "He's the
brains of the operation."
"See here,
Retief," Pouncetrifle spoke up. "The intellectual prowess of the
emperor is no concern of ours—"
"It's the
intellectual prowess of Ussh I'm thinking of at the moment, Mr. Ambassador. He
has a number of rather unusual capabilities."
"Lies!" Ussh
shouted. "Fantasies! The ravings of a disordered imagination! I'll see you
all hanged for disrespect to His Imperial Highness! It's all a plot to
discredit the people's choice, elevated by acclamation to the Lumbagan throne!"
He was interrupted by a slithering sound, followed by a heavy thump as the
emperor slid from the elaborate chair and sprawled full length on the dias,
snoring gently.
"It's a plot, all
right, Ussh—but you're the one behind it," Retief said. "It wasn't
His Imperial Highness who mobilized the troops and took the capital by storm;
it was you."
"Guards! Shoot
them down in their tracks for aggravated lèsé-majesté!" Ussh shouted.
"What about it,
Colonel?" Retief addressed the guard chief. "Was it our slumbering
host who gave the order to march on the capital?"
"Well—not
personally, of course. General Ussh notified me—but he was simply relaying His
Imperial Highness' commands—"
"Wasn't it also
Ussh who passed along the instructions that organized your unit in the first
place, and handed out the orders regarding the secret laboratory?"
"Here, that's GUTS
classification material you're discussing! "
"Not any more.
You've been taken in, Colonel. Those were all Ussh's ideas—"
"Mr. Retief!"
Ambassador Jith spoke up. "May I remind you that
I
am principal
officer here, and that
I
have given no such instructions to any member
of the Groaci delegation—"
"I'm sure you
haven't, Mr. Ambassador," Retief said. "But Ussh seems to have taken
it upon himself to use your name."
"Very well!"
Ussh hissed suddenly, wheeling to face the irate Groaci, who shrank back.
"Perhaps I
have
employed unconventional methods! But clearly it's
to Groac's advantage to go along with the
fait accompli
! As soon as the
emperor is safely ensconced on his throne, I'm in a position to assure you that
Groac will be the object of very special attentions by His Imperial
Majesty!"
"What's
that?" Colonel Suash roared. "Are you suggesting that the Emperor of
Lumbaga is nothing but a tool of foreign interests?"
"Not at all,
Suash," Ussh hastened to reassure the officer. "Merely that the new
Lumbagan government can rely on the full support of Groac." He turned back
to Jith. "What about it, Your Excellency?" he said urgently.
"You'll agree that it's clearly your duty to support His Highness'
claim—"
"Don't listen to
him, Jith," Pouncetrifle blurted. "You're quite right, Groac has no
business whatever sticking its olfactory organ into Lumbaga's affairs,
especially when I was right on the verge of proposing a well-rounded scheme for
installing a provisional governing committee under Terran sponsorship—"
"You presume to
tell me my duties, Harvey?" Jith cut in chillingly. "As my
subordinate Swarmmaster Ussh so cogently points out, Groacian obligations in
support of formerly exploited peoples require that I put aside ordinary
protocols for the nonce, and—"
"I don't like
it," Suash spoke up. "It sounds to me as if you aliens are getting
ready to slice Lumbaga up among yourselves! Accordingly, as senior Lumbagan
national present, I'm assuming temporary command! And my first act will be to
order the lot of you to the port to embark inside of thirty minutes, with or
without your suitcases!"
"Fool!" Ussh
snarled. "Do you imagine your feeble native regime can survive for a
moment without the sponsorship of Groac? If it weren't for His Highness'
temporary indisposition, he'd have your head off for this!"
"And I might add,
my dear Colonel," Jith whispered piercingly, "that at a word from me,
units of the Groacian Grand Battle Fleet are prepared, if necessary, to land
and restore order here!"
"You wouldn't
dare!" Pouncetrifle quavered, jowls aquiver.
"Would I
not?" Jith contradicted. "I see a great Groacian triumph in the
offing! And now, Colonel," he addressed the officer, "you and your
chaps may withdraw. I'm sure that His Highness will be himself in a
moment—"
The emperor stirred,
sat up.
"Well, just felt a
short nap coming on," he mumbled as he scrambled to his feet. "Now,
you just run along as Jith suggested, Suash, and—"
"How do you know
what he suggested?" Suash snapped back. "You were stone cold out on
the floor!"
"Yes, well, as to
that—"
"He knows,"
Retief said, "because Ussh is feeding him his lines."
"Have you taken
leave of your senses, Terran meddler?" Ussh yelled. "Everyone in the
room heard His Imperial Whatsit's cogent comments!"
"Uh-huh—but you
were doing his thinking for him—what there was of it. Unhappily for the future
of empire, you can't think of two things at once. Right now, for example,
you're busy being indignant with me—and your candidate for the crown is
relaxing on the job."
Every head but those of
Ussh and Retief swiveled to regard the figure slumped again on the throne.
"Heavens!"
Magnan gasped from the sidelines. "You mean we were about to offer our
credentials to a ventriloquist's dummy?"
"Not quite. He's
alive—but when Ussh assembled him, he carefully left out the more useful
portions of the brain."
Suash stared
uncertainly from his potential sovereign to Ussh, who stood with canted
eyestalks in a pose of total concentration.
"If that's true
"
"Nonsense,
Colonel," the Lumbagan emperor-elect said firmly. "I repose the
fullest confidence in Ussh, a marvelous fellow and my most trusted adviser. Now
I think you'd better run along, as we have matters of high state policy to
discuss."
"Don't go!"
Pouncetrifle cried. "Colonel Suash, I call on you in the name of humanity
to remain present! There's no telling what might happen in the absence of
witnesses!"
"I take orders
from His Highness, Terry," Suash snapped. "And he said go.
Accordingly, we're going!" The colonel barked a command. His troops
right-shouldered arms and marched away across the polished floor.
"Retief—do
something!" Pouncetrifle wailed.
"Do what, Mr.
Ambassador?" Ussh inquired in tones of triumph. "His Highness has
spoken! And now"—he paused until the last of the Lumbagan soldiers filed
from the room and the tall doors shut behind them—"and now, with those
trouble-makers out of earshot, on to the disposition of the Terran spies!"
With an abrupt motion, he drew a power pistol from inside his ornate jacket.
"A pity they should happen to be shot down by accident as they led an
attempted assault on His Highness' person, but such are the tribulations that
beset those who would stand in the path of empire."
"You
wouldn't!" Pouncetrifle gasped.
"See here,
Ussh," Ambassador Jith whispered. "You don't actually mean to commit
violence on the persons of the Terrans, I trust? To deport them in restraining
fetters, yes. But I forbid you to do away with them entirely."
"It will be our
little secret, Your Excellency," Ussh cut in curtly. "His Imperial
Highness has matters under complete control."
"Are you quite certain
of that?" Jith asked, eyeing the presumptive ruler, who now stood swaying
slightly, gazing into the middle distance. "Candidly, he presents the
appearance of an unsuccessful lobotomy case."
"Why not tell him
the rest of the secrets, Ussh?" Retief said. "Let him know how clever
you really are. Describe your discovery of a sure-fire method for assembling
Lumbagans to order, according to any genetic code desired. Tell him about your
experiments, which produced some rather unusual types, some of whom proved
useful for special purposes, such as terrorizing the populace. Describe your
soldier farm, and let him in on the secret of the lab on Sprook where you
worked out the details of your hostility transmitter—"