Accidental Flight Read online

sound, I'll melt theteeth out of his mouth." He held the toaster against his side, out ofline with the telecom, but aimed at Cameron's face.

  Cameron began to shake with urgency, but he kept still.

  "Ready?" Docchi asked.

  "Flip the switch and we will be, with everything we've got. If theydon't read us, it'll be because they don't want to."

  The rocket slipped out of the approach lanes. It spun down, the sterntubes pulsing brightly, coming toward Earth in a tight trajectory.

  "Citizens of the Solar System!" began Docchi. "Everyone on Earth! Thisis an unscheduled broadcast, an unauthorized appeal. We are using theemergency bands because, for us, it is an emergency. Who are we?Accidentals, of course, as you can see by looking at us. I know thesight isn't pretty, but we consider other things more important thanappearance. Accomplishment, for example. Contributing to progress inways normals cannot do.

  "Shut away on Handicap Haven, we're denied this right. All we can dothere is exist in frustration and boredom; kept alive whether we wantto be or not. Yet we have a gigantic contribution to make ... if weare allowed to leave the Solar System for Alpha Centauri! You can'ttravel to the stars now, although eventually you will.

  "You must be puzzled, knowing how slow our present rockets are. Nonormal person could make the round trip; he would die of old age. Butwe accidentals can go! We would positively _not_ die of old age! TheMedicouncil knows that is true ... and still will not allow us to go!"

  At the side of the control compartment, Cameron opened his mouth toprotest. Jordan, glancing at him, imperceptibly waggled the concealedweapon. Cameron swallowed his words and subsided without a sound.

  "Biocompensation," continued Docchi evenly. "You may know about it,but in case information on it has been suppressed, let me explain: Theprinciple of biocompensation has long been a matter of conjecture.This is the first age in which medical technology is advanced enoughto explore it. Every cell, every organism, tends to survive, as anindividual, as a species. Injure it and it strives for survivalaccording to the seriousness of the injury. We accidentals have beenmaimed and mutilated almost past belief.

  "Our organisms had the assistance of medical science. _Real_ medicalscience. Blood was supplied as long as we needed it, machines did allour breathing, kidneys were replaced, hearts furnished, glandularproducts supplied in the exact quantities necessary, nervous andmuscular systems were regenerated. In the extremity of our organicstruggle, because we had the proper treatment, our bodies were wipedvirtually free of death."

  Sweat ran down his face. He longed for hands to wipe it away.

  "Most accidentals are nearly immortal. Not quite--we'll die four orfive hundred years from now. Meanwhile, there is no reason why wecan't leave the Solar System. Rockets are slow; you would die beforeyou got back from Alpha Centauri. We won't. Time doesn't matter to us.

  "Perhaps better, faster rockets will be devised after we leave. Youmay get to there long before we do. We won't mind. We will simply havemade our contribution to progress as best we could, and that willsatisfy us."

  With an effort Docchi smiled. The instant he did, he felt it was amistake, one that he couldn't rectify. Even to himself it felt morelike a snarl.

  "You know where we're kept That's a politer word than imprisoned. Wedon't call it Handicap Haven; our name for it is the _junkpile_. Andto ourselves we're junkmen. Does this give you a clue to how we feel?

  "I don't know what you'll have to do to force the Medicouncil to granttheir permission. We appeal to you as our last resort. We have triedall other ways and failed. Our future as human beings is at stake.Whether we get what we want and need is something for you to settlewith your conscience."

  He nudged the switch and sat down.

  His face was gray.

  "I don't like to bother you," said Jordan, "but what shall we do aboutthem?"

  Docchi glanced at the telecom. "They" were uncomfortably close andconsiderably more numerous than the last time he had looked.

  "Take evasive action," he said wearily. "Swing close to Earth and usethe planet's gravity to give us a good push. We've got to keep out oftheir hands until people have time to react."

  "I think you ought to know--" began Cameron. There was an odd tone tohis voice.

  "Save it for later," said Docchi. "I'm going to sleep." His bodysagged. "Jordan, wake me up if anything important happens. Andremember that you don't have to listen to this fellow unless you wantto."

  Jordan nodded and touched the controls. Nona, leaning against thegravital panel, paid no attention to the scene. She seemed to belistening to something nobody else could hear. That was nothing new,but it broke Docchi's heart whenever he saw it. His breath drew inalmost with a sob as he left the control room.

  * * * * *

  The race went on. Backdrop: planets, stars, darkness. The littleflecks of light that edged nearer didn't seem cheerful to Jordan. Hislips were fixed in a straight, hard line. He could hear Docchi come inbehind him.

  "Nice speech," said Cameron.

  "Yeah." Docchi glanced at the telecom. The view didn't inspire furthercomment.

  "That's the trouble, it was just a speech. It didn't do you any good.My advice is to give up before you get hurt."

  "It would be."

  Cameron stood at the threshold. "I may as well tell you," he saidreluctantly. "I tried to before the broadcast, as soon as I found outwhat you were going to do. But you wouldn't listen."

  He came into the control compartment. Nona was huddled in a seat,motionless, expressionless. Anti was absent.

