Empire of Two Worlds Read online

  He called over Tone. “You said we could drain nutrient fluid off. Are you still sure?”

  “Yes, if we get the crew to help us.”

  “They’ll help us,” Bec said, with one glance at the frightened technicians. They wore long white gowns and white gloves. I’d never seen a costume like that before.

  Underneath the gallery there was a valve where the organics from the tank could be drained off. Apparently they used it regularly in order to clean out wastes and replenish the nutrient fluid from recycled material in an adjoining chamber.

  The technicians were reluctant at first; they took quite a knocking about before we persuaded them to co-operate in opening the valve. The stuff that came gushing out was thick and slimy and the smell was so strong it made us gag. We started to fill up the vats. In spite of the smell we were all excited, like kids, because we were doing something that had never been done before.

  “O.K.,” Bec said to Tone while the work was going on. “Now take me to this old man.”

  Tone led the way to the exit. “You come too, Klein,” Bec told me, “I’d like you to see this.”

  We went part way back up the ramp in the darkness. Tone found a smaller passage that went off at right angles and then curved round in a crazy spiral. Shortly light shone round the edges of a thick door. Tone thumped on it with his fist.

  “Open up, Harmen,” he cried in his reedy voice. “It’s me, Tone.”

  After a brief shuffling noise from the other side, the door swung open. An old man stood there. His hair was unkempt and down to his shoulders. He was tall, thin, but still energetic and hardly stooped at all. His face made an impression on you the instant you saw it: the nose was bony and hooked, the corners of the mouth turned down, and the eyes were intense and penetrating. But the corners of those eyes were wrinkled with humour-lines, and somehow the total effect was kindly despite its bizarreness.

  “I’ve brought some friends; they wanted to meet you,” Tone told him.

  Harmen’s eyes followed us with displeasure as we walked into the room. “I told you never to bring anyone here.”

  “You should never trust a taker,” Bec told him with a smile.

  Even before the door opened I had heard a faint buzzing noise. Now it was louder, but intermittent. The air was heavy with the smell of electricity and unidentified substances. The room was large. The light was erratic, and came mainly from various instruments that gave off illumination in irregular pulses and flamed colour against the walls and ceiling.

  These instruments were set up on a number of tables. The whole effect was weird, unbelievable. Something started to creep up my spine.

  “Harmen used to be a tank technician,” Bec murmured to me. “All the time, though, he was interested in something else, as you can see. When he retired he set up this little place here. It’s perfect for him, as you can see. Nice and private. Only Tone knew about it — Harmen was sorry for him and helped him get pop.”

  “He’s an alchemist,” I whispered. “What the hell are we doing here?”

  I’d heard of alchemists — alks — before, but naturally never seen one. They were something you threatened your children with. They were supposed to have evil magic powers and to indulge in nasty habits like sucking the blood from live babies. I didn’t know they really existed any more, but of course it would have to be in secret. There were city ordinances against “unauthorised or secret experimentation”, and popular fear of alks was strong.

  “Alchemy is the only field of scientific endeavour left in the world,” Bec said quietly, trying to calm me. “Don’t believe what you hear about alks. Harmen doesn’t drink blood, and he can’t take away your will and make you his puppet by remote control. At least, I don’t think he can.” He gazed around him. “Just look at all this stuff! I bet this guy knows more electronics than anybody in the city.”

  Some of the apparatus on the tables seemed to be modelled on discharge tubes of various shapes and sizes, some globular, some retort-shaped with several electrodes discharging into the same chamber. What was going on in those discharge tubes was weird, frightening, but kind of beautiful. Colours — all the colours you can think of. The discharge tubes — flasks, or whatever — seemed to have various substances in them which the electrical charges were acting on. In one, the stuff was splashing against the sides of the retort in colour changes of a definite sequence: black, red, white, then yellow with brilliant islands of green, then deep purple. It was hypnotic. I tore my eyes away, suddenly remembering the stories about how an alk can steal your will and put it in a little mechanical doll.

