Martyr

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  Transcriber's Note:

  This etext was produced from Fantastic Universe January 1957. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.

  _Rejuvenation for the millions--or rejuvenation for the five hundred lucky ones, the select ones, that can be treated each year? Tough, independent Senator Dan Fowler fights a one-man battle against the clique that seeks perpetual power and perpetual youth, in this hard-hitting novel by Alan E. Nourse. Why did it have to be his personal fight? The others fumble it--they'd foul it up, Fowler protested? But why was he in the fight and what was to happen to Senator Fowler's fight against this fantastic conspiracy? Who would win?_

  martyr

  _by ... ALAN E. NOURSE_

  "I can break him, split his Criterion Committee wide open _now_ while there's still a chance, and open rejuvenation up to everybody...."

  * * * * *

  Four and one half hours after Martian sunset, the last light in theHeadquarters Building finally blinked out.

  Carl Golden stamped his feet nervously against the cold, cupping hiscigarette in his hand to suck up the tiny spark of warmth. The nightair bit his nostrils and made the smoke tasteless in the darkness.Atmosphere screens kept the oxygen in, all right--but they never keptthe biting cold out. As the light disappeared he dropped thecigarette, stamping it sharply into darkness. Boredom vanished, andwarm blood prickled through his shivering legs.

  He slid back tight against the coarse black building front, peeringacross the road in the gloom.

  It was the girl. He had thought so, but hadn't been sure. She swungthe heavy stone door shut after her, glanced both left and right, andstarted down the frosty road toward the lights of the colony.

  Carl Golden waited until she was gone. He glanced at hiswrist-chrono, and waited ten minutes more. He didn't realize that hewas trembling until he ducked swiftly across the road. Through thewindow of the low, one-story building he could see the lobbycall-board, with the little colored studs all dark. He smiled inunpleasant satisfaction--no one was left in the building. It wasroutine, just like everything else in this god-forsaken hole. Utter,abysmal, trancelike routine. The girl was a little later than usual,probably because of the ship coming in tomorrow. Reports to get ready,supply requisitions, personnel recommendations--

  --and the final reports on Armstrong's death. Mustn't forget that. The_real_ story, the absolute, factual truth, without any nonsense. Thereports that would go, ultimately, to Rinehart and only Rinehart, asall other important reports from the Mars Colony had been doing for somany years.

  Carl skirted the long, low building, falling into the black shadows ofthe side wall. Halfway around he came to the supply chute, coveredwith a heavy moulded-stone cover.

  Now?

  It had taken four months here to know that he would have to do it thisway. Four months of ridiculous masquerade--made idiotic by theincredible fact that everyone took him for exactly what he pretendedto be, and never challenged him--not even Terry Fisher, who drunk orsober always challenged everything and everybody! But the four monthshad told on his nerves, in his reactions, in the hollows under hisquick brown eyes. There was always the spectre of a slip-up, anaroused suspicion. And until he had the reports before his eyes, hecouldn't fall back on Dan Fowler's name to save him. He had shookDan's hand the night he had left, and Dan had said, "Remember, son--Idon't know you. Hate to do it this way, but we can't risk it now--"And they couldn't, of course. Not until they knew, for certain, whohad murdered Kenneth Armstrong.

  They already knew why.

  * * * * *

  The utter stillness of the place reassured him; he hoisted up thechute cover, threw it high, and shinned his long body into the chute.It was a steep slide; he held on for an instant, then let go.Blackness gulped him down as the cover snapped closed behind him.

  He struck hard and rolled. The chute opened into the commissary in thethird deep-level of the building, and the place was black as theinside of a pocket. He tested unbroken legs with a sigh of relief, andlimped across to where the door should be.

  In the corridor there was some light--dim phosphorescence from theMartian night-rock lining the walls and tiling the floor. He walkedswiftly, cursing the clack-clack his heels made on the ringing stone.When he reached the end of the corridor he tried the heavy door.

  It gave, complaining. Good, good! It had been a quick, imperfect jobof jimmying the lock, so obviously poor that it had worried him alot--but why should they test it? There was still another door.

  He stepped into the blackness again, started across the room as thedoor swung shut behind him.

  A shoe scraped, the faintest rustle of sound. Carl froze. His owntrouser leg? A trick of acoustics? He didn't move a muscle.

  Then: "Carl?"

  His pocket light flickered around the room, a small secretary'sante-room. It stopped on a pair of legs, a body, slouched down in thesoft plastifoam chair--a face, ruddy and bland, with a shock of sandyhair, with quixotic eyebrows. "Terry! For Christ sake, what--"

  The man leaned forward, grinning up at him. "You're late, Carl." Hisvoice was a muddy drawl. "Should have made it sooner than this,sheems--seems to me."

  Carl's light moved past the man in the chair to the floor. The bottlewas standing there, still half full. "My god, you're _drunk_!"

  "Course I'm drunk. Whadj-ya think, I'd sober up after you left metonight? No thanks, I'd rather be drunk." Terry Fisher hiccuppedloudly. "I'd always rather be drunk, around this place."

  "All right, you've got to get out of here--" Carl's voice rose withbitter anger. Of all times, of _all_ times--he wanted to scream. "Howdid you get in here? You've _got_ to get out--"

  "So do you. They're on to you, Carl. I don't think you know that, butthey are." He leaned forward precariously. "I had a talk with Barnessthis morning, one of his nice 'spontaneous' chats, and he pumped thehell out of me and thought I was too drunk to know it. They'reexpecting you to come here tonight--"

  Carl heaved at the drunken man's arm, frantically in the darkness."Get _out_ of here, Terry, or so help me--"

  Terry clutched at him. "Didn't you hear me? They _know_ about you.Personell supervisor! They think you're spying for the Easternboys--they're starting a Mars colony too, you know. Barness is sureyou're selling them info--" The man hiccupped again. "Barness is anass, just like all the other Retreads running this place, but I'm notan ass, and you didn't fool me for two days--"

  Carl gritted his teeth. How could Terry Fisher know? "For the lasttime--"

  Fisher lurched to his feet. "They'll get you, Carl. They can try youand shoot you right on the spot, and Barness will do it. I had to tellyou, you've walked right into it, but you might still get away if--"

  It was cruel. The drunken man's head jerked up at the blow, and hegave a little grunt, then slid back down on the chair. Carl steppedover his legs, worked swiftly at the door beyond. If they caught himnow, Terry Fisher was right. But in five more minutes--

  The lock squeaked, and the door fell open. Inside he tore through thefile cases, wrenched at the locked drawers in frantic haste, rippingthe weak aluminum sheeting like thick tinfoil. Then he found thefolder marked KENNETH ARMSTRONG on the tab.

  Somewhere above him an alarm went off, screaming a mournful notethrough the building. He threw on the light switch, flooding the roomwith whiteness, and started through the papers, one by one, in thefolder. No time to read. Flash retinal photos were hard to superimposeand keep straight, b
ut that was one reason why Carl Golden was on Marsinstead of sitting in an office back on Earth--

  He flipped the last page, and threw the folder onto the floor. As hewent through the door, he flipped out the light, raced with clatteringfootsteps down the corridor.

  Lights caught him from both sides, slicing the blackness like hotknives. "_All right, Golden. Stop right there._"

  Dark figures came out of the lights, ripped his clothing off without aword. Somebody wrenched open his mouth, shined a light in, rammedcoarse cold fingers down into his throat. Then: "All right, youbastard, up stairs. Barness wants to see you."

  They packed him naked into the street, hurried him into athree-wheeled ground car. Five minutes later he was wading throughfrosty dust into another building, and Barness was glaring at