  "You know why the Medicouncil refused to let you go?"

  "Sure," said Docchi.

  "The general metabolism of accidentals is further from normal thanthat of creatures we dredge from the bottom of the sea. Add to that anenormously elongated life span and you ought to see the Medicouncil'sobjection."

  "Get to the point!"

  "Look at it this way," Cameron continued almost desperately. "TheCentauri group contains quite a few planets. From what we know ofcosmology, intelligent life probably exists there to a greater orlesser extent. You will be our representatives to them. What _they_look like isn't important; it's their concern. But our ambassadorshave to meet certain minimum standards. They at least--damn it, don'tyou see that they at least have to _look_ like human beings?"

  "I know you feel that way," said Jordan, rigid with contempt.

  "I'm not talking for myself," Cameron said. "I'm a doctor. Themedicouncilors are doctors. We graft on or regenerate legs and armsand eyes. We work with blood and bones and intestines. We know what athin borderline separates normal people from--from you.

  "Don't you understand? They're perfect, perhaps too much so. Theycan't tolerate even small blemishes. They rush to us with things likehangnails, pimples, simple dandruff. Health--or rather the appearanceof it--has become a fetish. They may think they're sympathetic to you,but what they actually feel is something else."

  "What are you driving at?" whispered Docchi.

  "Just this: if it were up to the Medicouncil, you would be on your wayto the Centauri group. But it isn't. The decision always had to bereferred back to the Solar System as a whole. And the Medicouncilcan't go counter to the mass of public opinion."

  Docchi turned away in loathing.

  "Don't believe me," said Cameron. "You're not too far from Earth. Pickup the reaction to your broadcast."

  Worriedly, Jordan looked at Docchi.

  "We may as well find out," said Docchi. "It's settled now, one way orthe other."

  They searched band after band. The reaction was always the same.Obscure private citizen or prominent one, man or woman, they all toldhow sorry they were for the accidentals, but--

  "Turn it off," said Docchi at last.

  "Now what?" Jordan asked numbly.

  "You have no choice," said the doctor.

  "No choice," repeated Docchi dully. "No choice but to give up. Wemisjudged who our allies were."

  "We knew
you had," said Cameron. "It seemed better to let you go onthinking that way while you were on the asteroid. It gave yousomething to hope for. It made you feel you weren't alone. The troublewas that you got farther than we thought you would ever be able to."

  "So we did," Docchi said. His lethargy seemed to lift a little. "Andthere's no reason to stop now. Jordan, pick up the ships behind us.Tell them we've got Cameron on board. A hostage. Play him up as ahero. Basically, he's not with those who are against us."

  Anti came into the control compartment. Cheerfulness faded from herface. "What's the matter?" she asked.

  "Jordan will explain to you. I've got to think."

  Docchi closed his eyes. The ship lurched slightly, though thevibration from the rockets did not change. There was no reason foralarm; the flight of a ship was never completely steady. Docchi paidno attention.

  At last he opened his eyes. "If we were properly fueled andprovisioned," he said without much hope, "I would be in favor of thefour of us heading for Alpha or Proxima. Maybe even Sirius. Itwouldn't matter where, since we wouldn't intend to come back. But wecan't make it with our small fuel reserve. If we can shake the shipsbehind us, we might be able to hide until we can steal the necessaryfuel and food."

  "What'll we do with Doc?" asked Jordan.

  "We'd have to raid an unguarded outpost, of course. Probably a smallmining asteroid. We can leave him there."

  "Yeah," said Jordan. "A good idea, _if_ we can run away from ourpersonal escort of bloodhounds. Offhand, that doesn't seem verylikely. They didn't come any closer when I told them we had Doc withus, but they didn't drop back--"

  He stopped and raised his eyes to the telecom. He blinked, notbelieving what he saw.

  "They're gone!" His voice broke with excitement.

  Almost instantly Docchi was beside him. "No," he corrected. "They'restill following, but they're very far behind." Even as he looked, thepursuing ships visibly lost ground.

  "What's our relative speed?" asked Jordon. He looked at the dialshimself, frowned, tapped them as if the needles had gone crazy.

  "What did you do to the rockets?" demanded Docchi.

  "Nothing! There wasn't a thing I _could_ do. We were already runningat top speed."

  "We're above it. Way above it. How?"

  There was nothing to explain their astonishing velocity. Cameron,Anti, and Jordan were in the control compartment. Nona still sathuddled up, hands pressed tight against her head. There was noexplanation at all, yet power was pouring into the gravital unit, as along unused, actually useless dial was indicating.

  "The gravital drive is working," Docchi blankly pointed out.

  "Nonsense," said Anti. "I don't feel any weight."

  "You don't," answered Docchi. "You won't. The gravital unit wasoriginally installed to drive the ship. When that provedunsatisfactory, it was converted. The difference is slight butimportant. An undirected general field produces weight effects insidethe ship. That's for passenger comfort. A directed field, outside theship, will drive it. You can have one or the other, not both."

  "But I didn't turn on the gravital drive," said Jordan in flatbewilderment. "I couldn't if I wanted to. It's disconnected."

