by Kenneth C. Flint
The odd scraping sound could be heard even above the distant rumble of thunder.
One of the two figures seated at the dining table twisted around, cocking its head to listen.
“What’s that?” a gruff voice demanded. “Rover, go check!”
Something shifted in a shadowed corner. A mass slid forward with a wet, sucking sound, coming into the light. It was a gelatinous form, a mucuslike mass of greasily shining bile-green that humped and slithered itself over the floor as a ring of slender, bulb-tipped stalks wavered atop the rounded mass. It oozed on across the width of the long dining room toward one of the arched window openings in the far wall.
“I wouldn’t have believed a Meduza could be trained at all,” the second figure at the table remarked with some surprise.
The first man turned back to the guest seated across the dining table from him. “On the contrary, Senator. It’s quite easy to train. One of the most malleable species I’ve found, in fact. I wish there were more like it.”
The man’s face was obscured by a massive scar disfiguring the right side, leaving the right eye a slit in the sagging flesh and flattening out the nose, giving him a piggish look.
“I can unfortunately imagine what things you wish for, Dr. Evazan,” the Aqualish senator replied with a shudder of revulsion. Generally humanoid, he had walruslike features, with large, liquid black eyes and thick, incurving tusks. Short bristling whiskers lined the stubby snout that was split by a wide, thin mouth.
The senator lifted a hand to clutch the glass before him. The hand was finlike, fingerless, but with an opposable thumb. It marked him as a member of the more prominent of the two Aqualish races, and thus belonging to their ruling classes. He drank deeply of the dark green Andoan ale within the glass as he watched Rover nervously.
The gelatinous creature had by now reached one of the window openings. Heaving itself into a higher peak, it poised a moment, its bulbed stalks jerking about as if sniffing the air.
Beyond the opening, the vast sea of the water planet of Ando stretched away to a gray-black horizon. In the boiling storm clouds that hung there, spectacular lightning flickered and flared to light the towering thunderheads.
The deep boom of thunder rolled across the gale-churned waves to rebound from the sheer stone walls of the spired castle perched high upon the cliffs. Hundreds of meters below the castle window, fists of massive waves slammed themselves against the base of the rocky isle, splaying to white fingers that grabbed futilely upward.
The full magnificence of the wild scene was somewhat obscured by a shimmering scrim of light created by the energy shield that formed a screen across each opening.
The bloblike creature sank back down. Its pod-tipped stalks turned toward Evazan at once and waved to him, as if in urgent signal.
Dr. Evazan cocked the remaining eyebrow above his left eye. His half-blasted face expressed no other sign of emotion.
“You might just want to drop down under the table now,” he told his guest in a quite matter-of-fact voice.
The Aqualish senator stared in astonishment as one of Evazan’s hands appeared from under the table clutching a blaster pistol. The other hand lifted to punch one button on a small tabletop console, and then a second.
All the lights went out.
Simultaneously a sizzling sound came from beyond the windows, and the energy screens of three openings were punctured inward as three forms dived through them from outside.
The senator gave a shrill honk of terror and dived beneath the thick tabletop.
The three forms hit the floor, rolled, and came instantly to their feet. A flicker of distant lightning illuminated three humanoid shapes as they lifted blaster rifles to fire.
Evazan was already rolling from his chair toward the shelter of a conform lounge. He fired as he went, his bolt striking one of the three forms squarely.
The attacker let out a grunt of pain as he staggered and went down. The other two dived for cover. Bolts from opposing weapons crisscrossed the dark room, cracking into stone walls and ripping through furnishings.
One of the attackers was so intent on hitting Evazan, he was not aware of something creeping up—not until a liquid sound made him whip about just as Rover lunged.
The intruder had no chance for defense as the Meduza’s stalks all shot forward, touching their pod ends to the other’s face and chest. Each pod flared brightly, and the victim’s form stiffened, shuddering as if an electric shock coursed through it, then collapsed.
Evazan’s twisted mouth lifted in a grotesque smile. “Good boy, Rover,” he muttered. But the smile vanished as he looked toward the room’s door, adding in an irked tone, “But where in hell are you, Ponda?”
