Battlefield Earth

They were into the duct work now and they really did start hammering and pounding. The trick was to inset lead-irised readers into the duct vent intakes and exhausts around the room so that they could not be seen and yet, peering out of the dark depths of the vents, could read an exact portion of the workrooms. The ducts actually required some very fancy work of their own. Although Ker was a midget, he could bend sheet iron with his paws like it was paper.

Ker fixed it so the ducts, as they entered and left the room, were rickety. If you touched them they appeared to be in danger of coming apart and falling out. But in actual fact the final fittings were armor-welded.

They set the readers into these, made sure the irises worked, put the ducts in place, and began on the circulator pumps. It was late evening by this time, but they worked straight on through. By about one in the morning they had completed a usable circulator system that would go on working.

They felt they were ru

None of these readers could be powered and picked up from more than a few hundred feet away. They all had different frequencies to keep them apart and this meant a bulky feeder system.

Jo

The tough part of it was getting the transmission through to the Academy. They solved it by using ground waves. Ground waves differ from air waves in that they can travel only through the ground. The “aerial” to send is a rod driven in the earth and the “aerial” to receive is simply another. It takes a different wavelength band so there was no danger of anything detecting it. Since ground waves were not in general use by the Earth Psychlos it required a feverish fabrication of components, converting normal radio to ground wave.

It was the fall of the year and it was still dark when Angus and Ker went screeching off to the Academy to install the receivers and recorders, one unit in a toilet, one in an unused telephone box, and the third under a loose tile in front of the altar in the chapel.

Jo

Jo

At eight o'clock Angus and Ker sauntered in as though just arriving for the day. They bolted the door and both turned huge grins on Jo

“It works!” said Angus. “We watched you laboring away and even read the serial number of your welding torch.

We got all fifteen readers on the screen!” He thrust out his hand. “And here's the discs!”

They replayed them. They could even see the grain in material, much less read numbers!

They heaved a sigh of relief.

Then Angus took Jo

But from here on, it's just putting cream on the oatmeal to convince Terl. Every minute you stay here is a minute too long.”

Ker was already putting the rigged probe back in exactly the same place, arranging the cabinet just as it had been. “When I took on this job and suspected you'd be coming,” he said as he worked, “I fueled a plane. It 's the one exactly opposite the hangar door– 93 is the last of its serial numbers. All waiting for you. They don't want us, they want you!”

“It will take us only forty-five minutes or an hour to rig the rest,” said Angus. “You get out of here and that's an order from Sir Robert– to get you gone the moment you can leave.”

Ker now had relocked the door of the cabinet and was prying at the corner with a jimmy to make it appear it had been unsuccessfully tampered with without being opened. “Goodbye!” he said emphatically.

Yes, it was true. They could handle the rest and were in no danger. But it was also true that it had to be completed. He would get ready and stand by in the plane. “Come down and tell me when it's all done,” he said.

“You got it!” said Angus.

Jo

Chapter 3

By five o'clock that morning, Brown Limper Staffor knew he had found Tyler.

For days now he had been unable to sleep, to even sit down quietly or eat. Forgotten were all other cares of state, forgotten were all other tasks that ordinarily occupied his time. With a wild, intent glare in his eyes, for nearly twenty-four hours a day, he had concentrated only upon closing the trap which had been set. Crime must be punished! A malefactor must be brought to book. The safety and integrity of the state must be given priority. Almost every text he had studied on government, all advice he had been given, proved to him only one thing: he had to get Tyler!

Victory had begun to beckon with a drone picture he took off the machine at 3:00 A.M. He had trouble with these machines. Ever since these recorders had been moved to the capital, he had been irritated by their incomprehensible complexity, and he often hit them when they failed to spit out what was wanted. It made him feel martyred having to do all this work with so little help. But he had been sca

And there was Tyler! Dancing one of those insane prances the Highlanders did. By bonfire with half a dozen others. Although the pictures were silent, a pain went through his ears as he imagined the crazy pipe music that must have been playing. Yes! Hunting shirt and all, it was Tyler.

The machine gave him a lot of trouble trying to backtrack its trace. He never could tell one Psychlo number from another. But he managed it and got a blown-up view.

It wasn't Tyler! He realized then he was not being logical. Tyler would not be dancing and flinging his arms about. The last time he had seen him down at the compound, Tyler had been limping heavily on a cane and had no use of his right arm.

But at 4:48 A.M. a picture from another drone, then overflying the Lake Victoria area, spewed out and showed a man by the lake throwing rocks in the water. A man with a hunting shirt, same hair, same beard. Tyler! But it couldn't be Tyler because he was using his right arm to throw and as he drew back it was obvious he had no limp.

He had no more than thrown the picture down on the floor when Lars Thorenson rushed in as though he had news. Brown Limper let him have it but . What were two Tylers doing visible on two different drones in such a short time apart, yet so widely separated on the Earth's surface?

“That's what I am trying to say,” cried Lars. “There are three Scots who look like Tyler. But that isn't it. You know what Terl told us to look for? Scars on Tyler's neck from the collar he wore so long. I couldn't understand why Stormalong was wearing his scarf so high around his neck. He never did before. And just five minutes ago I woke up with the whole thing plain as daylight! He's hiding those scars! Tyler is down in that compound right now posing as Stam Stavenger! Stormalong!"