Talents, Incorporated by Murray Leinster (best sales books of all time TXT) 📕

of the explosion was such that there was not even glowing metal-vapor where it had been. Every atom of the ship's substance had been volatilized and scattered through so many thousands of cubic miles of emptiness that it did not show even as a mist.

"A good ship," said Bors grimly. Then he growled. "I wonder if they saw that on Garen and what they thought about it!" He straightened himself. "How did you know we were in trouble?"

"There's a Talent," said Gwenlyn matter-of-factly, "who can always tell how people feel. She doesn't know what they think or why. But she can tell when they're uneasy and so on. Father uses her to tell him when people lie. When what they say doesn't match how they feel, they're lying."

"I think," said Bors, "that I'll stay away from her. But that won't do any good, will it?"

Gwenlyn smiled at him. It was a very nice smile.

"She could tell that things had gone wrong with the ship," she observed, "because of the way you felt. But I've forbidden her ever to tell when someone lies to me or anything like that.[108] I don't want to know people's feelings when they want to hide them."

"Fine!" said Bors. "I feel better." Standing so close to Gwenlyn, he also felt light-headed.

She smiled at him again, as if she understood.

"We'll head for Glamis now," she said. "The situation there should have changed a great deal because of what you've done."

"It would be my kind of luck," said Bors half joking, "for it to have changed for the worse."

It had.

Chapter 9

"The decision," said King Humphrey the Eighth, stubbornly, "is exactly what I have said. In full war council it has been agreed that the fleet, through a new use of missiles, is a stronger fighting force than ever before. This was evidenced in the late battle and no one questions it. But it is also agreed that we remain hopelessly outnumbered. We are in a position where we simply cannot fight! For us to have fought would probably have been forgiven if we had been wiped out in the recent battle—preferably with only slight loss to the Mekinese. We offered battle expecting exactly that. Unfortunately, we annihilated the fleet that was to have occupied Kandar. In consequence we have had to pretend that we were destroyed along with them. And if we are discovered to be alive, and certainly if we offer to fight, Kandar will be exterminated as a living world, to punish us and as a warning to future victims of the Mekinese."

"Yes, Majesty," Bors said through tight lips. "But may I point out—"

"I know what you want to point out," the king broke in irritably. "With the help of these Talents, Incorporated people,[109] you've worked out a new battle tactic you want to put into practice. You've explained it to the War Council. The War Council has decided that it is too risky. We cannot gamble the lives of the people on Kandar. We have not the right to expose them to Mekinese vengeance!"

"I agree, Majesty," said Bors, "but at the same time—"

The king leaned back in his chair.

"I don't like it any better than you do," he said peevishly. "I expected to get killed in a space-battle—not very gloriously, but at least with self-respect. Unfortunately we had bad luck. We won the fight. I do not like what we have to do in consequence, but we have to do it!"

Bors bit his lips. He liked and respected King Humphrey, as he had respect and affection for his uncle, the Pretender of Tralee. Both were honest and able men who'd been forced to learn the disheartening lesson that some things are impossible. But Bors believed that King Humphrey had learned the lesson too well.

"You plan, Majesty," he said after a moment, "to send me out again to capture food-ships if I can."

"Obviously," said the king.

"The idea being," Bors went on, "that if I can get enough food for the fleet so it can make a journey of several hundreds of light-years—"

"It is necessary to go a long way," the king confirmed unhappily. "We need to take the fleet to where Mekin is only a name and Kandar not even that."

"Where you will disband the fleet—"

"Yes."

"And hope that Mekin will not take vengeance anyhow for the fight the fleet has already put up."

The king said heavily, "It will be a very long time before word drifts back that the fleet of Kandar did not die in battle. It may never come. If it does, it will come as a vague rumor, as an idle tale, as absurd gossip about a fleet whose home planet may not even be remembered when the tales are told. There will be trivial stories about a fleet which abandoned the[110] world it should have defended, and fled so far that its enemies did not bother to follow it. If the tale reaches Mekin, it may not be believed. It may not ever be linked to Kandar. And if some day it is believed, by then Kandar will be long occupied. Perhaps it will be resigned to its status. It will be a valuable subject world. Mekin will not destroy it merely to punish scattered, forgotten men who will never know that they have been punished."

"And you want me," repeated Bors, "to find the stores of food that will let the fleet travel to—oblivion."

"Yes," said the king again. He looked very weary. "In a sense, of course, we will simply be doing what we set out to do—to throw away our lives. We intended to do that. We are doing no more now."

Bors said grimly, "I'm not sure. But I will obey orders, Majesty. Do you object if I pass out the details of the new device among some junior officers? I speak of the way to compute overdrive speed exactly and how to vary it. It could help the fleet to stay together, even in overdrive."

The king shrugged. "That would be desirable. I do not object."

"I'll do it then, Majesty," said Bors. "I'll be assigned a new ship. I'd like the same crew. I'll do my best, in a new part of the Mekinese empire, this time."

"Yes," said the king drearily. "Don't make a pattern of raids that would suggest that you have a base. You understand, it is impossible to use more than one ship...."

"Naturally," agreed Bors. "One more suggestion, Majesty. A ship could be sent back to Kandar—not to land but to watch. If a single Mekinese ship went there to ask questions, it could be destroyed, perhaps. Which would gain us time."