He moved out from his cover, crawling about the dark room, angling for a shot at the last foe. As Evazan lifted up to take aim at the last place he had seen the other, that final invader drew a bead on the doctor’s shadowy form.
The door of the room burst inward and a new figure plunged through. A quick, well-aimed blaster bolt skewered Evazan’s attacker, barely saving the doctor from a fatal shot.
The last body thudded to the floor. Evazan climbed to his feet, brushing himself off. “About time, Ponda,” he told the new arrival, stepping to the table to switch the lights back on.
The returning illumination revealed another Aqualish male clutching a freshly fired blaster. But Ponda Baba’s left hand was the hairy, talon-fingered hand of one of the lesser Aqualish race. The right hand and the forearm to which it was fixed were artificial, and of a rather crude mechanical type, their skeletal metal frame uncovered by bioflesh.
“You’re lucky,” Ponda replied in a growl, shoving his blaster back into a holster. “I almost left you to take them all yourself.”
With that he turned and clomped out of the room.
The Andoan senator was just rising from beneath the dining table. Evazan holstered his own weapon and looked to his guest apologetically.
“Sorry. In the old days, Ponda Baba would have been in here like a shot. A real team we were then.”
“He … ah … works for you?” the senator said, still recovering from shock.
“We were partners,” the doctor tersely explained.
The senator seemed dismayed by that. “You know, he is of the lowest caste here on Ando. Its people have dubious morals and most violent habits. They are treated with so much contempt that few of them stay on our planet. They go off and often become galactic criminals.”
“Well, Ponda couldn’t have been a better pal to me,” Evazan said, pouring out stiff drinks for them both. “That is, until one day on Tatooine. Had a run-in at the Mos Eisley Cantina there. An old man with a Jedi lightsaber took off Ponda’s right arm for helping me. After that we had a kind of falling-out.”
“He’s here now,” the senator pointed out. “And it does seem he just saved your life.”
“Well, I still owe him an arm,” the doctor explained. “He’s had trouble raising enough credits for a good bionic replacement. So we’ve set up an uneasy alliance until I can help him out. I supply an arm, he works as my bodyguard … supposedly.” He took a deep draft of his ale.
“What about them?” asked the senator, looking toward the downed attackers.
“Them?” said Evazan, shrugging carelessly. “Just more bounty hunters. Must have climbed all the way up here.”
He set down his glass and walked toward one of the bodies. It was clad in a gray jumpsuit and helmet, like the other two, with an equipment belt around the waist. He rolled it over with a foot, revealing the staring, slack-jawed face of a human male, swarthy of complexion, lean and sharp of feature.
Evazan eyed a small device attached at the man’s waist.
“They used individual field disrupters to get through the screens,” he said thoughtfully. “Looks like a new type. I’ll have to boost shield power.” He looked around to the Aqualish, adding testily, “Senator, I shouldn’t have to worry about this kind of thing at all. You’re supposed to be protecting me, making sure no one can even get near here with equipment like that.”
“We can’t screen and search everyone who comes to the planet,” the senator said defensively. “The security we’ve provided for you is already very great and incredibly expensive.”
Evazan shook his head. “Still not enough. This is the third attempt on my life here. They get better every time.”
“We had rather assumed that hiding you in such a fortress on such an isolated isle would be protection enough,” the senator returned with an indignant tone. “Of course, we didn’t know then that half the galaxy was trying to hunt you down.”
Evazan stepped back toward him. “Are you saying I’m not worth it?” he demanded.
“It is that very point about which I’m here,” was the stern reply.
“All right,” the doctor assented. “We’ll talk about it.” He waved at the dining table. “Do you want to finish our meal first?”
The senator looked at their plates still filled with food. “Eat?” he said, then looked toward the bodies. “What about them?”
“Oh, Rover will take care of it,” said Evazan.
The blob had already crawled up to one of the dead men. drawing its viscous mass over the form, engulfing and hiding it. The creature began to quiver in excitement and gave forth a slurping noise.
