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29 chapters
UNWISE CHILD
UNWISE CHILD
When a super-robot named Snookums discovers how to build his own superbombs, it becomes obvious that Earth is by no means the safest place for him to be. And so Dr. Fitzhugh, his designer, and Leda Crannon, a child psychologist acting as Snookums’ nursemaid, agree to set up Operation Brainchild, a plan to transport the robot to a far distant planet. Mike the Angel—M. R. Gabriel, Power Design—has devised the power plant that is to propel the space ship Branchell to its secret destination, complet
47 minute read
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Unwise Child
Unwise Child
DOUBLEDAY & COMPANY, INC. GARDEN CITY, NEW YORK 1962 All of the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 60-13524 Copyright © 1962 by Randall Garrett All Rights Reserved Printed in the United States of America First Edition...
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BOOKS BY RANDALL GARRETT
BOOKS BY RANDALL GARRETT
Biography Pope John XXIII: Pastoral Prince Science Fiction Unwise Child Books by “Robert Randall” The Shrouded Planet The Dawning Light “Robert Randall” is a pseudonym used on books written in collaboration with Robert Silverberg. With sincere appreciation, this book is dedicated to TIM and NATALIE who waited ... and waited ... and waited ... and waited for it....
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1
1
The kids who tried to jump Mike the Angel were bright enough in a lot of ways, but they made a bad mistake when they tangled with Mike the Angel. They’d done their preliminary work well enough. They had cased the job thoroughly, and they had built the equipment to take care of it. Their mistake was not in their planning; it was in not taking Mike the Angel into account. There is a section of New York’s Manhattan Island, down on the lower West Side, that has been known, for over a century, as “Ra
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2
2
Mike the Angel kept his hand in his pocket, his thumb on a little plate that was set in the side of the small mechanism that was concealed therein. As he neared the door, the little plate began to vibrate, making a buzz which could only be felt, not heard. Mike sighed to himself. Vibroblades were all the rage this season. He pushed open the rear door rapidly and stepped inside. It was just what he’d expected. His eyes saw and his brain recorded the whole scene in the fraction of a second before
6 minute read
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3
3
Sergeant Cowder looked the room over and took a drag from his cigarette. “Well, that’s that. Now—what happened?” He looked from Mike the Angel to Harry MacDougal and back again. Both of them appeared to be thinking. “All right,” he said quietly, “let me guess, then.” Old Harry waved a hand. “Oh no, Sergeant; ’twon’t be necessary. I think Mr. Gabriel was just waiting for me to start, because he wasn’t here when the two rapscallions came in, and I was just tryin’ to figure out where to begin. We’r
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4
4
Mike the Angel did not believe in commuting. Being a bachelor, he could afford to indulge in that belief. In his suite of offices on 112th Street, there was one door marked “M. R. Gabriel.” Behind that door was his private secretary’s office, which acted as an effective barrier between himself and the various employees of the firm. Behind the secretary’s office was his own office. There was still another door in his inner office, a plain, unmarked door that looked as though it might conceal a cl
7 minute read
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5
5
Mike the Angel was sitting behind his desk in his private office when the announcer chimed. Mike narrowed his eyes and turned on his door screen, which connected with an eye in the outer door of the suite. Who could it be this time? It was Sergeant Cowder. “You got here fast,” said Mike, thumbing the unlocker. “Come on back to my office.” The sergeant came through the outer office while Mike watched him on the screen. Not until the officer finally pushed open the door to Mike’s own office did Mi
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6
6
The firm of M. R. GABRIEL, POWER DESIGN was not a giant corporation, but it did pretty well for a one-man show. The outer office was a gantlet that Mike the Angel had to run when he came in the next morning after having spent the night at a hotel. There was a mixed and ragged chorus of “Good morning, Mr. Gabriel” as he passed through. Mike gave the nod to each of them and was stopped four times for small details before he finally made his way to his own office. His secretary was waiting for him.