  "I would agree with you, except for one thing. It's working." Docchistared at Nona, whose eyes were closed. "Get her attention," he said.

  It was Jordan who gently touched her shoulder. She opened her eyes. Onthe instrument board, the needle of a once useless dial rose and fell.

  "What's the matter with the poor dear?" asked Anti. "She's shaking."

  "Let her alone," said Docchi.

  No one moved. No one said anything at all. Minutes passed while theancient ship creaked and groaned and ran away from the fastest rocketsin the Solar System.

  "I think I know," said Docchi at last, still frowning. "Consider thegravity-generating plant. Part of it is an electronic computer,capable of making the necessary calculations and juggling theproportion of power required to produce, continuously, directed orundirected gravity. In other words, a brain, a complex mechanicalintelligence. From the viewpoint of that intelligence, why should itperform _ad infinitum_ a complicated but meaningless routine? Itdidn't know why, and because it didn't, very simply, it refused to doso.

  "Now consider Nona. She's deaf, can't speak, can't communicate. In away she's comparable to the gravital computer. Like it, she has a veryhigh potential intelligence. Like it, she's had difficulty graspingthe facts of her environment. Unlike it, though, she has learnedsomething. How much, I don't know, but it's far more than theMedicouncil psychologists credit her with."

  "Yeah," said Jordan dubiously. "But what's happening now?"

  "If there were two humans involved, you would call it telepathy,"answered Docchi hesitantly, fumbling for concepts he could only sensewithout grasping. "One intelligence is electronic, the other organic.You'll have to coin a new term, because the only one I know isextrasensory perception, and that's obviously ridiculous. It is, isn'tit?"

  Jordan smiled and flexed his arms. Under the shapeless garment hismuscles rippled. "It isn't," he said. "The power was there, but we'rethe only ones who know how to use it. Or rather Nona is."

  "Power?" repeated Anti, rising majestically. "You can keep it. I wantjust enough to get to Centauri."

  "I think you'll get it," Docchi promised. "A lot of things seemclearer now. For example, in the past, why didn't gravital units workwell at considerable distances from the Sun? As a matter of fact, theefficiency of each unit was inversely proportional to the square ofthe distance between it and the Sun.

  "The gravital computer is a deaf, blind, mass-sensitive brain. Themajor fact in its existence is the Sun, the greatest mass in the SolarSystem. To such a brain, leaving the Solar System would be likestepping off the edge of a flat world, because it couldn't be aware ofstars.

  "Now that it knows about the Galaxy, the drive will work anywhere.With Nona to direct it, even Sirius isn't far away."

  "Doc," said Jordan carelessly, "you'd better be figuring a way to getoff the ship. Remember, we're going faster than man ever went before."He chuckled. "Unless, of course, you _like_ our company and don't wantto leave."

  "We've got to do some figuring ourselves," interposed Docchi. "Such aswhere we are heading now."

  "A good idea," said Jordan. He busied himself with charts andcalculations. Gradually his flying fingers slowed. His head bent lowover his work. At last he stopped and folded his arms.

  "Where?" asked Docchi.

  "There." Jordan dully punched the telecom selector and a view becamefixed on the screen. In the center glimmered a tiny world, a fragmentof a long-exploded planet. Their destination was easily recognizable.

  It was Handicap Haven.

  "But why do we want to go there?" asked Anti. She looked in amazementat Docchi.

  "We're not going voluntarily," he answered, his voice flat and spent."We're going where the Medicouncil wants us to go. We forgot about themonitor system. When Nona activated the gravital unit, that fact wasindicated at some central station. All the Medicouncil had to do wasuse the monitor to take the gravital drive away from Nona."

  "We thought we were running away from the ships, which we were, butonly to beat them back to the junkpile?" asked Anti.

  Docchi nodded.

  "Well, it's over. We did our best. There's no use crying about it."Yet she was. She passed by Nona, patting her gently. "It's all right,darling. You tried."

  Jordan followed her from the compartment.

  Cameron remained; he came over to Docchi. "Everything isn't lost," hesaid, somewhat awkwardly. "You're back where you started from, butNona at least will benefit."

  "Benefit?" said Docchi. "Someone will. It won't be Nona."

  "You're wrong. Now that she is an important factor--"

  "So is a special experimental machine. Very valuable. I don't thinkshe'll like that classification."

  Silence met silence. It was Dr. Cameron who turned away.

  "That ghastly glow of yours when you're
angry always did upset me.I'll come back when it's dimmer."

  Docchi glared after him. Cameron was the only normal aware that it wasNona who controlled the gravital unit. All the outside world couldrealize was that it was in operation, as it had been designed to work,but never had. If Cameron could be disposed of--

  He shook his head. It wouldn't solve anything. He might fool them fora while. They might think he was responsible. In the end, they'd findout. Nona wasn't capable of that much deception, for she never knewwhat a test was.

  He went over to her. Once he had hoped.... It didn't matter what hehad hoped.

  She looked up and smiled. She had a right to. No word had ever brokenthe silence of her mind, but now she was communicating with something,whatever it was that an electronic brain could say. Of course shedidn't understand that