“He cleans up all leftovers,” Evazan said. “It’s part of why I’ve been able to train him with such ease. He’s so well fed here.”
“I’m really not very hungry anymore,” the Aqualish said. He sat down and took a very deep gulp of ale. “Let’s just get on to the point of my visit, shall we? I don’t want to … I mean, I don’t have much time to stay here.”
“Fine,” said the doctor, taking a seat, too. “What’s your problem?”
“Credits,” the senator replied bluntly. “This whole project has gotten out of hand. Supplying this place and your laboratory facilities was costly enough. And now there’s security. This incident only underscores the problem. It’s costing our government a fortune!”
“And well worth one,” Evazan returned, leaning forward on the table to speak with intensity. “For decades now you’ve been all but slaves of the Empire, living by its orders. You’ve lost your pride and your identity to survive. Just how much are you willing to pay to get loose from your chains?”
Rover had finished ingesting the first body. Leaving only a man-shaped wet spot on the stone, it crawled to a second form.
“No amount would be too great to be free of the Empire,” the senator admitted, trying not to watch the creature’s grisly work. “Still, my appropriations subcommittee needs reassurance to continue your financing. Our present budget squeeze—”
“Your budget be scorched!” Evazan shouted. “When I finish my research, you’ll have a secret so valuable to the Empire that they’ll give you your freedom and anything else you’d want.”
“Yes, yes, so you assure us,” the senator replied. “But we’ve had little evidence of late to support your claims for some great medical breakthrough. Perhaps if you give me some proofs of your progress, something solid I can take back, then I can convince them to go on.”
“Fair enough,” the doctor conceded. “I’ll show you how very close to total success I am. It’s already been tested several different ways. In fact, I only need one last thing to prove my breakthrough works. I have to find a specimen of a human male—a young, strong, healthy, perfectly formed one.”
The senator’s large eyes narrowed in curiosity. “Why?”
“You’ll see for yourself.” Evazan got to his feet. “I’ll take you down to the laboratory right now.”
The senator looked up at him. “To your … laboratory?” he said with clear misgivings. “Is that really necessary, Doctor? Surely some other evidence would suffice. Research data, perhaps, or—”
“I insist,” Evazan said. “You have to see what I’ve done here for yourself!”
The Aqualish sighed and, with great reluctance, got to his feet.
“This way, Senator,” said the doctor, ushering him from the room.
Behind them the Meduza noisily finished its second meal and moved on to the final course. The third dead man lay curled halfway on his side. A small comlink unit attached to his belt was partly visible. The tiny green “power on” indicator light was aglow …
Outside the castle, not far above the windows, a single figure clung to the sheer stone wall—a man of slender build and dark complexion, with hawkish features, deep brown eyes, and a black mustache. He was clad like the three dead men.
Both his feet and one hand were wedged in narrow cracks to hold him in the precarious spot, his body pressed tight to the wall against the tearing wind. His free hand held his own comlink close to one ear.
He had listened in on the conversation between Evazan and the senator. He had heard the two depart. Now he listened to the grotesque squooshing sound as the creature enveloped his last comrade.
With a crackling of shorted power the comlink channel went dead, and the man’s face tightened into a grim expression.
Hanging his comlink back on his belt, he clambered up the castle wall with great dexterity, onto a slanting section of roof. A long-range comlink unit in backpack form was fastened to the smooth slate by suction-support webbing. Cramming his body into a corner between the roof and a spire to secure himself against the wind, he pulled the comlink headset from the pack and spoke urgently into its mouthpiece.
“Hello, Mother? It’s Gurion. Do you copy?” He looked up to the clouded sky with some concern. “Are you still up there?”
“Still in orbit, Gur,” came a reply. “What’s the report?”
“All dead,” Gurion answered bluntly. “All but me. Evazan must have some heavy protection inside there. They were the best.”
After a heavy silence, the voice came again, carrying a tone of sorrow not fully masked. “That’s it, then. You get off there, Gur. Right now. We’ll pick you up.”
“No. Not me,” he said firmly. “I’m going to go inside, get close to him. It’s the only way to be sure of nailing him.”
“By yourself?” said the voice in surprise. “That’s suicide!”
