But, I Don't Think, Page 2

Kraybo was a fool; if the second, then hewas a liar, and was no more capable of handling the fire control of the_Naipor_ than the captain was.

  The Guesser hated to have Kraybo punished, really, but that was the onlyway to make a youngster keep his mind on his business.

  _After all_, thought The Guesser, _that's the way I learned; Kraybo canlearn the same way. A little nerve-burning never hurt anyone._

  But that last thought was more to bolster himself than it was to justifyhis own actions toward Kraybo. The lieutenant was at the door of thecaptain's office, with The Guesser right behind him.

  * * * * *

  The door dilated to receive the three--the lieutenant, The Guesser, andthe sergeant-at-arms--and they marched across the room to the captain'sdesk.

  The captain didn't even bother to look up until High Lieutenant Blykesaluted and said: "The Guesser, sir."

  And the captain gave the lieutenant a quick nod and then looked coldlyat The Guesser. "The ship has been badly damaged. Since there are norepair docks here on Viornis, we will have to unload our cargo and thengo--_empty_--all the way to D'Graski's Planet for repairs. All duringthat time, we will be more vulnerable than ever to Misfit raids."

  His ice-chill voice stopped, and he simply looked at The Guesser withglacier-blue, unblinking eyes for ten long seconds.

  The Guesser said nothing. There was nothing he _could_ say. Nothing thatwould do him any good.

  The Guesser disliked Grand Captain Reed--and more, feared him. Reed hadbeen captain of the _Naipor_ for only three years, having replaced theold captain on his retirement. He was a strict disciplinarian, and had atendency to punish heavily for very minor infractions of the rules. Not,of course, that he didn't have every right to do so; he was, after all,the captain.

  But the old captain hadn't given The Guesser a nerve-burning in all theyears since he had accepted The Guesser as The Guesser. And CaptainReed--

  The captain's cold voice interrupted his thoughts.

  "Well? What was it? If it was a mechano-electronic misfunction of thecomputer, say so; we'll speak to the engineer."

  The Guesser knew that the captain was giving him what looked like anout--but The Guesser also knew it was a test, a trap.

  The Guesser bowed his head very low and saluted. "No, great sir; thefault was mine."

  Grand Captain Reed nodded his head in satisfaction. "Very well.Intensity Five, two minutes. Dismissed."

  The Guesser bowed his head and saluted, then he turned and walked outthe door. The sergeant-at-arms didn't need to follow him; he had beenlet off very lightly.

  He marched off toward the Disciplinary Room with his head at the properangle--ready to lift it if he met a lesser crewman, ready to lower it ifhe met an executive officer.

  He could already feel the terrible pain of the nerve-burner coursingthrough his body--a jolt every ten seconds for two minutes, like a whiplashing all over his body at once. His only satisfaction was theknowledge that he had sentenced Kraybo to ten minutes of the same thing.

  * * * * *

  The Guesser lay on his bed, face down, his grasping fingers clutchingspasmodically at the covering as his nerves twitched with rememberedpain. Thirteen jolts. Thirteen searing jolts of excruciating torture. Itwas over now, but his synapses were still crackling with the memories ofthose burning lashes of energy.

  He was thirty-five. He had to keep that in mind. He was thirty-five now,and his nerves should be under better control than they had been attwenty. He wondered if there were tears streaming from his eyes, andthen decided it didn't matter. At least he wasn't crying aloud.

  Of course, he had screamed in the nerve-burner; he had screamed thirteentimes. Any man who didn't scream when those blinding stabs of pain camewas either unconscious or dead--it was no disgrace to scream in theburner. But he wasn't screaming now.

  He lay there for ten minutes, his jaw clamped, while the twitchingsubsided and his nervous system regained its usual co-ordination.

  The burner did no actual physical damage; it wasn't good economics foran Executive to allow his men to be hurt in any physical manner. It tooka very little actual amount of energy applied to the nerve endings tomake them undergo the complex electrochemical reaction that made themsend those screaming messages to the brain and spine. There was lesstotal damage done to the nerves than a good all-night binge would do toa normal human being. But the effect on the mind was something elseagain.