  “What do you want here?” the alk demanded in gravelly tones.

  “We’ve come to see what you can do, old man. What you know.” I sensed that Bec was unexpectedly discomfited in these new surroundings. He suddenly felt himself to be a clumsy mobster.

  “You want instruction in the Hermetic Art?” Harmen seemed puzzled and wary.

  “It’s on the level,” Tone said brightly. “They’re not here to bust you.”

  “That’s right,” Bec answered. “Come on, tell us about it.”

  While they were talking I noticed a screen in one corner of the room. The loud buzzing noise was coming from behind it. So I stepped over and peeped behind it.

  There was a big, round globe. Every time the irregular buzzing noises sounded a massive jolt of power must have been flashed into it, because it boiled and glared with a brightness I’d never experienced before. Momentarily I was blinded. I staggered back, blinking. Harmen was expounding to Bec in high-flown language.

  “Alchemy, or the Hermetic Art,” he said, “is the eternal science, older than any others and continuing after they die. With every exoteric advance in knowledge the alchemical operations can be refined and perfected further, the missing techniques can be devised anew and so the Great Work carried further forward on the path to completion.”

  “And what would completion be?”

  Harmen frowned slightly. “You want answers all at once? My own teacher did not divulge that until I had mastered four separate disciplines of experimentation.”

  “So what? Tell me now.”

  “You think it will help you? The aim of the Work is the Tincture, the Prima Materia, Hyle, the Sublime Substance that is neither mass nor energy and by the possession of which one can conquer space and time.”

  Bec met this proclamation with a blank look. A faint derisory smile appeared on Harmen’s face.

  The alk continued to drone on, but it was clear that Bec soon lost the drift for he suddenly interrupted: “Is it right that Tone got all those books from you?”

  The other nodded. “I have amassed a fair library. Those history books I’m not interested in and didn’t mind parting with. The science and technology books I keep. The techniques that are applied to alchemy now come from the science that was developed about eight hundred years ago.”

  He showed Bec a thick, ancient volume that he took out of a drawer. Stamped on the cover in old-style video-comp lettering was the title: Plasma Physics and the Secret Art.

  “My library, however, extends right back to the primitive state of the art, beginning with the Emerald Table and containing such valuable works of instruction as The Sophic Hydrolith. I can carry a process through six stages, from the Raven’s Head to the Blood of the Dragon. But not, alas, to the Tincture. However, those operations refer to the pre-atomic stage of alchemy. The later manuals, such as the Plasma Physics and the texts on the dissociation of matter by high-frequency magnetic fields, have greatly extended the range of alchemical operations.”

  I got the idea that Harmen was so pleased to talk about his work that it didn’t matter much to him that none of us grasped too well what he was talking about. Bec cut off the flow of words with a wave of his hand.

  “O.K., Harmen, you’ve got me convinced. How would you like to quit this place and come and do your work in my outfit. I’ll give you anything you need — anything. You must run short of equipment
the way you are now.”

  Harmen nodded. “I do. But what are your reasons?”

  “I’m interested in original research. The world’s gone too long without anything new. I aim to change that.”

  The alk pursed his lips. “The final preparation of the tincture requires the use of an atomic furnace. I am without one. Can you provide it?”

  Bec thought for a moment. “We should be able to handle that.” The hardest part of building the sloop had been acquiring its nuclear power unit. But we had done it, so I guessed we could do it twice.

  “Then I’ll think about it. Come and see me again in a few days.”

  “Sorry, old man, this is the time for snap decisions.” He turned to me. “Get back to the tank, Klein, and send down some of the boys to help Harmen crate up his equipment and books. I don’t think we’ll be able to come back later.”

  Harmen let out a roar of indignation, but it was too late for him to do anything about it. Bec had taken to him, for some reason. He was being hi-jacked, like the tank technicians.

