Stellar Assignment E-Book

E. C. Tubb

• Herausgeber: Wildside Press
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Seitenzahl: 223

Beschreibung

Trapped in an economic rat-race, Kevin Blake had little going for him but an over-active imagination—an attribute which brought him to the notice of Paul Trevainen. Trevainen made Kevin an offer he couldn’t resist: find a billionaire’s daughter, bring her back to Earth, and collect a dazzling reward.

The only trouble? Crystal was wilful, stubborn, and worst of all, hard to find.

The quest would force Kevin to become an advocate in an alien court, turn him into a hunter, and make him the captive of giant, money-hungry frogs. Worst yet, he would have to rebel against established authority, become a fugitive, and even a criminal.

Was it a mistake to long for adventure?

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

STELLAR ASSIGNMENT

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

STELLAR ASSIGNMENT

E.C. TUBB

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

Copyright © 1979 by E.C. Tubb; copyright © 2021 by Lisa John.

Published by Wildside Press LLC.

wildsidepress.com | bcmystery.com

CHAPTER 1

From beneath the pillow the mellifluous voice said, “Wake up! Wake up! It’s a wonderful day! The sun is shining, the birds are singing, the wind rustles the leaves of the trees!”

Kevin Blake grunted and kept his eyes firmly closed.

“Wake up!” said the voice urgently. “You are full of vim, vigour and vitality! The blood is rushing through your veins! Today is a new beginning, a time of great opportunity, a period of tremendous promise! Wake up! Wake up!”

“Go to hell,” said Kevin thickly.

“Get up!” snapped the voice imperiously. “Rise and shine! It’s later than you think! Get up and get going! Wake!”

A pause of five seconds and a harsh, grating noise replaced the feminine tones. Ten seconds later it stopped and he felt a warm glow of satisfaction at having beaten the device. Just as he was sinking back into blissful oblivion a thousand red hot needles jabbed at his naked skin and he reared, yelling from the shock, slamming his hand at the pillow.

“You cow!” he stormed. “You vicious, sadistic, unfeeling bitch! I could have been ill, dying, but what would it matter to you?”

Nothing, of course, nothing at all. It was just a machine and, he thought, sitting on the edge of the bed, a lying one at that. There were no birds, no trees and if the sun was shining it was a safe bet that he wouldn’t be able to see it through the usual smog. And he wasn’t full of vim, vigour and vitality. He felt worn out, tired, beaten before the day had even started.

Wearily he padded to the shower, wondering at his fatigue. True he had worked late the previous evening but five hours should have been enough and, at his age, loss of sleep shouldn’t have dragged him down so low.

It’s worry, he decided as he smeared depilatory cream over cheeks and chin. The concern over the new book, the need to start another, the constant doubt as to whether he was writing the right stuff in the right way. And yet what else could he do? Television was out, lacking a union card he didn’t stand a chance even if he could produce the crap they demanded. Sex stories were a drug on the market and sadism didn’t pay for the paper to write them. To get a novel published meant that you had either to be an attractive woman with an intimate relationship with a publisher or a gigolo making up to his wife. Influence, he thought sourly, washing off the cream and dissolved stubble. Without it you get nowhere.

Teeth brushed, fingernails scrubbed, he left the bathroom and dressed in sober garments; maroon slacks, a scarlet cummerbund, yellow shoes and blouse topped with a maroon bolero. There was no coffee, no tea, no cocoa or yerba mate, not even enough powdered milk to flavour the hot water. Cursing he rose from the store-cupboard. Last night he’d come in late and flopped straight into bed but Duncan should have replaced the essentials. The nurd had probably been entertaining again, dispensing hospitality with a lavish hand, ignoring the needs of his room-mate.

Fuming Kevin strode from the room, slamming the door and heading down the passage towards the elevators. As usual there was a crowd waiting and he only managed to fight his way into the third cage. Fifty stories down and he emerged numb from the pressure into the concourse and headed for a cafeteria. He was lucky, it only took fifteen minutes in line before he collected his coffee and sinker. His luck held and he managed to get a seat. A pimple-faced girl simpered at the pressure of his thigh as he squeezed beside her and a man grunted as his elbow dug into his waist.

“Watch it, buster!”

“Slow down,” snapped Kevin. “You want all the room?”

“Just my share,” said the man. “I’ve a right to that, haven’t I?”

Kevin dunked his doughnut, not answering and the man gulped the last of his coffee.

“Some people,” said the girl as he left. “No consideration for others at all.” She moved a little closer, maintaining the contact between hip and knee. “You often eat here?”

“No.”

