Federations

But one of the Computermen seized up a pike and, with a terrible cry, cast it straight into Alverin’s breast. Alverin staggered backward, pierced through the heart and lungs. In that same instant of time, the man who had cast the pike was stricken through his arm by three arrows. Yet these shots were not ill-aimed; for Alverin’s men, by custom, spoke before they struck, wounded rather than slew.

Alverin drew the pike-head out from his bloody chest and wiped the blood away. The wound closed up into a scar and then Alverin’s chest grew fair and smooth again. He cast the bloody pike aside. “I am an Earthman; I was born beneath blue sky!” he called out. To the wounded man, he said, “The knowledge of the men who made this entire world have made me as I am, and I am not to be slain by your small weapons.” And he ordered his physician to tend to the wounded among the enemy, even the man who had smitten him.

Alverin turned. He saw Valdemar laying motionless, his body crushed beneath the fallen giant. “So,” Alverin whispered, “These secret paths you showed to us were not a trap. Did you play us true, this once, old liar? If so, where is the ring?”

Now he turned again. In the threshold of the golden doors leading to the Main Bridge, a pikeman still crouched above Henwas the Watchman, a steady knife still touching the prone man’s throat. Henwas was bleeding at the shoulder and the leg, and yet his face was remote and calm, as if no wound nor pain could trouble him.

Alverin stepped forward till he could see, lying in the shadow of the door, dying, Acting Captain Weston II, and, in his bloodstained hand, the ring.

Beyond was the Bridge, a large dimly lit cathedral of a space, surrounded on all sides by the darkened screens of the Computer.

Weston croaked, “Pikeman. Slit the Watchman’s throat if the rebel-king steps forward one step more.”

“Weston,” said Alverin in a soft, stern voice, “Yield up to me the ring. I will restore to all the world, the light, the power, and the justice, which, by right, should have been ours. You have my solemn promise that all your men shall be dealt with justly.”

“Should I believe a mutineer? You betrayed Valdemar,” hissed Weston wearily.

“After he surrendered to the Enemy. Free men follow leaders into battle, and render him the power of Command, only while he does their will, in pursuit of a just war, or in defense against hostility. That power of Command, incapable of destruction, returned to the free men of this ship, upon Valdemar’s abdication of it. By their fair and uncoerced election, I was tendered the Command, and so am Captain. That trust I hold sacred; render me the ring, and I shall see this world prosper.”

“Prosper? Are we not surrounded by enemy worlds?” Weston asked softly.

“We are too humble for their attention,” Alverin said, “If we do not offend them, they will pay us no more heed.”

“And if the ring is used to launch the fabled Weaponry at World’s Core?” Weston now raised himself on one elbow. His face was pasty-white, his eyes wild and sick.

“Then the world dies, if not in this generation, then in the next.”

The lieutenant, his hand being bandaged by a tall pale doctor, spoke up, “Sire! Yield the ring to Alverin! Even we, so many years his foe, acknowledge his justice, wisdom, and trueheartedness. If any man is deserving of empire, it is such a man as this!”

But Henwas, who still had him by the ankle, said a voice of calm command, “In your last moment, sir, I pray you be a Captain truly. Use the ring, or give it me, to complete the mission of the Twilight of the Gods. We both are dying, you of wounds, me of radiation poison and disease. Should we, in such a time as this, abandon our posts and sue for peace? This whole world was made for war.”

“Pikeman, stand away. Here, Watchman; take the accursed thing. Do your duty; kill all my enemies, you, them, everyone. And be damned to you all.” With a curse on his lips, Weston slid into death, and his cold hand gave the ring to Henwas.

Henwas came up to his knees and thrust the pikeman down across the dais’ stairs. Such was the strength of his arm that the man was flung many yards away. Alverin and the elves started forward suddenly, but Henwas, leaning inward from the golden door, reached and touched the shining ring against the dark, cold mirrored corner of the nearest of the many computer screens which filled the huge, black bridge.

He spoke the words: “Eternal Fidelity. I am forever loyal.” And all the mirrors flamed to life and shone with purest light. On each screen images appeared, words, symbols, strange letters and equations, and everywhere, the thousand shining lights of all the Enemy stars.

A pure and perfect voice, like no voice ever to be made by lips or tongue of man, rang out: “READY.”

Several of the Computermen screamed in fear or shouted with joy. One sank down to his knees and cried out, “Oh, that I have seen this day!” Even the knights and guards of Weston’s, and Alverin’s tall men, stood speechless, eyes wide.