People Minus X

by Raymond Z. Gallun

That much Ed got out before the transmitter clicked to silence. He knew he hadn't said anything original and that he had pushed an argument intensely, like a high-pressure salesman without full belief. What he had said was the way things should be, perhaps, but were not. Yet, again, like a romantic kid, had he felt the glamorous impact of his own words?

He was aware that androids would hear and millions of the old race—intent on communications from an enemy station—as well. A mysterious, informal voice was always a thing to draw attention, and his remarks had been rather startling. That they would be repeated and discussed a thousand times from other stations was probable. For they were like a chink of hope in one of two granite walls of obstinate righteousness and strength.

But Ed decided that he'd build no bright pictures of what his speech would accomplish but would wait for hard facts. He wished desperately that he'd had a moment more to speak on the transmitter, to call out Barbara's name.

Now he drifted again in a morning sunshine. Luck had held out this far at least. But over woods and crude shelters and hidden equipment and grimy grim-faced hordes that looked as human as refugees could, there were interruptions that denied optimism. A patrolling rocket ship sailed high; an intensified neutron beam turned a finger of air white hot behind it—very close. And mountaintops, already truncated and smoking, still would flare up dazzlingly. Android muscles and backs strained and bent to build fortifications as nothing merely human could. The toilers were both men and women. Could android children cry? Yes, some did.

Another thing happened. Ed, floating unseen low in the air, felt the buzz of shouts and cries. A man who seemed to be near collapse was being helped forward by a youth whose sidearms dangled near the knees of his torn dungarees. At a little distance, where size seemed more as it used to be, Ed saw that the exhausted man was Les Payten. He was mud from head to foot; his face and arms were bloodied by brambles, his suit was a rag.

He was brought straight to Abel Freeman's shelter. There, supported by the armed youth, he spoke his piece: "I'm here again, Freeman, because a friend of mine asked me to bring you something for him. Does that make me a fool? I know it does. Because he's only my remembrance of a friend now. Damn you all!"

Les Payten fainted. A package wrapped in a plastic sheath fell from his hands, but Abel Freeman caught it. A couple of Abel's ornery sons looked on, exchanging puzzled scowls. Freeman warned them away with a clenched fist, knotty as an oaken club, and then shouted, "Nancy! Oh, Nancy-y-y!" But there was no time for Ed to observe Freeman's hellion daughter functioning as a nurse. He went inside Freeman's radio again, and spoke, "Freeman, this is Dukas. I came to you to give and receive help. That means that I've tried to guess right about you. I believe I have. When your neo-biologists examine what Payten has brought, they will be able to guess its value to me and mine. And I think that they will be able to combine its uses with those of their own equipment for something I'd like to see done. But there are other matters. Some of your power plants broke down, but so did others across the line. I did most of that. Prell must be doing more of it right now. What I said over your wireless was meant to gain a little time."

Ed paused. Freeman did not open the radio case again. Ed couldn't see him. He could only feel small thuds and clinkings—the android leader opening the package that Les Payten had brought. Ed wondered if he could ever imagine what was going on in Freeman's head, the thousand problems and feelings that must be seething there.

Freeman might be no good at book learning. And his roots were in a century when even a flying machine was a wild thought. But he had to be shrewd to match the legend behind him. And he had to take tough situations with a light shrug for the same reason.

Finally Ed felt the rumble of his chuckle. "You mean I'm one of your 'reasonable' variety," he said. "Meantime you smash my stuff, eh, little bug in the air! I ought to get damn unreasonable! You might even finish me off! I'm kind of curious about that! But I don't think you have to bother. I know that the old-time folks are moving lots more hell machines up. And they're awful mad, because we got quite a few of them in one place last night—sort of by miscalculation. What's this talk about us androids matching the stars? Well, young fella, go 'head and talk some more. Yep, on our wireless rig. What's left to lose? And I'm still curious."