Kaspar's Box

"They are stuck because at least one of the races there is not only not inclined to help but is inclined to hinder. Something will have to be done about it, but your Doctor and your people are already trying to win them. In the end, they will be left but your people will not, and all by their own choice. We have more than enough people. We do not have enough good people."

Joshua suddenly roared and reached into his utility pack and pulled out a very nasty laser pistol. "No!" he screamed, his voice echoing in the shaft. "You are the angels of control! I swore to serve the demons of freedom!"

Maslovic, nearest the big man, went into action almost reflexively, bringing up a leg and kicking hard into Joshua's backside. Not expecting it, the big man fell slightly forward, talking several steps nearer the edge of the bridge, but not losing his grip on the pistol or completely losing his balance. He managed to put out his other hand and stop his forward motion a good meter short of the edge, and it was clear he was going to make it, turn, and begin firing. He did not, however, decide to go down on his kees and turn and fire, a movement that they might not have been able to counter, but instead struggled unsteadily back to full erectness.

Patrick Murphy raised his leg and pushed it right into the big man's groin. Joshua yelled again and took several steps backward, trying to bring the pistol up and aim it first at the one who'd just kicked him. He stepped back one step, two steps, three steps.

He didn't have three steps.

With a look less of madness than total bewilderment, Joshua plunged into the seemingly bottomless chasm, his roars of defiance fading quickly.

Murphy smiled. "I didn't know I had it in me!"

"I never did understand why we brought him along," Maslovic commented.

Jerry Nagel looked up at the wall. "I assume your folks can lead us out of here? At least for now?"

"We had to bring you here. You represent all the factions of your race. You can be our ambassadors to them now."

Randi Queson looked at where Joshua had gone over into oblivion. "He made his choice. Now we get to make ours."

The gnome was suddenly there, gesturning for them to follow.

As soon as they cleared the bridge, Murphy reached into his own pouch and brought out a flask. He drank a good deep belt, then offered it to the rest, including the gnome, who sniffed with that huge nose and then made it clear that it was to be nowhere near him.

Ann took a slug herself, then handed it back. "I wonder if we can perhaps help them to win this thing? Or at least believe that they can."

"Maybe, maybe not," Maslovic responded. "But now at least we know the score. It's always the challenge that makes life worth living, isn't it?"

"I can see that you will have to learn a bit more about being human," Ann responded. "It took me a very long while myself. Still, there's great power here, and opportunity, and none of us have anyone left back in the colonial systems to worry or worry about."

"You're going to have to start introducing him to some philosophy," Randi Queson noted.

"You don't go back to Balshazzar for that," Jerry Nagel put in. "I think we start with the captain, there."

"Aye, lad! I think this will be a heavy time. I think maybe I can weather it, with me whiskey here, and maybe some good cigars someplace, and with three beautiful girls. The rest of you can think the deep thoughts and save worthless humanity. Maybe you just might. I think of meself as keepin' the home fires burnin'…"

Jack L. Chalker

Jack Laurence Chalker was an American science fiction author. Chalker was also a Baltimore City Schools history teacher in Maryland for a time. He also was a member of the Washington Science Fiction Association and was involved in the founding of the Baltimore Science Fiction Society.

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