The Zap Gun

"You've got guts, Febbs," Ed Jones declared, expressing the sentiments of the group. "I was sure it was an Einsatzgruppe from KACH."

"In my opinion," Harry Markison said, with overwhelming relief, "it looked to be the goddam Soviet secret police, the KVB. I've got a brother-in-law in Estonia—"

Febbs said, "They're just not smart enough to pinpoint our meetings. History will deal them out, evolution-wise to make way for superior forms."

"Yeah," Jones agreed. "Like look how long it took them to come up with a weapon to defeat the alien slavers from Sirius with."

"Open the package," Markison said.

"In time," Febbs said. He fitted the squash-like gewgaw in place and mopped his drenched, steaming forehead.

"When do we act, Febbs?" Gill asked. They all sat, eyes fixed on Febbs, waiting for his decision. Aware of this, he felt relaxed. The pressure was off.

"I've been thinking," Febbs said, in his most Febbs-ish ma

"I required the five of you," he said, "because I had to obtain all six components that constitute this weapon. However—"

Pressing the trigger he demolecularized, by means of the wide-angle setting of the phase-inversion beam emanating from the muzzle of the weapon, his fellow five concomodies at their seats here and there around the rickety table.

It happened soundlessly. Instantly. As he had anticipated. The vid and aud tapes from Lanferman Associates, shown to the Board, had indicated these useful aspects of item 401's action.

There was now left only Surley G. Febbs. And armed with Earth's most modern, fashionable, advanced, soundless, instant weapon. Against which no defense was yet known... even to Lars Powderdry, whose business it was to conjure up such things.

And you, Mr. Lars, Febbs said to himself, are next.

He laid the weapon down carefully and, with calm hands, lit another cigarette. He regretted that there was no longer anyone in the room to witness his rational, precise movements—anyone but himself, anyhow.

And then, because obviously now he had time to spare, Febbs reached out, picked up the brown-paper-wrapped package which the autonomic 'stant mail delivery robot had brought and set it directly before him. He unwrapped it, slowly, leisurely, meditating in his infinitely subtle mind on the future which lay so close ahead.

He was frankly puzzled by what he found within the wrappings. It was not additional tools. It was nothing he, or the now-nonexistent organization FUCFDUTCRBASEBFIN, Cell One, had ordered. It was in fact a toy.

Specifically, he discovered as he lifted the lid of the brightly colored, amusing box, it was a product of the marginal toy-maker, Klug Enterprises. A game of some kind. A child's maze.

He felt, immediately, on an instinctive level—because after all he was no ordinary man—acute, accurate, intuitive dismay. But not sufficiently acute, accurate or intuitive enough to cause him to hurl the box aside. The impulse was there. But he did not act on it—because he was curious.

Already he had seen that this was no common maze. It intrigued his uniquely subtle, agile mind. It held him gripped so that he continued to peer at the maze, then at the instructions on the inside lid of the box.

"You are the world's foremost concomody," a telepathic voice sounded in his mind, emanating from the maze itself. "You are Surley Grant Febbs. Right?"

"Right," said Febbs.

"It is you," the telepathic voice continued, "who make the primary decision as to the worthwhileness of each consumer commodity newly introduced on the market. Right?"

Febbs, feeling a cold bite of caution over his heart, nevertheless nodded. "Yes, that's so. They have to come to me first. That's my job on the Board—I'm the current concomody A. So they give me the important components."

The telepathic voice said, "Vincent Klug of Klug Enterprises, a small firm, would therefore, Mr. Febbs, like you to examine this new game, The Man In The Maze. Please determine whether in your expert opinion it is ready for marketing. A form is provided on which you may transcribe your reactions."

Febbs said haltingly, "You mean you want me to play with this?"

"That is exactly what we want. Please press the red button on the right side of the maze."

Febbs pressed the red button.

In the maze a tiny creature gave a yelp of horror.

Febbs jumped, startled. The tiny creature was roly-poly and adorable-looking. Somehow it was appealing even to him—and he normally detested animals, not to mention people. It began to hurry frantically through the maze, seeking the way out.

The placid telepathic voice continued. "You will notice that this product, made for the domestic market and soon to be run off in quantity if it successfully passes such initial tests as you are providing it, bears a striking resemblance to the famous Empathic-Telepath Pseudononhomo Ludens Maze developed by Klug Enterprises and utilized recently as a weapon of war. Right?"

"Y-yes." But his attention was still fixed on the travails of the tiny roly-poly creature. It was having a terrible time, becoming more confounded and more embroiled in the tortured ways and byways of the maze each second.

The harder it tried the deeper it became enmeshed. And that's not right, Febbs thought or rather felt. He experienced its torment, and that torment was appalling. Something had to be done about it, and now.

"Hey," he said feebly. "How do I get this animal, whatever it is, out?"

The telepathic voice informed him, "On the left-hand side of the maze you will find a gaily-colored blue stud. Depress that stud, Mr. Febbs."

Eagerly he pressed it.

He felt at once, or imagined he felt (which was it? The distinction seemed to have evaporated) a diminution of the terror surging within the trapped animal.

But almost at once that terror returned—and this time with renewed, even increased, severity.

"You would like," the telepathic voice said, "to get the man in the maze out. Would you not, Mr. Febbs? Be honest. Let's not kid ourselves. Is this not right?"

"Right," Febbs whispered, nodding. "But it's not a man, is it? I mean, it's just a bug or an animal or something. What is it?"

He needed to know. The answer was urgent to him. Maybe I can lift it out, he thought. Or yell to it. Somehow communicate with it so it sees how to get away and that I'm up here, trying for its sake.

"Hey!" he said to the scampering creature as it rebounded from one barrier to the next as the structure, the pattern, of the maze altered and realtered, always outwitting it. "Who are you? What are you? Do you have a name?"

"I have a name," the trapped creature thought back frantically to him, linking itself, its travails, with him. Sharing its plight with Surley G. Febbs desperately and gladly.

He felt himself enmeshed now, not looking down at the maze from above but—seeing the barriers ahead of him, looming. He was—

He was the creature in the maze. "My name," he squealed, appealing to the enormous, not fully-understood entity above him whose countenance, whose presence, he had sensed for a moment... but now who seemed to be gone. He could no longer locate it. He was alone again as he faced the shifting walls on every side.

"My name," he squealed, "is Surley G. Febbs and I want to get out! Can you hear me, whoever you are up there? Can you do something for me?"

There was no answer. There was nothing, no one, above.

He scampered on alone.