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7
7
Two days later Mike the Angel was sitting at his desk making certain that M. R. GABRIEL, POWER DESIGN would function smoothly while he was gone. Serge Paulvitch, his chief designer, could handle almost everything. Paulvitch had once said, “Mike, the hell of working for a first-class genius is that a second-class genius doesn’t have a chance.” “You could start your own firm,” Mike had said levelly. “I’ll back you, Serge; you know that.” Serge Paulvitch had looked astonished. “Me? You think I’m cr
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8
8
The underground tubeway shot Mike the Angel across five miles of track at high speed. Mike left the car at Stage Twelve and headed up the stairway and down the corridor to a heavy double door marked freight loading . He put on his parka and went through the door. The foyer was empty, and, like the one at the rocket landing, protected from the Antarctic blast only by a curtain of hot air. Outside that curtain, the light seemed to lose itself in the darkness of the bleak, snow-filled Wastelands. M
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9
9
Captain Sir Henry (Black Bart) Quill was seated in an old-fashioned, formyl-covered, overstuffed chair, chewing angrily at the end of an unlighted cigar. His bald head gleamed like a pink billiard ball, almost matching the shining glory of his golden insignia against his scarlet tunic. Mike the Angel had finally found his way through the maze of underground passageways to the door marked wardroom 9 and had pushed it open gingerly, halfway hoping that he wouldn’t be seen coming in late but not re
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10
10
The Brainchild lifted from Antarctica at exactly 2100 hours, Greenwich time. For three days the officers and men of the ship had worked as though they were the robots instead of their passenger—or cargo, depending on your point of view. Supplies were loaded, and the great engine-generators checked and rechecked. The ship was ready to go less than two hours before take-off time. The last passenger aboard was Snookums, although, in a more proper sense, he had always been aboard. The little robot r
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11
11
“What I want to know,” said Lieutenant Keku, “is, what kind of ship is this?” Mike the Angel chuckled, and Lieutenant Mellon, the Medical Officer, grinned rather shyly. But young Ensign Vaneski looked puzzled. “What do you mean, sir?” he asked the huge Hawaiian. They were sitting over coffee in the officers’ wardroom. Captain Quill, First Officer Jeffers, and Lieutenant Commander von Liegnitz were on the bridge, and Dr. Fitzhugh and Leda Crannon were down below, giving Snookums lessons. Mike loo
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12
12
The William Branchell —dubbed Brainchild —fled Earth at ultralight velocity, while officers, crew, and technical advisers settled down to routine. The only thing that disturbed that routine was one particularly restless part of the ship’s cargo. Snookums was a snoop. Cut off from the laboratories which had been provided for his special work at Chilblains, he proceeded to interest himself in the affairs of the human beings which surrounded him. Until his seventh year, he had been confined to the
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13
13
Leda Crannon sat down on the edge of the bunk in Mike the Angel’s stateroom, accepted the cigarette and light that Mike had proffered, and waited while Mike poured a couple of cups of coffee from the insul-jug on his desk. “I wish I could offer you something stronger, but I’m not much of a drinker myself, so I don’t usually take advantage of the officer’s prerogative to smuggle liquor aboard,” he said as he handed her the cup. She smiled up at him. “That’s all right; I rarely drink, and when I d
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14
14
Mike the Angel spent the next three days in a pale blue funk which he struggled valiantly against, at least to prevent it from becoming a deep blue. There was something wrong aboard the Brainchild , and Mike simply couldn’t quite figure what it was. He found that he wasn’t the only one who had been asked peculiar questions by Snookums. The little robot seemed to have developed a sudden penchant for asking seemingly inane questions. Lieutenant Keku reported with a grin that Snookums had asked him
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15
15
Midnight, ship time. And, as far as the laws of simultaneity would allow, it was midnight in Greenwich, England. At least, when a ship returned from an interstellar trip, the ship’s chronometer was within a second or two, plus or minus, of Greenwich time. Theoretically, the molecular vibration clocks shouldn’t vary at all. The fact that they did hadn’t yet been satisfactorily accounted for. Mike the Angel tried to make himself think of clocks or the variations in space time or anything else equa
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16
16
Mike the Angel hefted the heavy stun gun in his right fist, feeling its weight without really noticing it. He knew damned good and well it wouldn’t be of any use against Snookums. If Mellon came at him, the supersonic beam from the gun would affect his nerves the same way an electric current would, and he’d collapse, unconscious but relatively unharmed. But Mike doubted seriously that it would have any effect at all on the metal body of the robot. It is as difficult to jolt the nerves of a robot