“Nor me. I think eating at home is so much better, don’t you? I’m on the sixtieth floor, room 601152, Sylvia Wharton. Another thirty minutes and I can go home. You?”

“Kevin Blake. 502046. I’m just leaving.”

“Kevin Blake? The author?” Her expression grew rapturous. “Did you write the Morals Of Mediaeval Man?”

“Yes,” said Kevin. “Did you like it?”

“I thought it wonderful!” she gushed, her face glowing. “So full of interesting little details about well, you know. Did they really have to wear chastity belts in those days? And did they have to sleep all together in halls and places? You must be a very clever person to have known all those intimate details.”

“Well,” said Kevin modestly. “I had to do quite a bit of research.”

“And The Sinful Seventies,” she continued. “I read it twice because it was so interesting. All that wife-swapping and the drugs and parties and things! I’m so pleased to have met you. Wait until I tell Lorna, that’s my sharer, about it. She’ll be green with envy. And I must get your other books. What is the latest?”

“Survival in Society,” said Kevin quickly. He had obviously misjudged the girl, instead of a pimple-faced nonentity she had charm and grace and a delicate cultural understanding. “I’ll autograph it for you if you buy a copy.”

“I must get it,” she burbled. “I’ll put in a request as soon as I get home. I’ll call the library right away.”

“The library?”

“Of course,” she said innocently. “I never buy books, I mean, not actually pay for them. That would be silly, wouldn’t it? After all, that’s what libraries are for, aren’t they?”

Kevin swallowed the last of his coffee and reminded himself that first impressions were usually the correct ones. The girl wasn’t cultured and charming at all. She was just a pimple-faced nuisance.

Firmly he rose. “It was nice to have met you,” he said. “Don’t forget to ask for that book.”

“I won’t,” she promised. “And you won’t forget my number, will you? 601152. Sylvia Wharton.”

“The book,” he insisted, before turning away. “Don’t forget it.”

After all, every little helped.

* * * *

There was trouble on the subtrans and Kevin was thirty minutes late arriving for work. The checker, a stooped, middle-aged man with a perpetual frown and a lipless mouth stood by the clock, holding out his hand before Kevin could punch his card.

“You’re late, Blake,” he snapped. “You know the rules. More than two minutes late and you have to report to me. More than ten and you lose an hour. Over that and you have to ask permission to work the shift at all.”

“I’m sorry,” said Kevin. “I was going to report to you after I hit the clock.”

“You’re lying,” said the checker. “You were going to clock in and go straight to your desk. The floor overseer would think you’d reported to me and I’d allowed you in.It’s the last day of the week and the cards would go straight up to the pay office and, if I hadn’t been smarter than you figured I wouldn’t have known you’d been late at all. Right?”

Kevin sighed. “You’re right, Mr Edwards, as usual.”

Mollified the checker relaxed. “At least you’re not arguing about it. The trouble with most of you people is that you forget I know all the tricks. You don’t hold down a job like mine for thirty-five years without staying one jump ahead. The Transworld Trading Company doesn’t hire a fool to hold down a position like mine. Excuse?”

“The subtrans broke down. Someone jumped on the track, I think, there was a forty-three minute delay.”

“Proof?” Edwards held out his hand. “The conductor would have given you a slip had you asked.”

“Sure,” agreed Kevin. “Me and all the rest of the passengers. It would have held me up the best part of an hour. But you know that,” he added. “And you can check that I’m telling the truth. If you find I’m lying I’ll lose a day’s pay.”

Edwards sucked in his cheeks. “Well—” he began, then changed his mind. “All right, Blake, you’ve a good record so I’ll pass you in this time. See me after, eh? I reckon it’s worth an hour, don’t you?”

“Sure, Mr Edwards. And thanks.”

Savagely Kevin punched his card and handed it to the checker. He could argue but then the nurd would stand on his authority and he would lose the shift. If he neglected to pay he would have the checker riding on his neck. If he complained he would get exactly nowhere. After thirty-five years with the firm Edwards had friends in the right places.

Hepton looked up from his work as he passed his desk. Like Kevin he was a clerk, unlike him he was old, withered, hanging on to his job with a vicious desperation. He threw over a sheaf of bills.

“Top-office wants this checked in double-quick time. As you weren’t in I volunteered to take care of it. I told the overseer I figured you were sick.”

“That was nice of you,” said Kevin bitterly.

“Well, you know how it is. I like to help out when I can.”

“By making certain he knew I wasn’t in. Hell, with friends like you I don’t need enemies.”

“I was only trying to help.”

“I know what you were trying to do,” said Kevin. “Why didn’t you just keep that big mouth of yours shut instead?”

