Ten From Infinity

P >> Paul W. Fairman >> Ten From Infinity

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Now, however, it seemed to be coming to life again. Les stared at the
photo under the headline. It was a good one--exceptionally clear.

And beyond a shadow of a doubt, it was the man who had just come to Les
King's room to purchase a glossy of himself for ten dollars. No wonder
the sight of that stranger had nagged at Les. He'd seen that face
before.

"Now just what in the hell have we got here?" Les mused. Something
definitely worth looking into, that was for sure.

He reached for his pants.

4

Dr. Rudolph Entman, one of the world's foremost neurologists, stripped
off his rubber gloves and scowled at the strange body that lay on the
table before him.

"Goddamn it," he fumed, "it's artificially constructed. It's been
hand-made--manufactured. And there's one thing I'd give a few years of
my life to know."

Brent Taber stared moodily into Entman's myopic little eyes and asked,
"What's that, Doctor?"

"How in hell did they do it?"

"Who do you suppose _they_ are?"

Entman looked ceilingward in a manner that indicated he might either be
hunting for _them_ somewhere out beyond, or sending a prayer heavenward
in a plea for Divine counsel and guidance.

"Some form of entity with far greater intelligence than we possess."

"You can tell me more than that, can't you?" Brent asked sharply. And
when Doctor Entman looked up in surprise, he added, "Sorry for the tone.
My nerves have gotten a little edgy lately."

Entman smiled understandingly. "I don't wonder. As to this living
machine--no ... it's not a machine because it did _live_. Let's see what
we can figure out. What's it made of? The material used in its
construction is--oh, hell--how can I put it? This way, maybe. Take a
wool blanket and call it genuine flesh, blood and bone. Now, take a
blanket made of one of the new synthetics--Dacron or any one of the
other equally serviceable materials--call that the material this
creature is made of. Figuring it that way--"

"You mean our visitor's body is constructed of things that feel and look
like flesh, blood and bone--work as well, but aren't. Right?"

"Right. But, of course, that doesn't tell you anything you didn't know
before."

"But what about their potentials, their capabilities? They're
_human_--in the sense that they're exact duplicates of humans--and they
_live_, but what about emotions? If we accept the somewhat unscientific
theory that it's a soul which is responsible for feelings and emotions,
these ... these ... creatures would be handicapped." Brent paused as if
uncertain of his ground. "Wouldn't they?" he asked lamely. "I mean, they
couldn't--theoretically, at least--react to situations ... or other
people's emotions."

Doctor Entman nodded his head and murmured, "I would be inclined to
agree. Except that we're obviously dealing with superior
intelligence--I'm speaking about the "people" responsible for these
androids--and we have no idea how far they might have progressed in
duplicating that indefinable something we call a soul."

For a moment he lapsed into silence. Then looked up at Brent abruptly.
"Have you read anything on Kendrick's experiments with synthetic
emotion?"

"Can't say that I have."

"Kendrick, down at Penton Technological Institute, has done some
remarkable things in drawing the stuff of human emotion from one person,
holding it on a tape, and transferring it to another person."

"On the face of it, that sounds ridiculous."

"Doesn't it? Nevertheless, the vibrations set up, or created you might
say, by a person in anger, consist of some sort of _stuff_--in the sense
of an incredibly high frequency wave. Radio or television waves are the
best comparisons.

"Kendrick, in one demonstration, took a young man who was very much in
love with a certain young lady. A really love-sick lad. He placed him in
the recording unit gave him the young lady's picture, and told him to
let his mind dwell on her to the exclusion of all else."

Doctor Entman smiled briefly. "This, I imagine, wasn't difficult for the
lad to do. Entman then put another young man, one who was unacquainted
with the girl, into a receiving unit and exposed him, after giving him
the girl's picture, to the vibrations created by the lovelorn chap.
Later, they saw to it that the second lad was introduced to the girl.
The results were rather startling, in that the young lady suddenly had
two ardent suitors in place of one."

Brent Taber scratched his ear and looked dubious. "That sounds pretty
sensational. But maybe the second lad just plain happened to fall in
love with the girl by natural processes."

"True, but the experiments tended to eliminate that possibility. Other
emotions were tested. How about a man walking up to a man he'd never
seen before in his life and busting him in the nose?"

