His Share of Glory The Complete Short Science Fiction

The Executive Officer, feeling his grip going, moved too quickly and blundered into half a dozen obstacles—chairs and desks that should not be in his path—before he reached the moaning figure of the second Star. Twice he struck and missed, bringing the case down on an empty chair. With the last dyne of his psychological reserve he raised the case, brought it down with a solid chunk, brought it down biting into the skull of the mathematician.

Mamie Tung smiled grim satisfaction and proceeded with the treatment. It was a technique of her own, something fearfully obscure and delicate, unbearably complicated by the duality imposed on her.

But the drive of the woman brought about nearly an elimination of one of her components, drove it into the back of her mind where it stood as little more than a shadow. The other Madame Tung was coldly, stonily, picking over the brain of Star Macduff.

She drove a tentacle of consciousness into the hypnotized man, tapped his personal memory-store. She had no interest in that at the moment; drove deeper, reached one obscure group of neurones specialized in the calculus of relationships, alias symbolic logic, alias the scientific method, alias common sense.

Vampirish, she drew at the neurones, what they held, how they worked, what they did, why they did it so much better than any of the other officers' corresponding groups. And it came like a flood of golden light, like the ever-new sensation that comes when an old thing looks different.

She let go of the cataleptic figure completely, let it crumple to the floor, while she busied herself with the unfamiliar tools of the Calculator. It was all new to her, and it is to be remarked greatly to her credit that she did not go mad.

"I've worked it, Will," she said. "Slick as a whistle."

"Speak up then." The E.O. was very near collapse; Yancey Mears—one of them—had fallen to the floor and was big-eyed and heaving in the chest while the other wandered about distraitly raving under her breath, sounding very far away.

"It's probabilities, Will. Those people—they worked space around for us so that when we came to some decision-point we took not one course or another but both. Since we aren't used to that kind of thinking, it didn't pan out—and a couple of us are nearly done in by it.

"Star's math says it's completely plausible, and the wonder is that they don't do it on Earth for difficult situations, social and otherwise.

Imagine the joy of attending on the same night a necessary academic banquet and taking out a lover. I must be raving. But it's the goods, Will.

Everything fits."

"What was the decision-point?"

"It was when Star made that fool remark about what our boarders really looked like. You called him down, torn between sending him aft with the ordinaries and keeping him here with the superiors. Conveniently for you we—the ship—branched into two probabilities at that point.

You could have covered yourself by both ordering him aft with the ordinaries and keeping him here with the superiors. Justice would be done and we'd be insured against the chance of a poor decision.

Unfortunately that convenient arrangement doesn't work for our little minds; the very convenience of it nearly broke us. But I'm getting so I can handle one at a time. I doubt that I'll ever be able to handle both, but it's good enough to separate and leave one of yourself in temporary silence.

"Now, for instance, I'm using the me that's in the Sphere Nine in which Yancey fainted. The other me is in the Sphere Nine in which you clubbed and finally killed the Star that I didn't hypnotize. You—or rather youse—have been wavering your consciousness between the two Sphere Nines. In the one in which this me is, you tried to pick up Yancey; in the other one you did a neat job on Star."

"Executive Office …" said a pleading voice over the—one of the—

phones. "I'll take it," said the active Mamie Tung.

"Psychologist speaking."

"Ordinary speaking—what happened— Ratings Ten, Twelve and Three've beat each other's brains out …"

"Cut, will you. I'm going to check on that."

"Cut, Officer," said the pitifully bewildered voice.

The active Mamie Tung stacked herself against a wall; slowly the passive came to life and experimentally stepped over to the phone, nodding at Will Archer, who was experimenting quietly in transference of attention.

"Commons room," she said into the phone.

There was no answer.

"They've probably all murdered each other in this probability. Now that I'm in it, I'll see what I can do with Yancey."

She took hold of the staring, wandering, mumbling woman, tried to sit her down. The creature broke away with a thin, distant scream and fled through the tube.

"Just as well. This branch seems to be an exceptionally sour one. That girl's mind was hopelessly wrecked. Let's both get into the other and treat the other Yancey."