  I went back to where they were working under the control gallery. The stench was awful. They had filled up the vats and then had found some containers on the premises and filled those. Bissey’s tank was only a small one that fed no more than a few thousand people, but by the time they’d finished they had still only drained off slightly more than a third of its hoard of organics. We’d have to be content with that. As it was the technicians were protesting shrilly about the risk of contaminating the nutrient and ruining it.

  I sent some boys down to Bec. Half an hour later they came back carrying loads of junk and books and stuff, then went back for more. There was masses of it and we had to leave a lot behind. Then Harmen came, looking wild-eyed and fierce. I told myself it was lucky I gave the sloop a lot of storage space. As it was we left a lot of stuff lying around the floor.

  It was quite a while before we pulled out. Outside, the curving crescent of the street was still empty. We jammed Harmen and the six techs in the sloop with us and set off back to the Basement.

  The chief tech was yelling that we were mad, criminally mad. “And why are you taking us?” he asked shrilly, though surely he could guess.

  Bec spoke over his shoulder from the driving seat. “Calm down. You’ll be all right. I’ll set you up, you can grow food just like you did before. I’ll treat you better than Blind Bissey ever did.”

  “You fool!” the technician fumed. “You don’t think the protein that’s grown in a tank is eatable, do you? It’s raw, you’d vomit if you tasted it. It has to be processed further to make the food you know.”

  “Then process it. We’ll get you everything you need.”

  Now we were already entering the Basement. The technicians peered through the windows at the dusty chaos. Most of them had probably never been down here before. A stranger to Klittmann might not notice the difference between that and the more select surroundings they were used to, but when you’ve been brought up in something all your life fine differences are important. Their faces were sour.

  We drove straight to the fortified garages and locked up the technicians under guard. Then Bec made for his office, taking me in tow.

  In his office Bec had a vision phone, one of the few in the whole of the Basement. He flicked out a number on the dial. There was a quiet whirr of machinery as the mechanical disc scanners spun, one set televising Bec’s face and the other tracing a blur of illumination on the paper receiving screen.

  The first face that appeared on the screen was that of a servant girl. Bluntly Bec told her of his wish to speak to her master. Something in his tone must have got through to her, because she turned away and did something at a table and her image vanished.

  “Bissey speaking,” a whispering voice said. But to Bec’s annoyance — he was proud of his vision phone — no picture appeared.

  “Show yourself, Bissey, I like to see who I’m talking to,” he demanded.

  “I can’t see you anyway. Why should you see me? What do you want?”

  “Better come through and show me your face,” Bec told him. “It’s about your tank.”

  There was a pause, then the screen’s fuzzy brightness cleared and it showed a low-quality picture of a fat man sitting in an armchair. His head was raised, his eyes clearly sightless. With one hand he fondled a dog that he used to guide him when he walked.

  “Here I am then. What’s this about the tank?”

  Brusquely, brutally, Bec told him what we had done. The fat man’s face went drawn and pale. At first he simply didn’t believe us. Bec invited him to check for himself. When he had done so he was shaking.

  “You klugs!” he whispered, his voice shaking. “There are laws in this city. The police department will come down there and mash you into little pieces.”

  “Sure, let them do that,” Bec said gaily. “Give them a call. But you can say goodbye to your protein nutrient. We’ll make sure that’s never usable again if the cops look like busting us.”

  True, Bissey still had two thirds of his stock; but the loss of even one third was plainly a traumatic threat to him. Nothing like this had happened for generations.

  “What do you want?” he hissed.

  “Listen,” Bec told him, “and listen good. We want fifty per cent. … ”

  He spoke on, his words punching like blows into the blind man’s flesh. By the time he had finished Bissey was beaten.

  Becmath was riding high. He had everything going for him, and he knew it. For him it was a high spot in his life that looked even better because he thought it was only a beginning.