  It was a very effective method of making a man learn almost any lessonyou wanted to teach him.

  After a while, The Guesser shuddered once more, took a deep breath, heldit for fifteen seconds, and then released it. A little later, he liftedhimself up and swung his legs over the edge of his bed. He sat on theedge of the bed for a few minutes, then got up and got dressed in hisbest uniform.

  After all, the captain hadn't said anything about restricting him to theship, and he had never been to Viornis before. Besides, a couple ofdrinks might make him feel better.

  There were better planets in the galaxy, he decided two hours later.Thousands of them.

  For one thing, it was a small, but dense world, with a surface gravityof one point two standard gees--not enough to be disabling, but enoughto make a man feel sluggish. For another, its main export was farmproducts: there were very few large towns on Viornis, and no center ofpopulation that could really be called a city. Even here, at thespaceport, the busiest and largest town on the planet, the populationwas less than a million. It was a "new" world, with a history thatdidn't stretch back more than two centuries. With the careful populationcontrol exercised by the ruling Execs, it would probably remain smalland provincial for another half millennium.

  The Guesser moseyed down one of the streets of Bellinberg probably namedafter the first Prime Executive of the planet--looking for a decentplace for a spaceman to have a drink. It was evening, and the sinking ofthe yellow primary below the western horizon had left behind it a clear,star-filled sky that filled the air with a soft, white radiance. Thestreets of the town itself were well-lit by bright glow-plates imbeddedin the walls of the buildings, but above the street level, the buildingsthemselves loomed darkly. Occasionally, an Exec's aircar would driftrapidly overhead with a soft rush of air, and, in the distance, he couldsee the shimmering towers of the Executive section rising high above theeight- or ten-storyed buildings that made up the majority of Bellinberg.

  The streets were fairly crowded with strollers--most of them Class Fouror Five citizens who stepped deferentially aside as soon as they saw hisuniform, and kept their eyes averted from him. Now and then, the powercar of a Class Three rolled swiftly by, and The Guesser felt a slighttwinge of envy. Technically, his own rank was the equivalent of ClassThree, but he had never owned a groundcar. What need had a spaceman of agroundcar? Still, it would be nice to drive one just once, he thought;it would be a new experience, certainly.

  Right now, though, he was looking for a Class Three bar; just a place tohave a small, quiet drink and a bite to eat. He had a perfect right togo into a lower class bar, of course, but he had never felt quitecomfortable associating with his inferiors in such a manner, andcertainly they would feel nervous in his presence because of the sidearmat his hip.

  No one below Class Three was allowed to carry a beamgun, and only Onesand Twos were allowed to wear the screening fields that protected themfrom the nerve-searing effects of the weapon. And they, being Execs,were in no danger from each other.

  Finally, after much walking, he decided that he was in the wrong part oftown. There were no Class Three bars anywhere along these streets.Perhaps, he thought, he should have gone to the Spacemen's Club at thespaceport itself. On the other hand, he hadn't particularly wanted tosee any of the other minor officers of his own class after thenear-fiasco which had damaged the _Naipor_. Being a Guesser set himapart, even from other Threes.

  He thought for a moment of asking a policeman, but he dismissed it.Cops, as always, were a breed apart. Be
sides, they weren't on thestreets to give directions, but to preserve order.

  At last, he went into a nearby Class Four bar and snapped his fingersfor the bartender, ignoring the sudden silence that had followed hisentrance.

  The barman set down a glass quickly and hurried over, bobbing his headobsequiously. "Yes, sir; yes, sir. What can I do for you, sir? It's anhonor to have you here, sir. How may I serve you?"

  The man himself was wearing the distinctive clothing of a Five, so hiscustomers outranked him, but the brassard on his arm showed that hismaster was a Two, which afforded him enough authority to keep reasonableorder in the place.

  "Where's the nearest Class Three bar?" The Guesser snapped.

  The barman looked faintly disappointed, but he didn't lose hisobsequiousness. "Oh, that's quite a way from here, sir--about theclosest would be Mallard's, over on Fourteenth Street and Upper Drive. Amile, at least."