“If it has to be. I don’t care,” Gurion said fiercely. “I mean to get to him, and I think I know how!”
Within the castle, Evazan and guest descended a long spiraling stairway. The deeper they went into the mysterious lower sanctums of the doctor’s lair, the more apologetic the Andoan senator became.
“For my part, there’s never been a question of your integrity,” the alien explained in a voice pitched ever higher by his rising concern. “It’s my Senate colleagues who have been picking up rumors. Some are saying you have the death sentence on ten systems.”
“Twelve, actually,” Evazan said carelessly. “It may be more by now. I haven’t checked.”
“Really?” said the senator, his voice rising a bit more. “And then there have been tales of some of your … ah … medical practices.”
“I won’t deny there’s some truth to them, too,” the doctor admitted. “I don’t apologize for what I’ve done. It was all to a good end.”
They reached the bottom of the stairwell. Evazan unlocked and opened a massive metal door. It creaked back on its hinges, and they both passed through.
Beyond, a single space took up all the huge castle’s basement area. Squat pillars and heavy arches of stone held up the high ceiling. Stretching into the far shadows, bank after bank of large glass cylinders glowed faintly, filled with gold liquid … and something else.
The senator stepped forward, staring in shock. Each cylinder appeared to contain some type of being.
He walked farther forward, looking down a row of creatures floating in amber fluid. There were giant Wookiees and diminutive Jawas, skeletonlike Givins and one-eyed Abbyssins. There were horned humanoids from Devaron and insectlike creatures of the Kibnon race, along with countless other species from planets all across the galaxy.
“Are they … dead?” the senator nervously inquired, peering into the cylinder of a reptilian Arcona who stared back with blank, jewellike eyes.
“Unfortunately,” said Evazan. “Preserved in my special embalming fluid. They’re some of my patients who didn’t survive my surgical attempts to help them. But the medical work I did on them has still been of great value to me.”
The senator looked at the corpses again, more closely. All had been worked upon in a manner that might loosely have been termed “surgical,” though the word “butchery” might better have been applied. Most were mutilated, their bodies slashed open, various limb parts or organs missing. In some cases the beings’ own elements had been replaced with things quite clearly alien.
“I say they’ve helped me,” Evazan went on, walking down a row of his “patients.” “Mostly by showing where my research had reached a dead end”—he cast the senator a ghastly smile—“if you’ll pardon the expression.”
“You experimented on them?” the senator said in horror.
Evazan waved the idea away. “Of course not. I meant to help them through my creative techniques. I intended to give them greater health and longer life. In theory, at least.”
He touched the cylinder holding the eviscerated form of a rodentlike Ranat. “I’ve devoted my whole life to helping others. They’ve called me a madman, a criminal, for my pains. But no one’s understood. I was only using my skills to re-form life in various ways, trying to create something better.” He sighed and looked back to the Aqualish. “But it wasn’t enough.”
The senator looked up and down the long ranks of the doctor’s victims. “Not enough?”
“Physical alteration wasn’t enough.”
The doctor moved on to the next cylinder. Within was a particularly hideous specimen. It was a creature that had been constructed of parts scavenged from dozens of different beings, stitched and stapled together to form a patchwork monstrosity.
“As you see, even cutting and splicing together the best of the galaxy’s body parts couldn’t achieve the effect I wanted.” He lifted a hand to touch the scarred right side of his skull. “No, it was the mind that was the key. That’s why my research took a new direction. Come over here.”
He led the way along the cylinder rows and into a large area in the middle of the room. Here a complex assemblage of electronic equipment towered to the ceiling in a rather precarious way. Its various systems, rigged together with tangled festoons of wire, crackled and sizzled uneasily even with the minimal power input now running through them.
The key feature of this haphazard but high-tech pile was two platforms set with operating tables. Straps clearly meant to restrain subjects added to their sinister look. Above each an odd, sievelike device dangled by a dozen wires from a pivoting boom. More wires connected these to the central machine.