"I will think about it," said the king doubtfully. "Maybe it has occurred to someone else. I will see. Meantime you will go to the admiral for a new ship. And then do what you can to find provisions for the fleet. It is not good for us to merely stay here waiting for nothing. Even action toward our own disappearance is preferable."[111]

Bors saluted. He went to the office of the admiral. The commander-in-chief of the Kandarian fleet was making an inspection, to maintain tight discipline in the absence of hope. A young vice-admiral was on duty in the admiral's stead. He regarded Bors with approval. He listened with attention, and agreed with most of what Bors had to say.

"I'll push the idea of a sentry over Kandar," he said confidentially. "I'll make it two ships or three and take command. I want to send some of my engineer officers to get the details of that low-power overdrive. A very pretty tactical idea! It should be spread throughout the fleet."

"It will help," Bors said with irony, "when we go so far away that we'll never be heard of any more."

"Eh?" The vice-admiral looked at him blankly. "Oh. Perhaps. You wouldn't be likely to pick up a cargo-ship loaded with Mekinese missiles, would you? We could adapt them to our use."

"If I did," Bors answered, "I suspect that somehow that ship would land itself on Mekin and blow up as it touched ground."

The vice-admiral raised his eyebrows. Bors saluted quickly and left.

Presently he was back on the Sylva. His new command would be supplied with extra missiles from other ships. Despite the fleet action against the Mekinese, there was not yet a shortage of such ammunition. When a missile could not be intercepted and itself did not try to intercept, the economy of missiles was great. In the battle of the gas-giant planet, the fleet had fired no more than three or four missiles for every enemy ship destroyed.

Morgan took Bors aside.

"I'm going to keep Logan here this trip. I'm working on the commanders. I need him. And our Talent for Detecting Lies,—she was the one who knew you were in trouble, Gwenlyn tells me—is very necessary. I was hampered by not having her while Gwenlyn was away. But she did a good job for you!"[112]

Bors shrugged. He did not like depending upon Talents. He still wasn't inclined toward acceptance of what he considered the occult. Now he said, "I'm duly grateful, but it's just as well. My mind doesn't work in a way to understand these Talents of yours. I admit everything, but I'm afraid I don't really accept anything."

"It's perfectly reasonable," protested Morgan. "The facts fit together! I'm no hand at working out theories; I deal in facts. But the facts do make sense!"

Bors found himself looking at the door of the family room, where Morgan had taken him. He realized that he was waiting for Gwenlyn to enter. He turned back to Morgan.

"They don't make sense to me," he said dourly. "You have a precognizer, you say. He foresees the future. I admit that he has. But the future is uncertain. It can't be foreseen unless it's pre-ordained, and in that case we're only puppets imagining that we're free agents. But there would be no reason in such a state of things!"

Morgan settled himself luxuriously in a self-adjusting chair. He thrust a cigar on Bors and lighted up zestfully.

"I've been wanting to spout about that," he observed, "even if I'm no theoretician. Look here! What is true? What is truth? What's the difference between a false statement and a true one?"

Bors's eyes wandered to the door again. He drew them back.

"One's so and the other isn't," he said.

"No," said Morgan. "Truth is an accordance—an agreement—between an idea and a fact. If I toss a coin, I can make two statements. I can say it will come up heads, or I can say that it will come up tails. One sentence is true and one is false. A precognizer simply knows which statement is true. I don't, but he does."

"It's still prophecy," objected Bors.

"Oh, no!" protested Morgan. "A precognizer-talent doesn't prophesy! All he can do is recognize that an idea he has now matches an event that will happen presently. He can't extract[113] ideas from the future! He can only judge the truth or falsity of ideas that occur to him. He has to think something before he can know it is true. He does not get information from the future! He can only know that the idea he has now matches something that will happen later. He can detect a matching—an agreement—perhaps it's a mental vibration of some sort. But that's all!"

"I asked if I would capture a cargo-ship on Tralee—"

"And I said I didn't know! Of course I said so! How could anybody know such a thing except by pure accident? A precognizer might think of nine hundred and ninety-nine ways in which you might try to capture that ship. They could all be wrong. He might say you wouldn't capture it. But you might try a thousandth way that he hadn't thought of! All he can know is that some idea he has concocted matches—some instinct stirs, and he knows it's true! That's why one man can precognize dirty tricks. His mind works that way! We've got a woman who knows, infallibly, who's going to marry whom! That's why the ship-arrival precognizer can say a ship's coming in. His mind works on such things, and he has a talent besides!"

"There are definite limits, then."

"What is there that's real and hasn't limits?" demanded Morgan.

The door opened and Gwenlyn came in. Bors rose, looking pleased.

"I'm telling him the facts of life about precognition," Morgan told her. "I think he understands now."

"I don't agree," said Bors.

Gwenlyn said amusedly, "Two of our Talents want to talk to you, Captain. You might say that they want to measure you for rumors."

"They what?" demanded Bors, startled.

"The Talent who predicts dirty tricks," said Gwenlyn, "is going to work with the woman who broadcasts daydreams. They'll be our Department of Propaganda."[114]

Bors said uncertainly, "But there's no point in propaganda! It's determined."

"I know!" said Morgan complacently. "The high brass has made a decision. A perfectly logical decision, too, once you grant