air-taxi driver, motioned with his gun. Small black eyes with rusty flecks glittered dangerously.

“You, Doc!” he clipped. “Get out the window. These puppets are liable to go hysterical any minute.”

Hope spurted inside Ward, ran through his brain like a rat in a garret, as he fell away from the Guards and found himself before the open window. An air-taxi was parked there, held by the grapple rail.

The Guards were strongly conditioned, so strongly that the possibility of Ward escaping overcame their blue funk. Desperately they sprang in a half-hearted attack, whipping out their guns.

“Chicken-gutted jackasses!” spat the taxidriver, firing again and plunging the first Guard moaning on his face. The big, red-skinned Guard slewed to one side; as he fell to escape the taxidriver’s aim, he pressed the stud of his paralysis ray. The taxidriver fell clear by a hair’s breadth beneath the stream of blue fire. Another needle twanged.

What happened then would have appalled the most sanguine and capacious imagination. Ward’s brain crawled; his stomach dropped with nausea and horror. The room swirled like madness unveiling herself as the dying Guard’s mouth opened and a tattered scream pierced the confined space. And then the Guard’s body began to disintegrate.

Some chemical reaction process, working at astounding, chain-reaction speed, reduced the whole body and uniform, within a few seconds, to a small liquid puddle which vaporized leaving no sign that such a Guard had ever existed, except the paralysis gun and a few bits of alloy.

The taxidriver said casually. “The Mo-Sanshon, Doc.”

Ward gulped. “The Mo—”

“That’s the reason they’re never found out, Doc. Suicidals. When they suspect there’s even a dim possibility of discovery, they release a catalyst into their blood stream. That’s what happens.”

“But surely,” choked Ward, “someone has seen—”

“What? They can never prove they’ve seen what doesn’t exist any more. Psycho cells have always been loaded with patients who claimed to see what wasn’t there. Come on, let’s dust out of this hole!”

Peculiarly ancient jargon, thought Ward, even for a taxidriver. He stepped onto the narrow ramp. A cold night wind cooled his fever and new hope strengthened him.

 Prev. P 3/24 next