Glowering he studied the bills. A consignment catfur mittens had been lost in transit to the colony on Tejat III. Another of diamond-tipped drills had never reached Ahmand of the Sirian system even though they had been paid for in advance. The Government of the Proxima Centauri Federation was annoyed at having received fifty tons of spangled cod-pieces instead of the cans of processed dog meat they had expected. The Ku Wang consortium of Achernar V could not understand why they had been sent a cargo of synthetic gills when they had most clearly ordered one of collapsible blowpipes together with poisoned darts for same.

A routine day’s work, thought Kevin sourly, something which any one of the five hundred clerks could have handled, but Hepton had had to make himself look take the opportunity of making his colleague look small. Sickness was frowned on by the Transworld Company. It would mean a black mark on his record.

Tiredly he began to stab buttons on his desk, checking consignments with the main computer, cross-checking, tracking down. The catfur mittens had been shipped by mistake to Sleeth. The drills were still in the warehouse waiting final clearance. The cod-pieces had been mislabelled and he arranged for the transfer of cargoes. The synthetic gills were a problem and it took him an hour to discover they should have been sent to Aquarion where, no doubt, the fish-folk were wondering how to use the blowpipes. Another arrangement to transfer cargoes and the thing was done.

Yawning Kevin assembled the papers, marked each witha note of the action taken and dropped the sheaf into the appropriate chute. Before he could reach for another stack from the pile accumulated on his desk the girl came round with the mid-shift coffee. She was a nice, well-built girl and he leaned back watching the play of her hips as she moved with her trolley between the desks.

“Women!” snapped Hepton spitefully. “That’s all you youngsters think about. Why, when I was your age I had to keep my nose to the grindstone. No time for day-dreaming then. It was work, work, work all the time.”

“Sure,” said Kevin. “And what has it got you?”

“A job. A pension in another ten years. Security.”

“Hell,” said Kevin.

“That’s what you think.” Hepton was defensive. “Let me tell you there are a lot worse things than having a steady job. You ever seen the dormitories? The jobless on the streets? The beggars? You don’t remember the riots like I do and you’re lucky. They were bad. So were the hunger years. I bet you’ve never had to share a room with five others. A small room at that.”

“I share,” said Kevin.

“Sure you do. We all do. But you share with one or two at the most.”

“One,” said Kevin.

“Twelve-hour turnabout,” said Hepton. “You call that sharing? I’ll bet there are days when you don’t even see each other. I remember when you had to wait for a man to get up so you could use the bed. Things were bad before they threw up the towers.”

“Knock it off,” said Kevin. “I’ve heard it all before.”

“Youngsters,” said Hepton. He gulped at his coffee and set aside the empty cup. “You don’t know when you’re well off.”

No, thought Kevin, finishing his coffee, that’s true enough. We’ve never known when we were well off. To some of the ancients this world would seem a paradise, warmth, food, clothing, non-physical work, entertainment, decent medical attention. The future has always looked glamorous to the past. But we have to pay for it. No birds, no trees, no sunshine which we can enjoy. Not the majority of us, that is. The rich, yes, they’ve always had it good, but not the rest. From one box to another, he thought, looking around. That’s what life has become. Moles crawling around in a concrete maze. Two-legged ants in a man-made mountain.

Well, to hell with it. Work was just something to get through. Another three hours and he could start to live again.

* * * *

Julia Frost was forty-two years old, an unconfirmed spinster, a secret romantic and a natural-born librarian. She displayed expensive teeth as Kevin approached, set down the pile of books she carried and hastily dusted herself down. The simple, red, yellow and black striped dress she wore did nothing for her figure but managed to hide the supporting garments she wore beneath. Her face was a sallow brown, her hair a darker brown fastened in a bun, her eyes were a matching colour. A mole to one side of her mouth sported three lank hairs.

“Kevin!” she greeted. “I was beginning to think you’d forgotten us.” The plural was for herself and the books. “I expect you’ve been busy, is that it? All those parties to launch the new book, the publishers, all those women. Yes?”

“No.”

“No parties?”

“No parties. No publishers fighting for the rights to my next work. No women.” He sighed. “It’s not going well, Julia. If things don’t pick up soon I’ll have to get a second job.”

Immediately she was concerned. “As bad as that? I refuse to believe it. It’s a good book, Kevin. A fine book. Once the right people read it, it will make your name. “You’ll be famous.”

“We’ll both be famous, Julia.” He dropped his hand on her shoulder, squeezed. “I won’t forget all the help you’ve given me. If I ever get rich you’ll be my personal secretary and then we’ll collaborate as I promised. But, in the meantime, well, we’ll just have to keep hoping.”