"Okay, okay. Then you think--"

"I think a lot of things. Here, I see the possibility of a race with
superior science, having moved far ahead of us in the directions
Kendrick is pointing toward in his research. For instance, with more
advanced knowledge and know-how, they've probably been able to charge a
synthetic body with a complete set of functioning emotional responses.
Grant them that and we can also concede a tailor-made ego."

"I don't mind admitting I'm scared, Doctor," Brent Taber said.

"I think it's a time to be scared."

"But if a race of people were that advanced, if their intention is
hostile, why do they pussyfoot around this way? Why don't they just come
down and take us over?"

"I've wondered that, too. And yet, a race on some planet out there in
the universe might not evolve according to what we consider a logical
pattern."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that while they can create a synthetic man, their interests, and
therefore their progress, may have stayed in peaceful channels. For
instance, they may not have bothered with anything as elementary as the
atom bomb."

"It's a thought."

"A wishful thought, I'll admit. But it does have some validity. Also, it
has a fact of some possible value to back it up."

"What fact?"

"That they _haven't_ come down and taken us over."

"You almost cheer me, Doctor. Almost, but not quite."

"Actually," Entman said, "I've been wondering about something else."

"What's that?"

"When and how they came here before."

"You mean, where did they get the model for the ten androids?"

"Yes. They had to have not only a model, but also some knowledge
concerning our geographical and atmospheric conditions. The two hearts
indicate that they knew the elements contained in our air--the pressures
and so forth necessary to our existence--and were unable to construct a
working model that would function under our conditions with a single
heart. So they put in two."

"It looks as though they missed on some other things, too. Seven of the
androids have expired."

Entman shrugged. "Still--a remarkable job, particularly since they would
have no chance for a trial-and-error test under the conditions that
would prevail. It's surprising that _any_ of the androids were able to
keep functioning."

"The eighth one is pretty sick. He may be gone by now. And about their
earlier coming, I can give you one point. They came quietly, probably at
night, grabbed their model, and moved out fast."

"How do you know that?"

"Because, obviously, they think all men on earth look alike. Or, at
least, we can assume that. Else how did they expect to get away with ten
identical androids?"

Entman's eyes widened. "I never thought of that," he muttered.

* * * * *

Senator Crane, a doggedly determined man, had listened to the replay of
Brent Taber's top-secret conference again and again. In the comfortable
rationalization of which he was capable, his whole zeal and hostility
were fashioned around Brent's "arrogant disregard of democratic
processes." Who did this bureaucrat think he was? Did he consider
himself smarter than the People? Did he feel they couldn't be trusted
with revelations affecting their survival? Well, by God, they'd been
trusted with word of the bomb and its implications, and they'd reacted
admirably. So they were entitled to frankness concerning this new threat
to their security.

Of course, Senator Crane reserved the right to enlighten them in his own
time and in his own way. After all, hadn't they elected him and thus
given him leeway to use his own judgment in their best interests?

But who the hell had elected Brent Taber?

Nobody.

So Crane listened to the recording and picked out what he classified as
the key lines.

_A routine autopsy revealed some peculiar things ... The man had
two hearts...._

_The blood? Could it have been a new kind of plasma?..._

_All in all, gentlemen, eight identical specimens have been picked
up in various American cities ...

Exactly alike...._

Crane ran through the rest of it and threw himself moodily into a chair.
The idiots! The stupid unelected, self-appointed guardians of democracy!
Not once--not _once_, mind you--had a single one of these great brains
referred to the obvious.

It was a Russian plot!

All those allusions to the extraterrestrial was so much bilge. The
Russians were infiltrating the country with synthetic men. This
meant--oh, God--it meant that in a short time Russia would be able to
create an army of these monsters and overwhelm the world.

Senator Crane sprang to his feet and measured his indignation in long
strides across the thick, expensive carpeting on his floor. The
traitor! The sheer, compulsive opportunist! That was certainly all that
Brent Taber could be called. Using this deadly situation as a means of
furthering his own interests.

Senator Crane deliberately stilled his rage and objectively considered
what he should do about it. With the obvious source of the androids
logically deduced, there was only his own defensive procedures to be
considered. And they had to be considered carefully. As he saw himself,
he stood alone, against a group of bumbling idiots, with the future of
the nation at stake. What to do?

