Armageddon, Inc Page 4

  furnished. She escorted him inside and paused to look at him critically.

  "You look awfully tired. Would you rather rest before you talk with us?"

  Ramsey smiled. "I look tired because I'm dying. I have a fatal disease.

  I'm not dangerous to anyone, I have nothing contagious, but I've been dying

  for a long, long time and it may finally happen while I am here. If it does,

  I apologize in advance. Inform my driver that he will be returning without me and dispose of my body in whatever way you dispose of your own dead."

  "If you are that sick, it is all the better reason for you to rest first."

  "No," Ramsey said. "It is extremely important that I talk with you while

  I am still able."

  Two others joined them--a man and a woman. In a pleasant living room,

  well-lighted from its large bay window, they took their places around a table.

  Melna pronounced introductions: "My brother, Will." Ramsey had been staring since he first glimpsed the man. It was Mill Rees, the corpse he had met only in an ambulance, but a dignified Mill Rees with a short, carefully trimmed beard.

  "My sister, Velna," Melna added. The woman looked to be about Will's

  age. Melna may have been the family's youngest child.

  Melna said, "This is Doctor Frederic Ramsey. He came more than a

  thousand kilometers by car to tell us what happened to Mill and to ask us

  whether we wanted Mill's body returned to us. Doctor Ramsey is suffering from a serious illness himself. He hasn't long to live. Is there anything that

  can be done for him, Will?"

  There was silence in the room while Will turned an intense gaze on

  Ramsey. Finally he said, "Your disease is not known to us. Is there no

  medical help for it where you come from?"

  "None," Ramsey said with a smile.

  "You are a doctor. You would know. It is good that you can smile about

  the threat of death. Many people cannot."

  "I've been dying for a long time," Ramsey said. "I have reached the

  point where I would like to get it over with."

  "I understand."

  Ramsey suddenly felt shaken. Was it possible that he had just received

  an intense physical examination? "Your disease is not known to us. . ."

  He had seen no doctor's office. Was Mill Rees's twin brother also a

  mutant practicing medicine on the side?

  Melna served a light fruit wine to all of them along with a plate of

  small cakes. Ramsey sampled both. The wine seemed very ordinary--slightly

  sweet with a low alcohol content. The cakes were delicious.

  "What can you tell us about Mill?" Melna asked.

  "He got into a fight," Ramsey said.

  Melna Rees leaned forward. "Was he--drunk?"

  Ramsey nodded.

  "It is a terrible weakness," she said. "He tried, but it had conquered

  him completely. He had to have drink, and only a little drink made him drunk.

  Then he couldn't control himself. Did you see the fight?"

  "No. I only know what I was told by a man who saw it. Someone spilled a

  little beer on Mill's arm. He struck the man and knocked him unconscious--but the man had many friends there. My young friend tried to help Mill, but the two of them were powerless against so many. Mill died almost at once. My young friend lived until the next day."

  "If his body is not returned here, what will happen to it?" Melna asked.

  "Whatever you prefer. It can be cremated and the ashes returned to you.

  It can be buried beside the body of the young man who tried to help him. It

  can be--"

  "Do that," she said. "Bury Mill beside the body of the young man who

  tried to help him. And convey our thanks and sympathy to the young man's

  family." She paused. "Mill had many abilities. He should have been able to

  protect himself. The fight must have happened very suddenly. Or perhaps he was very drunk."

  Ramsey tried a bold tact. "The fight did happen suddenly, and he was

  very drunk--but I don't believe his drunkenness interfered with his power to

  defend himself. He was able to make a spy-plane crash when he was drunk."

  The room went silent and remained so. Finally Will asked, "You saw this

  happen?"

  "I heard it described by someone who saw it. Mill looked up at the spy-

  plane, muttered, 'Crash, damn you!' and the plane crashed."

  Will said slowly, "I can read in your mind that you know much about

  Mill's abilities. You think of them as powers, but we call them abilities.

  You once wrote some kind of report on the subject. Was that why you made this long trip despite the fact that you are dying?"

  "In part," Ramsey said. "We needed to know what you wanted done with

  Mill's body--and we need your help."

  "Why?" Will asked.

  "To end the war," Ramsey said.

