2
He did. They were the most terrible weapons ever created by men. They had ended war by making all battles mass suicide for both sides. They were beams of the same neuronic frequencies utilized in the disciplinary circuits which kept men enslaved.
But where the disciplinary circuits were used in place of police and prisons and merely tortured the individual citizen to whom they were tuned—wherever he might be upon a planet—the fighting-beams killed indiscriminately. They induced monstrous, murderous currents in any living tissue containing the amino-chains normally a part of human flesh.
They were death-rays. They killed men and women and children alike in instants of shrieking agony. But no planet could be attacked from space if it was defended by such beams. It was two thousand years since the last attempt at attack from space had been made.
That fleet had been detected far out and swept with fighting-beams and every living thing in the attacking ships died instantly. So planets were independent of each other. But when space-ships ceased to be used the fighting-beams were needless and ultimately were scrapped or put into museums.
"Somebody," the mayor said wrathfully, "has changed those beams! They're not tuned to animal tissue in general any more! They're tuned to male tissue. To blood containing male hormones, perhaps! And Sinab Two is building an empire with 'em! We found out only two weeks ago!
"There's a planet near Ades—Thom Four. Four years ago its matter-transmitter ceased to operate. The Galaxy's going to pot anyhow. Nothing new about that! But we just learned the real reason. The real reason was that four years ago fighting-beams killed men and left women unharmed.
"Every man on Thom Four died as the planet rotated. The beams came from space. Every man and every boy and every male baby died! There were only girls and women left." He added curtly, "There were half a billion people on Thom Four!"
Kim stiffened. Dona, beside him, drew closer.
"Every man killed!" said Kim. "What—"
The Mayor of Steadheim swore angrily.
"Half the population! On Ades we're nine-tenths men! Women don't run to revolt or crime. There'd not be much left on Ades if those beams swept us! But I'm talking about Thom Four. The men died. All of them. So many that the women couldn't bury them all.
"One instant, the planet was going about its business as usual. The next, every man was dead, his heart burst and blood running from his nostrils. Lying in the streets, toppled in the baths and eating-halls, crumpled beside the machines.
"Boys in the schools dropped at their desks. Babes in arms, with their mothers shrieking at the sight! Only women left. A world of women! Cities and continents filled with dead men and women going mad with grief!"
Kim felt Dona's hand fumbling for his. She held it fast.
"Go on!" said Kim.
"When they thought to go to the matter-transmitter and ask for help from other planets the matter-transmitter was smashed. They didn't go at first. They couldn't believe it. They called from city to city before they realized theirs was a manless world. Then, when they'd have told the men of another planet what had happened—they couldn't.
"For four years there was not one man or boy on the planet Thom Four. Only women. The old ones grew older. The girls grew up. Some couldn't remember ever seeing a man. No communication with other worlds. Then, one day, there was a new matter-transmitter in the place of the smashed one. Men came out of it. The women crowded about them.
"The men were very friendly. They were from Sinab Two. Their employer had sent them to colonize. There were a thousand women to every man—ten thousand! Some of the women realized what had been done. They'd have killed the newcomers. But some women fell in love with them, of course!
"In a matter of days every man had women ready to fight all other women who would harm him. Their own men were dead four years. What else could they do? More and more men colonists came. Presently things settled down. The men were happy enough. They'd no need to work with all the women about.
"They established polygamy, naturally! Presently it was understood that Thom Four was part of the empire of Greater Sinab. So it was. What else? In a generation there'll be a new population, all its citizens descended from loyal subjects of the emperor.
"And why shouldn't they be loyal? A million colonists inherited the possessions and the women of a planet! It was developed. Everything was built. Every man was rich and with a harem. A darned clever way to build an empire! Who'd want to revolt—and who could?"
He stopped. The two moons of Terranova floated tranquilly, higher in the sky. The soft sweet unfamiliar smells of a Terranovan night came to the small group on the terrace of Kim Rendell's house.
"That's what's ahead on Ades!" raged the Mayor of Steadheim. "And I've four sons! A woman of Thom Four smashed the lock on the new matter-transmitter, which set it to send only to Sinab, and traveled to Khiv Five to warn them. But they laughed at her and when she begged to be sent to a distant planet they grinned—and sent her to Ades!"
He paused.
"Not long after, a criminal from Khiv Five—he'd struck a minor noble for spitting on him—came to Ades. There'd been inquiry for that woman. Spies, doubtless, from Thom Four, trying to trace her. It was clear enough she'd told the truth."
"So," said Kim slowly, "you think Ades will be next."
"I know it!" said the Mayor of Steadheim. "We've checked the planets that have cut communication in our star-cluster. Twenty-one inhabited planets have ceased to communicate in the past few years—the twenty planets nearest to Sinab. We figured Khiv Five would be next. Then we'd be in line for it.
"Khiv Five cut communications four days ago! Every man on Khiv Five is dead! We've had exiles from a dozen nearby planets. All know Khiv Five is cut off. It's inhabited only by women, going mad with grief!
"In a few years, when they grieve no longer, but despair instead, new colonists from Sinab will come out of a new matter-transmitter to let the women fall in love with them—and to breed new subjects for the Empire of Sinab! So we've got to have space-ships, man! We've got to!"
Kim was silent. His face was hard and grim.
"Twenty planets those so-and-so's have taken over!" roared the mayor. "They've murdered not less than four billion men already, and the weasels have a hundred wives apiece and the riches of generations for reward! D'you think I'll let that happen to Ades, with my four sons there?Space, no! I want ships to fight with!"
The two small moons rose higher. Strange sweet smells floated in the air. Dona pressed close to Kim. On Terranova, across the gulf between island universes, Kim was surely safe, but any woman can feel fear for her man on any excuse.
"It's a hard problem," said Kim evenly. "We barely made Terranova with theStarshine, and there's just about enough fuel left to take off with. Of course, on transmitter-drive she could go anywhere, but I doubt that we've fuel enough to land her.
"Here on Terranova we need supplies from Ades to live. If fighting-beams play on Ades we'll starve. And, even if we had fuel theStarshineisn't armed and they'll have a fleet prepared to fight anything."
Dona murmured in his ear.
"We're beaten, then," said the Colony Organizer bitterly. "Ades will be wiped out, we'll starve and the Sinabians will go through the First Galaxy, killing off the men on planet after planet and then moving in to take over."
Dona murmured again in Kim's ear. The Mayor of Steadheim growled profanely, furiously. Dona laughed softly. The two visitors stared at her suspiciously.
"What do we do, Kim Rendell?"
"I suppose," said Kim wryly, "we'll have to fight. We've no fuel and no weapons—but that ought to surprise them."
"Eh?"
"They'll be prepared," Kim explained, "to defend themselves against any conceivable resistance by any conceivable weapon. And a warship a fairly intelligent planet could build should be able to wipe out ten thousandStarshines. So when we attack them without any weapons at all they won't quite know what to do."
The two visitors simply stared at him.
"You've got to get hafnium! You've got to get fuel! You can't face a battleship!"
"But," said Kim, "battleships have fuel on board and they'll have hafnium too. It'll be risky—but convenient...."