The key question, of course, was: How soon will Russia be able to mount
an army? Probably not very soon, he decided. That fact gave him time to
ferret out more information; to become completely sure of himself.

One thing you had to realize about the American public--or about any
mass of humanity, for that matter--a thing of importance had to be
presented dramatically. This, in a sense, was the duty of the elected
public servant--to recognize this somewhat childish failing of the
average intelligence and make allowances for it. _You can do this, of
course_, Senator Crane told himself, _when you love the people_.

And, fortunately for their survival, Senator Crane loved the American
people.

So, for a few moments, he o'erleaped the hard work ahead and saw the
goal--envisioned the headlines:

SENATOR CRANE UNCOVERS DEADLY PERIL TO THE NATION

Due entirely to the patriotic, selfless efforts of one United
States Senator, the nation has been warned in time of....

SENATOR CRANE STUNS CONGRESS AND THE NATION WITH HIS REVELATIONS

Standing alone on the rostrum, a heroic figure pitted, as it were,
against all the sinister forces that bore from within, one valiant
United States Senator....

Crane had dropped back into his chair. His eyes had closed, the better
to visualize a grateful nation expending their plaudits.

And because he was a man who used a great deal of energy in pursuing an
objective, he tired at times. He became drowsy now....

... And went gently to sleep.

5

"Doctor Corson. Calling Doctor Corson. Please come to the second-floor
reception room."

Frank Corson got the call as he was leaving the maternity ward. He took
the elevator down and found a rather sloppily dressed, middle-aged man
sitting on a lounge beside a weather-beaten camera that tended to mark
his profession.

"I'm Les King, a free-lance news photographer. You're Doctor Corson?"

Frank Corson's reaction was slightly hostile. He wondered why. "I'm
Doctor Corson."

"I'm on the trail of a patient that came here late last night. Name,
William Matson. They tell me he was your patient."

Frank nodded briefly.

"They say he was released."

"That's right."

"A little over an hour ago."

"Right."

"They say he had a broken leg."

"If that's what they said, it must be a matter of record."

"Well, they're wrong on both counts. He came to see me over three hours
ago--and both his legs were as good as mine."

Frank Corson did not volunteer the information that he had personally
taken William Matson to his furnished room in Greenwich Village and that
Matson was there at this very moment, awaiting Frank's return.

"I think there must be some mistake on your part," Frank said.

"No mistake. But something very definitely got crossed up. Maybe we
ought to have a little talk--the two of us."

Anger stirred in Frank Corson. Did this Les King character think a
beaten-up camera gave him the right to walk in and make demands. "I'm
busy now. And I can't see what we'd have to talk about."

"A hell of a lot, maybe. There are some things you may not know about
this deal. You might have let a big thing slip through your fingers."

"Look here, I'm not interested in anything you've got to say. And I
think you've got a hell of a nerve, coming in here and cross-examining
me on something that's--"

King reacted with weary patience. "Take it easy. I'm just trying to get
some information that can help both of us, maybe."

"How could it possibly help me?"

"To make it simple, there's a standing ten-thousand-dollar reward for
knowledge of the whereabouts of a Judge Sam Baker who disappeared ten
years ago from a little upstate New York town. Now, if you aren't
interested--"

"Are you telling me that William Matson is Sam Baker?"

"Let's say a hell of a lot indicates it. Matson left here without giving
a home address. If you know what it is, we can do business. If you
don't--"

"I'm off duty in an hour," Frank Corson said. "Maybe we should talk it
over."

"That's better. In the meantime, if you'll tell me where I can find
Matson--"

Frank smiled. "Wait an hour. Then I'll show you. But we'll talk about it
first."

* * * * *

The tenth android, one of the two so earnestly sought after by Brent
Taber, had observed the accident at 59th Street and Park Avenue on the
previous night. He'd stood on the curb, lost in the crowd that gathered,
and had watched the proceedings carefully. A man who was not a man, a
machine that was not a machine, he incorporated, in many respects, the
best qualities of both. Now, as the leader of the group deposited from
space for a specific purpose, he exhibited these qualities excellently.

He waited. He observed. He added the accident to the several other
unforeseen incidents that endangered the project and its objective, and
stored them in his memory-bank.