  He told them about the war--its genesis, its horrors, the interminable

  conferences that were failing to end it, the spy-planes that even they must

  find irksome. He talked on and on, wondering how much of this they had

  already extracted from his mind.

  They politely made no comment until he finished. Then Will announced,

  "War is an evil thing."

  "Indescribably evil," Ramsey agreed.

  "We already know much about it. Mill and I studied it many years ago.

  We saw the spy-planes and were curious."

  "Do you have the same abilities Mill had?" Ramsey asked.

  "My abilities are similar to what his were. They varied because his

  interests were different from mine, and he developed his abilities in

  different ways."

  "And--your sisters?"

  "They have abilities, of course. Everyone has abilities, but

  those of Mill and I were special."

  "Was that your son who stopped the motor of our car."

  "Yes, and I apologize. We don't yet know the full extent of his

  abilities because he is still developing them." He smiled at Ramsey and added matter-of-factly, "You are wondering how many others there are. There is no one else with these special abilities. Is there something wrong?"

  Probably Ramsey's face had registered his puzzlement. "I am wondering

  how this small rural town suddenly managed to produce two men with such

  special abilities," he said.

  Will shrugged. "Perhaps it didn't happen suddenly. The town of

  Fronville and the surrounding country--including several more towns--has for

  generations been blessed with citizens who have had outstanding abilities, my mother and father among them. Also my grandparents and probably their parents and grandparents. It has taken generations of work to develop this community.

  One generation built the mills and the machinery they contain. The next

  redesigned the machinery and added more mills. Later generations added still more mills and found ways to make them work more efficiently or made further improvements in the machinery. Other citizens devoted their attention to marketing the goods the mills produced and in acquiring raw materials for the mills. They established the cooperative, which is a business we all participate in. We are not the super special humans you seem to have in mind.

  We are business people."

  "And scavangers," Ramsey suggested with a smile.

  "But that is an essential part of our business--a highly important part.

  We must have raw materials. We have agents in the Inland and abroad who buy up anything that can be salvaged whenever it can be had cheaply and send it to us. Sometimes discards are given to us for taking them away. And we run our business--our businesses--to improve the lives of everyone
in the

  cooperative's territory. We also keep working to enlarge the territory. When Mill and I discovered we had abilities of an unusual kind, naturally we used them to improve the cooperative's productivity and the efficiency of our marketing. But Mill tired of that and drifted off in search of something more exciting. And he became addicted to alcohol." Will shook his head sadly.

  Ramsey wished he knew more about genetics. Perhaps it made sense that an area that for generations had been producing people with unusual talents for mechanics and science and business and everything associated with the Fronville cooperative's activities would suddenly produce twin mutants. Who could say--now--how many of those ancestors with outstanding abilities were mutants whose powers led in understandable progression to Will and Mill?

  That background made the seemingly abrupt appearance of Will and Mill's

  remarkable abilities easier to accept than they would have been if the area

  had been populated with a normal mix of bright to stupid people.

  Ramsey thought of the Bach family where, after generations of highly

  talented musicians, Johann Sebastian, a super musical talent, appeared. Mill

  apparently had no children; Will had fathered a son who also was a mutant, and in time the son's abilities would be channeled into activities that would

  advance the efficiency of the cooperative unless he broke away as Mill had.

  Perhaps the son would also father mutants--or perhaps not. Bach had talented sons--less talented than himself but notably talented. After that the Bach talent quickly faded. Perhaps Will's son represented a genetic dead end and the freakish mutant talents had already run their course. Were mutations transmitted the same way that musical talent was? He simply did not know. No one knew how mutations were transmitted because no one had ever had mutants to study. When he returned to the Inland, he would find a genetic reference and try to discover what was known or speculated. In the meantime . . .

  Ramsey shook his head and thought, "What a waste!" He said aloud, "About the war--"

  "Mill and I looked into it. Apparently years before it had caused

  widespread devastation and millions of deaths, but by the time we studied it,

  it looked like a silly game the governments were playing. It was expensive

  but it seemed to be doing no harm, and except for an occasional spy-plane, it caused no problems at all for us. As I said, our concern is business--

  increasing our business--and as long as the war didn't interfere with that, we

  were satisfied to ignore it. Our friend among the Easts felt the same way

  about it."