  The Guesser scowled. He was in the wrong section of town, all right.

  "But I'd be honored to serve you, sir," the barman hurried on. "Privatebooth, best of everything, perfect privacy--"

  The Guesser shook his head quickly. "No. Just tell me how to get toMallard's."

  The barman looked at him for a moment, rubbing a fingertip across hischin, then he said: "You're not driving, I suppose, sir? No? Well, then,you can either take the tubeway or walk, sir...." He let the sentencehang, waiting for The Guesser's decision.

  The Guesser thought rapidly. Tubeways were for Fours and Fives. Threeshad groundcars; Ones and Twos had aircars; Sixes and below walked. Andspacemen walked.

  Trouble is, spacemen aren't used to walking, especially on a planetwhere they weigh twenty per cent more than they're used to. The Guesserdecided he'd take the tubeway; at the Class Three bar, he might be ableto talk someone into driving him to the spaceport later.

  But five minutes later, he was walking in the direction the bartenderhad told him to take for finding Mallard's on foot. To get to thetubeway was a four-block walk, and then there would be another long walkafter he got off. Hoofing it straight there would be only a matter offive blocks difference, and it would at least spare him theembarrassment of taking the tube.

  * * * * *

  It was a foolish thing to do, perhaps, but once The Guesser had set hismind on something, it took a lot more than a long walk to dissuade himfrom his purpose. He saw he was not the only spaceman out on the town;one of the Class Five taverns he passed was filled with boisteroussinging, and he could see a crowd of men standing around three crewmenwho were leading them in a distinctly off-color ballad. The Guessersmiled a little to himself. Let them have their fun while they wereon-planet; their lives weren't exactly bright aboard ship.

  Of course, they got as much as was good for them in the way ofentertainment, but a little binge gave them something to look forwardto, and a good nerve-burning would sober them up fast enough if theymade the mistake of coming back drunk.

  Nerve-burning didn't really bother a Five much, after all; they werebig, tough, work-hardened clods, whose minds and brains simply didn'thave the sensitivity to be hurt by that sort of treatment. Oh, theyscreamed as loud as anyone when they were in the burner, but it reallydidn't have much effect on them. They were just too thick-skulled tohave it make much difference to them one way or the other.

  On the other hand, an Exec would probably go all to pieces in a burner.If it didn't kill him outright, he'd at least be sick for days. Theywere too soft to take even a touch of it. No Class One, so far as TheGuesser knew, had ever been subjected to that sort of treatment, and aTwo only got it rarely. They just weren't used to it; they wouldn't havethe stamina to take it.

  His thoughts were interrupted suddenly by the familiar warning that rangin his mind like a bell. He realized suddenly, as he became blazinglyaware of his surroundings, that he had somehow wandered into adefinitely low-class neighborhood. Around him were the stark, plainhousing groups of Class Six families. The streets were more dimly lit,and there was almost no one on the street, since it was after curfewtime for Sixes. The nearest pedestrian was a block off and moving away.

  All that took him but a fraction of a second to notice, and he knew thatit was not his surroundings which had sparked the warning in his mind.There was something behind him--moving.

  What had told him? Almost nothing. The merest touch of a foot on thesoft pavement--the faintest rustle of clothing--the whisper of somethingmoving through the air.

  Almost nothing--but enough. To a man who had played blindfold baseball,it was plenty. He knew that someone not ten paces behind him had thrownsomething heavy, and he knew its exact trajectory to within a thousandthof a millimeter, and he knew exactly how to move his head to avoid themissile.

  He moved it, at the same time jerking his body to one side. It had onlybeen a guess--but what more did a Guesser need?

  From the first hint of warning to the beginning of the dodging motion,less than half a second had passed.

  He started to spin around as the heavy object went by him, but anotherwarning yelped in his mind. He twisted a little, but it was too late.

  Something burned horribly through his body, like a thousand millionacid-tipped, white-hot needles jabbing through skin and flesh andsinking into the bone. He couldn't even scream.

  He blacked out as if he'd been a computer suddenly deprived of power.