“This is my transfer instrument,” Evazan said proudly. “The main components were modified from advanced Imperial transmogrification units originally intended to alter droid programming. Ponda and I managed to ‘liberate’ this equipment from an Imperial research facility. But I’ve adapted it to use on living beings.”
The senator had been staring with mixed awe and skepticism at the dubious-appearing mass. Now he looked at Evazan in disbelief. “Living beings?”
“Living brains also store their gained knowledge electronically, much like a recording. That record can be altered, erased … or moved. The means to do it is now sitting before you.”
“To what end?”
“To have something no one has ever had before,” said the doctor grandly. “I’m finally on the brink of creating a practical form of immortality!”
The senator’s disbelieving look grew more pronounced. “You are joking, Doctor.”
“No joke at all,” said the other. He moved closer, speaking with sober intensity. “Just think of it! Not even the greatest of the Jedi Masters with all their powers over matter have achieved a real immortality. They may be able to prolong life to some extent, but they still decay and die eventually. My method will transfer the higher levels of a being’s intelligence into a fresh, new body whenever needed, just by the flick of a switch. Think how valuable that would be to the Empire. Their greatest rulers, their finest military minds could live on forever, gathering even more knowledge with each lifetime.”
“I suppose that is something the Empire would pay almost anything for,” said the Aqualish, but with grave misgivings in his tone. “If the thing works.”
“It’ll work,” Evazan said confidently, “and I’ll soon be able to prove it.” He grinned in sardonic delight. “Ironic, isn’t it, that Evazan, the one they’ve called Dr. Death, will be the one to create such eternal life!”
A nearby intercom console beeped an alert to an incoming transmission. Evazan turned to see the face of Ponda Baba appear in its tiny viewscreen as a voice came with some urgency from the speaker.
“Evazan, someone is at our door!”
“Our door?” the doctor repeated.
“At the sea gate below the castle. Says his aqua-speeder just broke down. Wants to call for a lift from here.”
“So he says,” Evazan replied. “Let’s see him.”
Ponda punched at his own console and the picture on the screen shifted to show a view of the sea gate area. A small ocean-going repulsorlift craft sat at the castle’s single dock. At the massive gate stood a most impressive-looking human male.
He was quite large, with a strapping build, as was evidenced by the body-hugging suit he wore. His chiseled features were handsome, and a thatch of blond hair waved about his well-formed head.
Evazan gazed with great interest upon the man, then he punched console buttons, bringing Ponda’s image back.
“Let him come up,” he ordered. “But only into the foyer. Keep a watch on him.”
“Are you sure that’s smart, Doc?” Ponda inquired.
“Just do it!” Evazan snapped the intercom off and turned to the senator. “You may get to see more than you’d hoped,” he said excitedly. “Today could be the climax of my research!”
He rushed up from the laboratory, the nonplussed senator following. They entered the castle’s huge entrance hall. In the wall beside its main door was set a control panel with a surveillance screen. Ponda Baba was already there, staring at a view of the room beyond the door.
In a small, bare antechamber to the entrance hall, their blond-haired visitor stood waiting patiently.
Evazan peered over Ponda’s shoulder at the man. His eyes lit with an eager glow.
“This one will be perfect!” he said. “What a piece of incredible luck!”
He reached past Ponda to flick a switch on the panel. From the ceiling light in the anteroom a crimson beam shot down, striking the blond man’s head. He went limp instantly, crumpling to the floor.
“You killed him?” the Andoan senator said, aghast.
“Just stunned him,” the doctor replied. He looked to Ponda. “Help me take him downstairs.”
He took hold of the door handle, but a hairy paw came down on his hand to stop him.
“Hold on, Doc,” came Ponda’s harsh voice. “You’re gonna make the transfer to him, aren’t you?”
“He looks as good as any I’ve ever seen,” Evazan admitted. “Why not?”
“No, Doc,” Ponda barked at him. “Me first!”
Evazan regarded his erstwhile partner. “What do you mean?”
“You promised I’d go first. You promised I’d get a body with a good arm. I brought you to my planet, helped you set this up, kept you alive for just that one thing. You cost me my arm on Tatooine. You owe me. It’s time to pay up.”
