The Invaders Plan

Then I put every scrap of clothes that had any blood on it or that led back to the Provocation Section into the permanent disintegrator, washed any remaining blood off myself in the toilet and dressed in my own uniform.

Just to put finishing touches on it all, I wrapped Prahd Bittlestiffender's old coat, his identoplate and suicide note in a package and addressed it to the police. Found by the River Wiel,the note said. I put it beside my desk to be mailed in ten days.

It was all neatening up. I opened my secret blackmail cache under a loose floorboard and took out the originals of Raza Torr's murder. I removed all the strips from his camera, verified them, and put the lot in the disintegrator.

The (bleeped) fool. Had I brought him here, he would have spotted my whole cache and I doubted he would have kept his word. He might even have tried to kill me once he had his hands on these pictures. The (bleeped) fool. As to his own pictures, they were worthless. Every one of me had been in disguise. Nobody could have identified me from them. Still, he had been a witness. And there is an old Apparatus motto that even he should have remembered: the careless die young. I yawned. I locked up. I walked down to my room to get some sleep.

All in all, it had been a pretty active day! But not too unusual in the life of an Apparatus officer. Frankly, it's hard to see how a government could run at all without clever and dedicated people such as us in their employ. The whole structure might come tumbling down!

Chapter 7

The day began a bit sourly. My driver was in a foul mood. When he brought the airbus by to pick me up, I had quite pleasantly asked him if he had had a good time on his night off and all the way to my office I had been treated to "How could somebody with no money have a good time?" and "One would starve if he went long enough without eating" and some distempered tale about some officer that had crashed because his driver was so worried about being a pauper. I was in too good a mood. I ignored it.

At the office, I set him to carrying the "Zanco" marked cartons from the basement to the back of the car and he kept throwing them in so forcefully with comments like "I work myself to death cleaning up this car and here we go again" and "This ain't no truck" that I got out of the back – there would be no room anyway when it was loaded – and bought a sweetbun and hot jolt from a passing vendor. I was pleased to have remembered to take the tokens out of the cash drawer of that shop – I had plenty even for a lunch and supper.

I sat in front eating and when he got behind the wheelstick, a bit hot and sweaty, he went into a new tirade about starving. I told him gently that the sweetbun and hot jolt were all gone and even tipped the canister to show him it was empty, but it didn't help. He actually picked a newssheet off the floor and threw it at me, excusing it with the remark, "I been all through it and can't find a (bleep) thing you were doing! You weren't working last night, you were loafing! It was you that had the night off, not me!" I calmly directed him to fly to the Widow Tayl's in the Pausch Hills suburb and sat there reading the Morning Oh! No!,the dawn newssheet favored by the riffraff. How wrong he was: I had made the front page!

SORROWING SUPPLY COLONEL SUICIDES EX-WIFE IN HYSTERICS OF LAUGHTER Late last night, according to informed sources in the Domestic Police, Colonel Rajabah Stinkins, Supply, Voltar Raiders, took the last firm act to end his tragic life. At eighteen thousand feet over the Great Desert, he blew up himself, his driver and his aircar with a megavolt blastick.

His ex-wife has been hospitalized after hours of uncontrollable laughter. Associates at the Ground Forces Play Club say that even the last minute intervention of firm and lifelong friends failed.

The Voltar Raiders will bury what can be found with military courtesy on Saturday. The public is invited to the feast.

Colonel Stinkins is survived by five lovely children, the older two of whom could not be reached as they are in reform school.

It was followed by a service record biography that seemed to make it clear he had spent a long life at a desk. I looked further. Ah, here was the next: FIRE RAVAGES INDUSTRIAL CITY Last night, a wall of all-devouring flame tore through the night-shrouded electronics district. Fifteen people are missing, mostly watchmen.

A half a square mile of charred and smoking ruins marked, at dawn, what had once been thirty-one thriving businesses.

Fire Department authorities state they have positively isolated the cause to an electrical short in the Jimbo Electronics Toys Plant.

Competitors jubilant. ...

Way down the list of firms consumed by flames was "The Eyes and Ears of Voltar." Nothing about Spurk. Probably had him confused with a watchman. I went on through the paper. Ah, another one: STOLEN CAR FALLS ON HOSPITAL Last night, a vehicle identified as stolen, crashed out of the midnight skies to land on the Hospital of Good Mercy.

The superintendent, Doctor Muff Chuff, who was not there at the time, said that damage was minimal, confined to the poor children's ward. As the roof collapsed, there is no body count as we go to press. "We were going to abandon that wing anyway," the Superintendent said. "We need more money and have too few doctors. Application for more building funds is being made. ..." I wandered on through the pages. And then, there it was, a small item: APPARATUS OFFICER RUN OVER IN MIDAIR The body of Officer Raza Torr of the Coordinated Information Apparatus was discovered in the small hours of the morning on the banks of the River Wiel. It was discovered by a passing garbage scow.

Police Traffic Investigator Roauf Roauf informed this reporter that evidence clearly showed Torr had been struck by a passing airbus and had fallen ten thousand feet.

I smiled. Leave it to the exacting press to get everything right!

We flew through the beautiful morning and were soon putting down at the Widow Tayl's. And I was so pleased I just sat there gazing toward the swimming bath. What a warm glow it gave me to bring so much happiness to this world.

There sat Doctor Prahd Bittlestiffender at the poolside. He was dressed in a robe several sizes too small for him. He had at least fifteen empty canisters lying about his reclining chair. On his lap he had a huge platter of sweetbuns he was wolfing – one bun, one bite.

Lying on her belly in the grass was the Widow Tayl. She had her robe skirt up around her shoulders and was naked from there on down. She had her chin cupped in her palms. She was gazing with rapt adoration at the doctor.

What a scene of post-carnal bliss! Truly, I felt like a benefactor of the whole race. The waves emanating from the Widow Tayl to Prahd almost shimmered in the morning sun.

Belatedly they noticed that an airbus had landed with a blast, ten seconds before, that had almost blown the leaves off the trees.

I got out. They looked in my direction.

But what was this? The Widow Tayl had patches of bandage on her face and the whole upper part of her torso was swathed in post-operation tape! Had they had a fight? Then I realized that Prahd must be set up and in business already. Practicing, maybe. Getting his hand in. Removing her warts and tightening her sagging breasts.

He came gangling halfway over to meet me. He was still chomping on a bun and wiping his hand on the robe.

"I am Officer Gris," I told him, in a very low voice.

I pulled my identoplate from my pocket and showed him. I looked stealthily to the right and left. I said, "You arrived okay?" He was looking at me oddly.

"Is everything all right?" I said. "Did Zanco deliver the shipment?" He nodded. But he said, "You sound just like Professor Gyrant Slahb!" Ah, well, we have a penetrative intellect here, I thought. But they train you splendidly in the Apparatus.