He watched the minor drama as it unfolded, and what was somewhat akin to
a danger bell went off in his mind when he saw a bright flash, traced
its source to a camera, and carefully studied the man who had taken the
picture. Pictures, he knew, could be dangerous. He must get his hands on
the picture, if possible.

He waited. He observed. He evaluated. The situation had gotten somewhat
out of his control, but he did not blame himself for this. Certain
emotions had been made a part of his being, but guilt, a useless one,
had been omitted, as had been any ability to react to love, compassion,
anger or hatred.

So, with no hope of reward or fear of punishment, he had recorded the
facts that he had been unable to communicate telepathically with eight
of the units under his command and that, therefore, they were no longer
operational. He had no way of knowing what had happened to them. This,
however, did not make his work one bit less vital. Even though eight
units were unaccounted for, his intelligent handling of the ninth
android, and of himself, was still vitally important. It was up to him
to see that the project was brought to a successful conclusion.

He watched as the ambulance came, noted the name of the hospital, and
recorded the proceedings. But he allowed the ambulance to drive away,
keeping his attention pointed at the man who had taken the picture.

When the man moved off down the street, the tenth android followed. When
the man entered Central Park, he was observed from a discreet distance.
When he came out again, he was followed into Times Square, down into
Greenwich Village, back uptown and, finally, to an apartment building in
the West Seventies. There he was observed opening a mailbox, and the
name thereon was duly recorded.

At this point, temporarily entrusting King to destiny, the tenth android
took a taxicab to the Park Hill Hospital where he entered, went to the
desk, and inquired about a friend of his, a William Matson.

He was directed to Emergency where a nurse, after checking a record
sheet on her piled-up desk, told him that Doctor Corson was with the
patient in Ward Five. Unaware that he had been extremely lucky, that
very few real people--people with only one heart, and a soul to go with
it--would have gotten such specific information out of a receiving-desk
nurse, the tenth android began counting wards until he came to the one
marked Five.

He looked in through the small window in the swinging door and saw his
counterpart in bed, a white-coated man bending over him.

That made the ninth android unapproachable, so his counterpart-leader
withdrew to the end of the corridor and waited until Doctor Corson came
out. He followed Corson outside and, from the back seat of another taxi,
never lost sight of the convertible until Rhoda Kane drove it into the
garage under her apartment building. From the street, the tenth android
saw Rhoda and Frank enter the elevator. As soon as the door closed, he
was in the outer lobby, watching as the numbers progressed upward on the
elevator dial. The hand stopped at 21. This was noted and recorded,
after which the tenth android called a finish to the night's activities
and retired to the small room he'd rented on a quiet street on the Lower
East Side where, if you bothered no one, no one would bother you.

He was back the next morning, however, and that's when his unavoidable
contact with Frank Corson on the sidewalk was made. He noted the
surprise on Corson's face, but the logical situation did not develop
because Corson did not make an issue of the meeting. He allowed the
tenth android to go on his way.

A nonsynthetic man would have wondered at this and thanked his own good
luck. Not so with the android. He knew nothing whatever about luck. He
accepted this bit of good fortune in exactly the same manner he would
have faced its opposite, and when Frank Corson boarded a bus, a taxicab
pulled out of a side street and followed.

The cab waited, in front of the Park Hill Hospital. When Frank Corson
and the ninth android emerged, two cabs, not one, wheeled down Manhattan
and into Greenwich Village.

Thus it was that some ten minutes after Frank Corson went back to his
duties at the Park Hill Hospital, there was a knock on the door of his
room in Greenwich Village. The ninth android opened the door. The tenth
android entered. The ninth android hobbled back to his chair and waited
quietly.

The tenth android looked both ways in the corridor and then closed the
door. He walked to the chair and stood looking down. He turned his eyes
to the bulky, cast-encased leg. "It will not heal," he stated
matter-of-factly.

The ninth android nodded. "I--know."

"That makes you useless."

Another nod. "Why couldn't they have made it possible for our flesh and
bone to become whole again after an--accident?"

"That wasn't possible."

The tenth android went to a tiny curtained-off kitchenette and returned
with a knife. He put his hand on the head of the ninth android and drew
it backward so that the neck muscles were taut. He raised the knife.

Then he paused and looked down with a faint expression of interest in
his otherwise empty eyes. "Are you afraid to die?"

"I don't--know. What is it to--die?"