  Bissey had capitulated. At first he had wanted the nutrient returned to his tank, but Bec had thought better of it and refused. So at great expense a little tank was set up in the Basement. It didn’t make eatable food, only raw protein that was shipped upstairs.

  The alchemist was installed pretty good, too. Bec gave him a work-room — he called it a “laboratory” — in the system of garages and apartments where the gang operated from. Anything he wanted, he and Bec used to go upstairs together and get it somehow. The atomic furnace we were still working on.

  Soon his “laboratory” was full of spluttering, flashing and buzzing and other noises and sights I wouldn’t really know how to describe. I didn’t like to go in there. Sometimes there were strange vibrations in the air that seemed to get right inside my mind and make me dizzy and give me peculiar feelings. But Bec used to talk to Harmen for hours at a time.

  Bec used to go upstairs and see Blind Bissey sometimes, too. He was planning to move in the upper world of big power blocs, and he liked to sound Bissey out about it. The fat man hated us, of course, but he used to keep himself well under control, fondling his dog, his blind eyes staring into space.

  We were on one of those visits when our plans collapsed around our ears.

  That day I had wondered why Bissey seemed pleased to see us for once. He even smiled. And I didn’t like the smug look on his face when he said goodbye.

  On the way back Bec wanted to stop off to buy something. He had a purchasing card now, one of those issued by the big manufacturing cartels, and he got a kick out of using it. So we stopped the car and went into a distributing outlet. Bec spent a long time choosing a metal belt with designs embossed on it.

  When we came out, police sloops were sweeping past, heading for the Basement. A lot of them. Bec frowned, and I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach.

  “Let’s see what’s going on,” he said gruffly.

  When the convoy had passed we made for home, taking a side route for safety’s sake.

  Noise is something everyone in Klittmann gets used to from birth. Because it’s just one massive enclosed space, sound travels easily and long. We were scarcely within the region of the Basement before we heard the sound of gunfire and explosions.

  It was the latter that frightened me. Explosives are almost never used in Klittmann except in tightly controlled conditions — certainly not in fight
ing. The danger of structural damage to the city is too great. That was why Bec’s use of a grenade at Klamer’s had taken me so much by surprise. Bec looked at me meaningfully. We went on a little further, then pulled up. We got out and went into a store owned by a trader named Klepp, usually a mine of information.

  “What’s going on?” Bec demanded aggressively. “Have you heard anything?”

  “Something big’s happening,” Klepp said warily. “The cops are here in force. Not only that but some kind of private armed militia. Not only that. …” he trailed off.

  “Come on, give!” Bec clenched his fist angrily, his eyes blazing.

  “A lot of the old small outfits in the West Section have come to life and formed a consortium against you. It’s a rebellion, Bec. They’re coming at you from all sides.”

  Bec growled a curse and strode from the shop.

  We stood outside. “Bissey knew about this,” he said furiously. “He was just playing us along. Let’s go and see what’s happening at the garage.”

  As we drew nearer the sounds of fighting grew louder. We approached cautiously. There was fighting elsewhere in the Basement, too — strangers from upstairs in unfamiliar uniforms were wandering about uncertainly and shooting into various buildings.

  “I’ll bet those are Bissey’s own workers,” Bec said. “Armed just for the occasion, told they’re fighting for their rations. This thing has been well planned.”

  We left the car about half a mile from the garage and went forward on foot to take a look. Police sloops were parked in the approach to the main frontage. The lid was down — the big slab of metal and concrete that we had grandiosely installed to keep out an army. Our own gun positions were silent and the sloops were firing Hacker shells at the lid to break it up.

  “They’ll be through there before long,” Bec mused. “Come on, we’ll get in the back way.”

  It didn’t take us long to work our way round and get into the complex by the hidden back entrance. Inside, it was organised desperation. They had put up makeshift barriers to hold off the cops when they broke through the lid. Half the mob had already sneaked off.