Chapter 6

I felt myself ready to retch. The thought of that thing travelling right behind me in a closed car all the way from Iowa was almost more than my stomach could stand. I'm not squeamish-I hid once for four days in the sewers of Moscow-but you don't know what the sight of one can do to you unless you yourself have seen one while knowing what it was.

I swallowed hard and said, "Let's see what we can do to work it off. Maybe we can still save Jarvis." I did not really think so; I had a deep-down hunch that anyone who had been ridden by one of those things was spoiled, permanently. I guess I had a superstitious notion that they "ate souls" whatever that means.

The Old Man waved us back. "Forget about Jarvis!"

"But-"

"Stow it! If he can be saved, a bit longer won't matter. In any case-" He shut up and so did I. I knew what he meant; the principle which declared that the individual was all important now called for canceling Jarvis out as a factor, i.e., we were expendable; the people of the United States were not.

Pardon the speech. I liked Jarvis.

The Old Man, gun drawn and wary, continued to watch the unconscious agent and the thing on his back. He said to Mary, "Get the President on the screen. Special code zero zero zero seven."

Mary went to his desk and did so. I heard her talking into the muffler, but my own attention was on the parasite. It made no move to leave its host, but pulsed slowly while iridescent ripples spread across it.

Presently Mary reported, "I can't get him, sir. One of his assistants is on the screen."

"Which one?"

"Mr. McDonough."

The Old Man winced and so did I. McDonough was an intelligent, likeable man who hadn't changed his mind on anything since he was housebroken. The President used him as a buffer.

The Old Man bellowed, not bothering with the muffler.

No, the President was not available. No, he could not be reached with a message. No, Mr. McDonough was not exceeding his authority; the President had been explicit and the Old Man was not on the list of exceptions-if there was such a list, which Mr. McDonough did not concede. Yes, he would be happy to make an appointment; he would squeeze the Old Man in somehow and that was a promise. How would next Friday do? Today? Quite out of the question. Tomorrow? Equally impossible.

The Old Man switched off and I thought he was going to have a stroke. But after a moment he took two deep breaths, his features relaxed, and he slumped back to us, saying, "Dave, slip down the hall and ask Doc Graves to step in. The rest of you keep your distance and your eyes peeled."

The head of the biological lab came in shortly, wiping his hands as he came. "Doc," said the Old Man, "there is one that isn't dead."

Graves looked at Jarvis, then more closely at Jarvis's back. "Interesting," he said. "Unique, possibly." He dropped to one knee.

"Stand back!"

Graves looked up. "But I must have an opportunity-" he said reasonably.

"You and my half-wit aunt! Listen-I want you to study it, yes, but that purpose has low priority. First, you've got to keep it alive. Second, you've got to keep it from escaping. Third, you've got to protect yourself."

Graves smiled. "I'm not afraid of it. I-"

"Be afraid of it! That's an order."

"I was about to say that I think I must rig up an incubator to care for it after we remove it from the host. The dead specimen you gave me did not afford much opportunity for studying its chemistry, but it is evident that these things need oxygen. You smothered the other one. Don't misunderstand me, not free oxygen, but oxygen from its host. Perhaps a large dog would suffice."

"No," snapped the Old Man. "Leave it right where it is."

"Eh?" Graves looked surprised. "Is this man a volunteer?"

The Old Man did not answer. Graves went on, "Human laboratory subjects must be volunteers. Professional ethics, you know."

These scientific laddies never do get broken to harness; I think they keep their bags packed. The Old Man calmed himself and said quietly, "Doctor Graves, every agent in this Section is a volunteer for whatever I find necessary. That is what they sign up for. Please carry out my orders. Get a stretcher in here and take Jarvis out. Use care."

The Old Man dismissed us after they had carted Jarvis away, and Davidson and Mary and I went to the lounge for a drink or four. We needed them. Davidson had the shakes. When the first drink failed to fix him I said, "Look, Dave, I feel as bad about those girls as you do-but it could not be helped. Get that through your head; it could not be helped."

"How bad was it?" asked Mary.

"Pretty bad. I don't know how many we killed, maybe six, maybe a dozen. There was no time to be careful. We weren't shooting people, not intentionally; we were shooting parasites." I turned to Davidson. "Don't you see that?"

He seemed to take a brace. "That's just it. They weren't human." He went on, "I think I could shoot my own brother, if the job required it. But these things aren't human. You shoot and they keep coming toward you. They don't-" He broke off.

All I felt was pity. After a bit he got up to go to the dispensary to get a shot for what ailed him. Mary and I talked a while longer, trying to figure out answers and getting nowhere. Then she announced that she was sleepy and headed for the women's dormitory. The Old Man had ordered all hands to sleep in that night, so, after a nightcap, I went to the boys' wing and crawled in a sack.