“How can I do that, Ponda?” he reasoned. “My perfect subject just showed up at my door. He’s here right now!”
“We’re both lucky then, Doc,” Ponda answered. “You got yours. I’ve got mine.”
Realization dawned in the doctor’s face. As one, both of them turned toward the Aqualish senator.
The senator had listened to their dialogue with growing alarm. As they looked to him, his expression grew taut with horror.
“He’s not young,” Evazan commented critically.
“He’s one of the ruling class, though,” Ponda replied. “I get an arm, and I get power, too.”
“You … you can’t mean what I think,” the senator gasped.
“We do,” said the doctor, pulling out his blaster. “Congratulations. You’ll be helping to make a great step for science.” He gestured with the gun. “Get going, please.”
“You can’t do this!” the senator cried as they marched him downstairs to the lab. “What about your financing? Your protection?”
“I won’t need either anymore,” the doctor replied. “I’ll finally be able to acquire a whole new identity. Be free of this scarred face. I can go out of here safe from bounty hunters, and with a secret that can change the galaxy.”
“That’s what you intended from the start, isn’t it?” the other guessed. “Just to help yourself!”
“What else?” said Evazan, laughing cruelly. He shoved the senator through the doorway into the lab. “Now, go get onto that left table. Quick.”
He and Ponda hustled the hapless senator to the table and strapped him upon its top. Evazan pulled the left-hand boom down closer, and fastened its dangling metal helmet over the dome of the captive’s head.
Ponda swiftly took a place on the other table. Evazan repeated the process of buckling restraints and fitting the other Aqualish with the second weird headpiece. Then he stepped away to a bank of controls.
He pulled levers, rotated dials, and watched readout screens indicating the surge of power. The machine sizzled loudly now, alive with enormous energy. The great pile of its parts shuddered visibly, threatening to tumble down.
As the indicators showed he’d reached maximum power, he threw a red double-handled switch. Blue-white sparks like tiny lightning bolts flickered downward along the wires, into the metal helmets on the two heads. The strapped-down bodies both jerked spasmodically.
Evazan watched a pair of dials right beneath the red switch. As the indicator on the left moved one way, its counterpart on the right moved the other. In only seconds the two needles had buried themselves on opposite sides of their dials.
With a cackle of glee the doctor slapped the power levers to Off. The flickering lights quickly faded, and the crackling of energy died away.
“It’s done! It’s worked!” Evazan chortled, running to the table holding the elder Andoan’s body. “Ponda! I’ve done it!” he said, undoing the straps. “How do you feel?”
But the Aqualish who had once been the senator lay quite still, apparently unconscious.
“It’s okay,” Evazan assured, patting the being. “You’ll be fine soon. Just rest there. I’ve got to see to my own new body!”
He left the laboratory, all but running back up to the main hall. His eyes gleamed with a wild look of nearly overwhelming anticipation. He threw open the door to the anteroom and charged in. His splendid specimen still lay motionless.
He knelt beside the man, gloating over his perfect body. “All I’ve wanted,” he said. “Youth, strength … and an unmarked face! I hope he’s unharmed.”
He put out a hand to lay on the man’s heart.
The hand vanished down through the massive chest as if the flesh had opened to swallow it!
He jerked his hand back, staring in astonishment. “A holoshroud!” he gasped.
His hand shot to grip the butt of his blaster. But the other man sat suddenly upright, swiftly striking out. A fist thrust forward to slam into Evazan’s face. The blow knocked him backward, sprawling at full length, stunned.
Before the doctor could recover, the blond man was on his feet. The image of his large form wavered, faded, and vanished completely, revealing the figure of a thin and hawkfaced man of dark complexion with a black mustache. One hand rested on the belt control for the holographic disguise, the other hand held the grenadelike shape of a powerful thermal detonator. Its thumb guard was already pushed back, and the man’s thumb rested on the detonator button.
“Toss the gun away, Evazan,” the man grated out, “or we’ll both go up together.”
Evazan drew out his blaster gingerly and heaved it far away. “Who are you?” he demanded.
“Gurion’s the name. I’ve been trying to get you for a long, long time. Get on your feet.”