"You become nonfunctioning."

"I think I would rather not become nonfunctioning."

The tenth android cut the ninth android's throat. Carefully and cleanly,
he severed the big artery that carried the blood-fluid back down to the
upper heart.

The blood-fluid spouted out and drained down over the chest of the ninth
android. He shuddered. His eyes closed. When the tenth android released
his grip, the head fell forward.

And from somewhere in the synthetically created mind of the tenth
android there came a question: Was it undesirable to become
nonfunctioning? The human was afraid to die. He sensed this but not the
reason for it, if there was one. The human was afraid to die.

He wondered only momentarily, vaguely recorded it as a mistake to wonder
about such things, and then crossed the room and put the red-stained
knife into the sink.

After that, he let himself quietly out of the apartment and walked off
down the street.

He had much to do. He had to leave town and finish the project alone.

Then, quite suddenly, he stopped, stepped into a nearby doorway and
stood motionless. There was no change in his expression except that
possibly his eyes became a shade emptier.

After a while he left the doorway and moved on. But it was with new
purpose and with new plans.

The new orders, relayed across a light-year of space, were not
intercepted by any terrestrial receiving device, however sensitive. But
they were received and recorded perfectly in the mind of the tenth
android.

* * * * *

Frank Corson and Les King sat in a coffee shop and regarded each other
with a certain wariness. "It's like this, at least from where I sit,"
King said. "About ten years ago a small-town judge named Sam Baker--"

"You told me that," Corson cut in impatiently. "Baker was supposed to
have been drowned, but they never found the body. Now, you think William
Matson is Sam Baker?"

King pondered the question morosely. "I've got every right to think so.
But Baker would have aged some in ten years. The man I saw--"

"The man you saw didn't have a broken leg. I must have seen the same one
when I--"

King was instantly alert. When you were on the trail of ten grand you
had to be alert, and suspicious of comparative strangers.

"You saw someone who looked like Baker and Matson? A guy without a
broken leg?"

"I was leaving an apartment building on the Upper East Side this
morning. I met him in the street."

"You didn't tell me that."

"I'm telling you now."

King scowled. "I don't get it. You were the doctor. You left a man with
a broken leg in bed in a hospital. You saw a man who looked like--"

"I saw the same man, goddamn it!"

"All right--the same man. And you didn't do anything about it? You
didn't say _Good morning_ or _It might rain_ or _What the hell are you
doing out of bed?_ You just let him walk away?"

"You're being unreasonable. When you come face to face with something
that's impossible, you don't treat it as a fact. It throws you off
balance."

King continued to scowl. "We're not getting anywhere. Let's face it. It
_was_ impossible. Let's get the hell up to your room and talk to William
Matson."

"All right."

Frank Corson came half out of his chair, then he dropped back again. "I
don't like this," he said.

"What's to like? What's to dislike? For ten thousand dollars we can
ignore both."

"I have a feeling we're getting into something beyond our depth."

"Okay, then let me handle it. I'll see that you get your cut."

"Not so fast," Corson said sharply. "I didn't say I was backing out. I
just said this might be bigger than we bargain for."

"I don't think that's quite it," King replied coldly. "I think you don't
trust me."

"Maybe that's it. I don't think you trust me, either."

"Ten thousand _is_ a lot of money. But we're not going to get it by
sitting in a coffee shop arguing over it."

"I guess you're right."

"Then let's go."

They left the coffee shop and, as they walked the four blocks that
separated them from the room where he was ashamed to take Rhoda Kane,
Frank Corson analyzed his own mood and attitude. He decided it wasn't
that he mistrusted King, or that he actually thought the deal had any
frightening elements in it. In plain truth, he was ashamed of himself.
Somehow, in his own mind, he was degrading his profession. His love of
Rhoda Kane, his need of money, his impatience with time and
circumstance, had forced him into what seemed like a cheap intrigue.
There was, somehow, a bad taste to the whole thing.

But it was too late to back out now. And what the hell! If there was ten
thousand dollars lying around, why shouldn't he get a piece of it? What
was wrong with that? He unlocked the door to his room.

He took a step forward and stopped, blocking the entrance.

"Oh, my God!"

Les King pushed through. His eyes widened, but that was his only
reaction. Then his camera swung up into position. The bulb flashed. He
lowered the camera.

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