I did not get to sleep at once. I could hear the rumble of the city above us and I kept imagining it in the state Des Moines was already in.

The air-raid alarm woke me. I stumbled into my clothes as the blowers sighed off, then the intercom bawled in the Old Man's voice, "Anti-gas and anti-radiation procedures! Seal everything-all hands gather in the conference hall. Move!"

Being a field agent I was a supernumerary with no local duties. I shuffled down the tunnel from the living quarters to the Offices. The Old Man was in the big hall, looking grim. I wanted to ask him what was up, but there was a mixed dozen of clerks, agents, stenos, and such there before me and I decided not to. After a bit the Old Man sent me out to get the door tally from the guard on watch. The Old Man called the roll himself and presently it was clear that every living person listed on the door tally was now inside the hall, from old Miss Haines, the Old Man's private secretary, down to the steward of the staff lounge-except the door guard on watch and Jarvis. The tally had to be right; we keep track of who goes in and out a good bit more carefully than a bank keeps track of money.

I was sent out again for the door guard. It took a call back to the Old Man to persuade him it was all right for him to leave his post; he then threw the bolt switch and followed me. When we got back Jarvis was there, being attended by Graves and one of his lab men. He was on his feet and wrapped in a hospital robe, conscious apparently, but he seemed dopey.

When I saw him I began to have some notion of what it was all about. The Old Man did not leave us in doubt. He was facing the assembled staff and keeping his distance; now he drew his gun. "One of the invading parasites is loose among us," he said. "To some of you that means something-too much. To the rest of you I will have to explain, as the safety of all of us-and of our whole race-depends this moment on complete cooperation and utter obedience." He went on to explain briefly but with ugly exactness what a parasite was, what the situation was. "In other words," he concluded, "the parasite is almost certainly here in this room. One of us looks human but is actually an automaton, moving at the will of our deadliest and most dangerous enemy."

There was a murmur from the staff. People stole glances at each other. Some tried to draw away. A moment before we had been a team, picked for temperament compatibility; we were now a mob, each suspicious of the other. I felt it myself and found myself edging away from the man closest to me-Ronald the lounge steward, it was; I had known him for years.

Graves cleared his throat. "Chief," he started in, "I want you to understand that I took every reasonable-"

"Stow it. I don't want excuses. Bring Jarvis out in front. Take his robe off."

Graves shut up and he and his assistant complied. Jarvis did not seem to mind; he seemed only partly aware of his surroundings. There was a nasty blue welt across his left cheekbone and temple, but that was not the cause; I did not hit him that hard. Graves must have drugged him.

"Turn him around," the Old Man ordered. Jarvis let himself be turned; there was the mark of the slug, a red rash on the shoulders and neck. "You can all see," the Old Man went on, "where the thing rode him." There had been some whispers and one embarrassed giggle when Jarvis had been stripped; now there was a dead hush.

"Now," said the Old Man, "we are going to get that slug! Furthermore, we are going to capture it alive. That warning is for you eager boys with itchy trigger fingers. You have all seen where a parasite rides on a man. I'm warning you; if the parasite gets burned, I'll burn the man who did it. If you have to shoot the host to catch it, shoot low. Come here!" He pointed his gun at me.

I started toward him; he halted me halfway between the crowd and himself. "Graves! Take Jarvis out of the way. Sit him down behind me. No, leave his robe off," Jarvis was led across the room, still docile, and Graves and his helper rejoined the group. The Old Man turned his attention back to me. "Take out your gun. Drop it on the floor."

The Old Man's gun was pointed at my belly button; I was very careful how I drew mine. I slid it some six feet away from me. "Take off your clothes-all of them."

I am no shrinking violet, but that is an awkward order to carry out. The Old Man's gun overcame my inhibitions.

It did not help any to have some of the younger girls giggling at me as I got down to the buff. One of them said, not too sotto voce, "Not bad!" and another replied, "Knobby, I'd say."

I blushed like a bride.

After he looked me over the Old Man told me to pick up my gun and stand beside him. "Back me up," he ordered, "and keep an eye on the door. You! Dotty Something-or-other-you're next."

Dotty was a girl from the clerical pool. She had no gun, of course, and she had evidently been in bed when the alarm sounded; she was dressed in a floor length negligee. She stepped forward, stopped, but did nothing more.

The Old Man waved his gun at her. "Come on-get 'em off! Don't take all night."

"You really mean it?" she said incredulously. "Move!"

She started-almost jumped. "Well!" she said, "no need to take a person's head off." She bit her lower lip and then slowly unfastened the clasp at her waist. "I ought to get a bonus for this," she said defiantly, then threw the robe from her all in one motion.

Whereupon she ruined her buildup by posing for an instant-not long, but you couldn't miss it. I concede that she had something to display, although I was in no mood to appreciate it.

"Over against the wall," the Old Man said savagely. "Renfrew!"