“Pretty smart of you to use that disguise,” Evazan told him, climbing up. “You’d never have gotten in here otherwise.”
“That’s just what I figured. Now, get moving, you butchering monster. Take me to the roof. Some friends’ll be picking us up there.” Gurion gestured meaningfully with the bomb. “I said, move!”
Evazan readily complied. They went into the main entry hall and up a broad staircase.
As they turned the corner on the first landing to start up a second flight, Evazan glanced down to see a shimmering first bit of Rover ooze through a doorway into the hall below. He smiled to himself.
“Look here,” he told his captor, intent on keeping the man’s attention on him, “this is crazy. I’m going to be a very rich man. I don’t know how much bounty you’re after, but I can pay you a lot more.”
“I’m not after bounty,” Gurion shot back. “My family name is Silizzar. Sound familiar?”
Evazan blanched at the name. “I—I may have had a-a patient or two—” he stammered.
Gurion cut him off. “You treated my whole family. For a stomach disorder caused by a poison you gave them as medicine! You gutted them one by one like so many fish. Seven people! None of them survived. No, I don’t want money for you. This is purely for revenge!”
Several flights higher they reached a small door that opened onto a flat area of the roof. A brisk wind from the sea tugged sharply at their clothes as they came out. The distant lightning flickered eerily on the scene, and the deep growling of the far thunder made a constant, ominous background sound.
Gurion directed Evazan around the roof’s edge, close to the spot where his backpack comlink was secured.
“Just stand there like stone,” Gurion warned. He lifted the bomb. “Remember, if I push this button, we’ve both only got a few seconds to live. I’d rather take you back to stand trial for all the other beings you’ve murdered. But I won’t hesitate to finish it right here!”
“I’m a statue,” Evazan readily agreed.
Gurion fetched his backpack and crouched beside it to take out the comlink’s headset. He kept an eye on the doctor as he spoke into the mouthpiece.
“Mother, it’s Gurion. Do you still copy me?”
“Still here, my friend. What’s happened?”
“I’ve got our baby here, alive. I’m up on the roof. Can you come get us?”
“On our way!” the voice said jubilantly. “Mother out.”
Out of the corner of one eye, Evazan saw the door onto the roof push open. One bulb-tipped stalk poked cautiously out around it, sensing the air ahead.
“There’ll be a shuttle here for us in a few minutes,” said Gurion as he put his comlink headset away.
The doctor took a couple of casual steps around him to get Gurion’s back to the door.
“You’ve really got to listen to me,” Evazan said pleadingly. “I’ve got a secret. Right here. An invention. A very big thing. Too valuable for anyone to turn down.”
“Not for me,” the other said flatly, his hard gaze fixed unwaveringly on his foe.
The shining mass of Rover squeezed through the door. The creature began to slither forward slowly, noiselessly. Flickering lightning glinted from its gelatinous form.
“But with it I can make you live forever,” the doctor argued on. “Real immortality. Everybody wants that.”
“Do you actually think giving me more lifetimes can make up for all the lives you stole?” Gurion said in disbelief. “You’re even more demented than I thought.”
Rover was now only meters behind the crouching man. The creature began to hump up higher, its stalks shifting forward to strike out.
In the tiny mirrors of Evazan’s eyes Gurion saw the Meduza’s twin reflections as a brighter lightning flare gleamed from its surface. He sprang upright, wheeling around to see the thing nearly on him.
Rover struck just as he jumped back away from it. Only a single bulb’s tip managed to graze Gurion’s knee with a sharp crackle of power.
The man cried out at the stinging pain and staggered. The arm holding the bomb dropped down.
Evazan leaped instantly for the arm. His two hands clenched tight on Gurion’s wrist and he shook hard. The untriggered detonator came loose and bounced away across the flat roof, coming to rest before the door.
With his captor disarmed, Evazan tried to break away to let Rover finish things. But Gurion grappled tight with him, his hands going for the doctor’s throat.
“I’ll kill you with my bare hands!” he snarled.
Evazan stumbled backward as he fought wildly to break loose. Gurion hung on with a strength born of his rage.