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17
17
Leda Crannon was standing outside the cubicle that had been built for Snookums. Her back and the palms of her hands were pressed against the door. Her head was bowed, and her red hair, shining like a hellish flame in the light of the glow panels, fell around her shoulders and cheeks, almost covering her face. “Leda,” said Mike the Angel gently. She looked up. There were tears in her blue eyes. “Mike! Oh, Mike!” She ran toward him, put her arms around him, and tried to bury her face in Mike’s che
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18
18
Captain Sir Henry Quill opened the door of the late Lieutenant Mellon’s quarters and went in, followed by Mike the Angel. The dead man’s gear had to be packed away so that it could be given to his nearest of kin when the officers and crew of the Brainchild returned to Earth. Regulations provided that two officers must inventory his personal effects and those belonging to the Space Service. “Does Chief Pasteur know what killed him yet, Captain?” Mike asked. Quill shook his head. “No. He wants my
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19
19
The interstellar ship Brainchild orbited around her destination, waiting during the final checkup before she landed on the planet below. It was not a nice planet. As far as its size went, it could be classified as “Earth type,” but size was almost the only resemblance to Earth. It orbited in space some five hundred and fifty million miles from its Sol-like parent—a little farther away from the primary than Jupiter is from Sol itself. It was cold there—terribly cold. At high noon on the equator,
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20
20
If you ignite a jet of oxygen-nitrogen in an atmosphere of hydrogen-methane, you get a flame that doesn’t differ much from the flame from a hydrogen-methane jet in an oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere. A flame doesn’t particularly care which way the electrons jump, just so long as they jump. All of which was due to give Mike the Angel more headaches than he already had, which was 100 per cent too many. Three days after the Brainchild landed, the scout group arrived from the base that had been built on
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21
21
Mike the Angel stepped into the cargo air lock of the Brainchild , stood morosely in the center of the cubicle, and watched the outer door close. Eight other men, clad, like himself, in regulation Space Service spacesuits, also looked wearily at the closing door. Chief Multhaus, one of the eight, turned his head to look at Mike the Angel. “I wish that thing would close as fast as my eyes are going to in about fifteen minutes, Commander.” His voice rumbled deeply in Mike’s earphones. “Yeah,” said
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22
22
Captain Sir Henry Quill scowled and rubbed his finger tips over the top of his shiny pink pate. “Your evidence isn’t enough to convict, Golden Wings.” “I know it isn’t, Captain,” admitted Mike the Angel. “That’s why I want to round everybody up and do it this way. If he can be convinced that we do have the evidence, he may crack and give us a confession.” “What about Lieutenant Mellon’s peculiar actions? How does that tie in?” “Did you ever hear of Lysodine, Captain?” Captain Quill leaned back i
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23
23
Captain Sir Henry Quill, Bart., stood at the head of the long table in the officers’ wardroom and looked everyone over. The way he did it was quite impressive. His eyes were narrowed, and his heavy, thick, black brows dominated his face. Beneath the glow plates in the overhead, his pink scalp gleamed with the soft, burnished shininess of a well-polished apple. To his left, in order down the table, were Mike the Angel, Lieutenant Keku, and Leda Crannon. On his right were Commander Jeffers, Ensign
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UNWISE CHILD
UNWISE CHILD
Dr. Fitzhugh looked out over the faces of the crewmen. “The whole thing can be summed up very quickly,” he said. “Point one: Snookums’ brain contains the information that eight years of hard work have laboriously put into it. It’s worth billions , so the robot can’t be disassembled, or the information would be lost. “Point two: Snookums’ mind is a strictly logical one, but it is operating in a more than logical universe. Consequently, it is unstable. “Point three: Snookums was built to conduct h
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NECROMANCER
NECROMANCER
RANDALL GARRETT wrote his first successful short story at the age of fourteen, for which he was awarded a check from his editor and a C-minus from his English teacher. Mr. Garrett spent his youth in various places in the United States—living wherever his Army officer father was assigned—and received his higher education at Texas Technological College. He is the author of three novels (two in collaboration with Robert Silverberg) and a biography of Pope John XXIII, and has had short stories publi
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Errata
Errata
The following typographical errors have been corrected....
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