  "You mean--there is someone among the Easts with abilities like yours?"

  Ramsey exclaimed.

  "One person that we know about. We had problems in communicating at

  first, but she learned English and we learned her language. We could have

  stopped the war, you see--any time we liked--but we have our own businesses to occupy us, as does she, and we don't like to meddle in the concerns of others. Anyway, as I said, it seemed like a silly but harmless game. But after what you have told us, we must reconsider. The war might suddenly turn violent again and no longer be a game. It might interfere severely with our business. It must be stopped."

  "We want you to help us win the war," Ramsey said. "That will stop it."

  Will turned a puzzled gaze on him. "You are still thinking of war as a

  game. Someone must win and someone must lose. Why can't both sides simply stop? I must consult my East friend about this."

  He went on talking, but to Ramsey the sound became blurred. He swayed in his chair as a wave of dizziness swept over him. Melna said with evident

  concern, "You are exhausted. You must rest."

  "Not yet!" Ramsey protested. He tried to tell them how important it was

  that they lend their support to the Wests, but he may not have been speaking coherently. The dizziness enveloped him again.

  "Rest," Will said. "Sleep. When you awake, we will take some food, and

  then I will have an answer for you."

  Ramsey had been dying--slowly--for so long he had failed to consider

  that taxing his limited stamina might speed the process and finish him off

  suddenly. He felt very close to death now. He allowed Melna to lead him to a small room with an unusually large bed. It was not a comfortable bed, but

  Ramsey was beyond such a trivial concern. He fell asleep at once.

  When he awoke, everything was quiet. He went to a window; it was dusk

  outside. The situation he had found in Fronville seemed like such a total

  enigma that he hardly knew what to do next. Obviously it would take a lengthy discussion and argument to persuade Will, and he doubted that he had sufficient strength to undertake it.

  He opened the door and looked out. Melna and her brother and sister were still seated at the table. It looked as though no one had moved. Will turned a smiling face on him.

  "First, you must eat something. Then we will talk."

  Melna set a light meal on the table--cold meat, cheese, a wonderful mixed salad. Ramsey was surprised to find that he was hungry.

  After they had eaten, he turned expectantly to Will.

  "I have conferred with my East friend," Will said. "I told her what you

  said about the war, and she agrees that it must be stopped. So we will stop

  it. The war will end everywhere at noon tomorrow."

  Ramsey said dazedly, "How can it end so suddenly?"

  "We will end it."

  "But how?"

  "We will stop it. All engines of war will no longer function. All

  machines will stop. We cannot permit the war to continue, so we will stop

  it."

  Ramsey said, "But--if you prevent us from defending ourselves, we will

  lose horribly because the Easts will still have their machines."

  "Their machines will stop, also."

  Ramsey gazed at him in consternation. His worst fear had become a

  reality. He had put his fingers into a bomb, and there was nothing he could

  do to keep it from exploding. He had never felt more helpless.

  "If all machines stop, it will mean an end of civilization," he

  protested. "That, certainly would be bad for business. You would have no

  more discards to acquire."

  "Not all machines. Just those that keep the war going."

  "But many machines are essential for both war and peace. An electrical

  generator, for example. If you stop it, the results will be catastrophic."

  Will smiled knowingly. "We will take care of that."

  In Ramsey's weakened condition, he no longer was able to protest.

  Somewhere he had gone very wrong, and he could not think where. Whatever his colossal blunder had been, he was too weak, too sick, to make any kind of attempt at correcting it. His only thought was to leave. "I thank you for your hospitality," he said. "Now I must return to my people."

  After an exchange of politenesses, in which he promised that Mill's body

  would be interred according to their wishes, he walked unsteadily away from

  the town. Each step came harder than the last--he had slept well in Melna's

  room, but he had not rested, and he felt dizzy. At noon tomorrow, the war

  would come to an end. Every war machine would stop. But what would the

  mutants do about machines used for both war and peace? How could they stop one and not the other? And if they goofed, there would be no gas pumped through the pipes, no water. No deliveries of supplies. In a very short time, the large cities would be scenes of riot, death, and catastrophe. He could hardly have carried out his mission more ineptly. He should have tried to make clear to Will the catastrophe he was inflicting on civilization, but he had no strength left to even make an effort.