I don't know whether the Old Man alternated men and women on purpose or not, but it was a good idea, as it kept resistance to a minimum. Oh, shucks, I do know-the Old Man never did anything by accident. After my ordeal the men were businesslike though some were obviously embarrassed. As to the women, some giggled and some blushed, but none of them objected too much. I would have found it interesting if the circumstances had been different. As it was, we were all bound to learn things about each other that we had not known. For instance there was a girl whom we used to call "Chesty"-never mind. In twenty minutes or so there were more square yards of gooseflesh exposed than I had ever seen before and the pile of guns on the floor looked like an arsenal.

When Mary's turn came, she set a good example by taking off her clothes quickly and in a completely unprovocative manner-the Old Man should have called her first, instead of that Dotty baggage. Bare, Mary made nothing of it, and wore her skin with quiet dignity. But what I saw did nothing to cool down my feelings about her.

Mary had added considerably to the pile of hardware. I decided she just plain liked guns. Me, I've never found use for more than one.

Finally we were all mother naked and quite evidently free of parasites, except the Old Man himself and his secretary, Miss Haines. I think he was a bit in awe of Miss Haines; she was older than he and inclined to boss him. It dawned on me whom it had to be-if the Old Man were right. He could have been wrong; for all we knew the parasite might be on a ceiling girder, waiting to drop on someone's neck.

The Old Man looked distressed and poked about in the pile of clothing with his cane. He knew that there was nothing in it-or perhaps be was really making sure. Finally he looked up at his secretary. "Miss Haines-if you please. You are next."

I thought to myself. Brother, this time you are going to have to use force.

She did not move. She stood there, facing him down, a statue of offended virginity. I could see that he was about to take action, so I moved closer to him and said, out of the corner of my mouth, "Boss-how about yourself? Take 'em off."

He jerked his head around and looked startled. "I mean it," I said. "It's you or she. It might be either. Get out of those duds."

The Old Man can relax to the inevitable. He said, "Have her stripped. And I'm next." He began fumbling at his zippers, looking grim.

I told Mary to take a couple of the women and peel Miss Haines. When I turned back the Old Man had his trousers at half mast-and Miss Haines chose to make a break for it.

The Old Man was between me and her and I couldn't get in a clean shot-and every other agent in the place was disarmed! Again, I don't think it was accident; the Old Man did not trust them not to shoot when the parasite was discovered. He wanted that slug, alive.

She was out the door and running down the passage by the time I could get organized. I could have winged her in the passageway but I was inhibited by two things-first, I could not shift gears emotionally that fast. I mean to say she was to me still old Lady Haines, the spinster secretary to the boss, the one who bawled me out for poor grammar in my reports. In the second place, if she was carrying a parasite I did not want to risk burning it, not after what we had been told. I am not the world's best shot, anyhow.

She ducked into a room; I came up to it and again I hesitated-sheer habit; it was the ladies' room.

But only a moment. I slammed the door open and looked around, gun ready.

Something hit me back of my right ear. It seemed to me that I took a long leisurely time in getting to the floor.

I can give no clear account of the next few moments. In the first place I was out cold, for a time at least. I remember a struggle and some shouts: "Look out!" "Damn her-she's bitten me!" "Watch your hands! Watch your hands!" Then somebody said more quietly, "Bind her hands and feet, now-careful." Somebody said, "How about him?" and someone else answered, "Later. He's not really hurt."

I was still practically out as they left, but I began to feel a flood of life stirring back into me. I sat up, feeling extreme urgency about something. I got up, staggering a little, and went to the door. I hesitated there, looked out cautiously; nobody was in sight. I stepped out and trotted down the corridor, away from the direction of the conference hall.

I slowed down momentarily at the outer door, then realized with a shock that I was naked and tore on down the hallway toward the men's wing. There I grabbed the first clothes I could find and pulled them on. I found a pair of shoes much too small for me, but it did not seem to matter.

I ran back toward the exit, fumbled, and found the switch; the door opened.

I thought I had made a clean escape, but somebody shouted, "Sam!" just as I was going out. I did not wait, but plunged on out. At once I had my choice of six doors and then three more beyond the one I picked. The warren we called the "Offices", being arranged to permit any number of people to come and go without being noticed, was served by a spaghetti-like mess of tunnels. I came up finally inside a subway fruit and bookstall, nodded to the proprietor-who seemed unsurprised-and swung the counter gate up and mingled with the crowd. It was not a route I had used before.

I caught the up-river jet express and got off at the first station. I crossed over to the down-river side, waited around the change window until a man came up who displayed quite a bit of money as he bought his counter. I got on the same train he did and got off when he did. At the first dark spot I rabbit-punched him. Now I had money and was ready to operate. I did not know quite why I had to have money, but I knew that I needed it for what I was about to do.