The back of the doctor’s foot hit the roof’s edge. Desperately he swung about, dragging Gurion off balance and out into space. The man fell.
Gurion’s own weight tore his hands free from the doctor’s throat. But the last downward jerk overbalanced Evazan also.
For a moment the doctor teetered on the brink, flailing out with his arms for balance. When that failed, he twisted his body violently around, grabbing out for the roof’s edge as he went over it.
His agility saved him. He hung on fiercely, dangling at arm’s length against the sheer stone face. Below him, Gurion’s form plunged downward, striking the jagged cliffs at several spots.
Evazan glanced down to see the body make the final crash into a surging wave. He then turned his attention to ensuring his own safety, but he quickly found this was not so easy a task. His arms alone weren’t strong enough to pull him up. His scrabbling feet could find no holds in the smooth stone.
A noise came from above him. He looked up as the toes of boots appeared over the edge just inches from his face. His gaze moved on up the body to see that it was Ponda Baba who stood there, staring down at him.
“P-Ponda!” he gasped out, at first with great relief. But a new realization swiftly turned relief to surprise. “But … how! You here? The—the transfer … it didn’t work?”
“Oh, it worked, Doctor,” came a voice no longer like that of his old friend. “But it worked backward.”
“Backward?” he echoed.
“That’s right. And so you’ve condemned me to the loathsome form of one of my people’s lowest breed of scum.” The Aqualish lifted the hairy arm that marked him as a social pariah on his own planet. “You’ve destroyed my life as a senator, Doctor. So now I am going to destroy yours!”
The mechanical arm lifted. In its jointed fingers was clutched the thermal detonator. The metal thumb rested on the triggering button.
“No!” cried Evazan. “No, no, wait! You can’t!”
“Good-bye, Doc!” the new Ponda Baba said simply.
He pushed the button, dropped the bomb, turned, and strode away.
“No, no!” Evazan screamed out as the bomb’s timer ticked down.
With the strength of desperation he hauled himself up. His eyes cleared the edge. He glimpsed the ticking bomb, and just beyond it the Meduza’s form.
“Rover!” he shouted to it. “Hellllp meeee!”
Far above, a small shuttle skimmed down through the atmosphere, flashing high across the waves. The rocky isle with the towering castle lay straight ahead. Two men of Gurion’s lean build and swarthy complexion sat at the controls.
“There it is,” one said. He looked to his companion. “Get ready to hover above the roof, while I get out the boarding—”
A great flash of light from ahead interrupted him. An explosion enveloped the entire castle top.
Both men stared with astonishment as the upper half of the structure disintegrated in the initial blast. A cloud of fine debris billowed up while larger pieces showered out and down. Then the lower half of the shattered castle collapsed inward, becoming in seconds a vast rubble pile.
“Poor Gurion,” the first man said, looking down at the broken remains as they soared overhead.
“That blast probably attracted Andoan security,” said the other. “We’d better get well away from here.”
He turned the ship, heading upward again.
“At least Gurion got his revenge on that lunatic Evazan,” the first man said as they left the ruins behind …
Far below, halfway down one rugged side of the castle’s high cliffs, a large bile-green mound of goo lay motionless on a ledge. From its splattered edges a thick yellow oil ran, dripping in greasy, fat globules over the edge.
Then the gellike mass heaved and quivered, bulging upward. Out of the largest lump of its center an arm suddenly shot forth, followed by another, and then by the head of Dr. Evazan. He took a great shuddering breath as he broke the surface, like a swimmer who’d been long under the sea.
With some difficulty he extricated himself from the blob that had once been his pet. Though the loyal creature had saved him by cushioning his fall, their hard impact together had squashed the Meduza’s life from it.
“Thanks, Rover,” he said, plucking a last clinging streamer of the slime off his shirt. He bent and patted the ruptured mass. “Sorry, boy.”
He looked upward to the blasted castle.
“Backward,” he said regretfully. “Damn!” Then he shrugged. “Oh, well. Maybe I’ll get it right next time.”
And with that he began the long climb downward to the sea.