“And working,” she reminded. “I’ve been going through the stacks and I’ve dug up quite a lot of useful items. What will the next one be about, Kevin? Sex? Warfare? The interplay of human relationships? The new morality? Expanding horizons?”

She was a gem, a jewel, a veritable gold mine and he couldn’t do without her. Not just for her encouragement but for her specialised knowledge and for her access to the mountain of books within the library. Too many books, he thought bitterly. Two hundred years of continuous output not counting those before the middle of the nineteenth century. Until the twentieth the production hadn’t been too bad but then had come the flood, the deluge, the superabundance of reading matter. Millions of books churned from the presses, an uncountable stack of paperbacks, entire forests converted into material to bear the printed word.

No wonder publishers weren’t interested in new material, he mused as he followed Julia into the depths of the library. With such a backlog to draw on why should they worry about things like royalties and cultivating new writers? All they had to do was to reissue the old titles, the best-sellers of a century ago, souped up a little maybe, brought up to date, but basically the old material. There was material enough to bring out a dozen titles a day for the foreseeable future, repeating for every new generation of readers. A worm, he thought, feeding on its own tail but growing so that the tail never became exhausted. A continual feed-back cycle which effectively made it both unnecessary and uneconomical to seek new authors. He was lucky to have sold what he had.

“How about religion?” she asked brightly, halting before a desk piled high with volumes. “I’ve sorted out a dozen works on the subject. Perhaps, if you studied them?”

“I must think about it,” he said hastily. “I need to get the feel.”

“Perversions?” Julia was determined to be helpful and she was in no hurry to leave. He looked so tired, she thought, so worried. She longed to wrap her arms around him and cradle his head on her bosom. To run her fingers through his hair and soothe away his cares. He’s so young, she told herself, so vulnerable. “Sex seems to be a good subject,” she urged. “Flagellations, fetish-objects, fellatio. Of course,” she hinted, “you’d have to do quite a bit of research.”

With her? Kevin shuddered at the thought. Not for the first time he had the impression that he was a fly trapped in a spider’s web. He could walk away, of course, but if he didhe would lose too much.

“Not sex,” he said firmly. “At least, not that kind. How about drugs? Wasn’t there something about men trying to find the ultimate by the use of hallucinogens?”

“Which period? The seventies had quite a lot about it and there was revived interest about thirty years ago when the MacMillian Amendment removed the restrictions on sale and supply.”

He brooded for a moment. Thirty years ago was a little too close. Authors could still be alive and there could be trouble with copyrights, also some readers had long memories. Better make it the seventies. Eighty years was long enough and there was no point in taking unnecessary chances.

“I’ll start digging them out,” she promised when he gave his decision. “In the meantime there’s quite a bit of relevant matter in those I’ve already selected. Now be a good boy and get down to your research. Would you like some coffee?”

“No thanks.”

“Tea? Yerba mate?”

“Later,” he said. “In a couple of hours. I want to get down to it.”

She smiled approval as she left and reluctantly he dug into the heaped piles. This was the part he hated, the questing and prying, the selecting, the accumulation of basic material. A page here, a chapter there, a paragraph from somewhere else. Skipping, dipping, a vulture pecking at meaty bones. A ghoul, he thought dispassionately, stealing from the dead, living on the product of other men’s brains. At times he didn’t even have to change a word, just assemble the accumulated material to form a coherent whole. Mostly it was a matter of reduction, cutting down the inflated verbosity, condensing and lightening with an eliminating pencil.

A copier stood beside the desk and he settled down to work, the stack of duplicated pages mounting at his side. The effect of hallucinogenic drugs on the sexual impulse, he decided. A useless title but it gave him a work-guide. Plenty of case histories and personal confessions which would easily allow plenty of spice as well as taking up a lot of space. Perversions too, Julia had a point there, and they would be simple to introduce. Freud would be the man for that. His peculiar Victorianism would have to be remodelled but his patients had certainly used their imaginations.

“How are we getting on?” Julia had returned, a steaming cup in her hand. Casually she examined the top sheet on the pile. “Kevin! Are you sure this will do? It seems awfully heavy to me.”

“It won’t be in the final draft,” he promised. The cup held genuine Indian tea and he enjoyed the fragrance before sipping the brew. “Anyway, this is just basic research and I’ll probably discard most of it when you find more appropriate sources.”

“Of course,” she watched him for a moment, eyes bright in the reflected light of the desk lamp. “Don’t work too hard now.”

“I won’t.”

“Maybe you should rest for a while. I’ve a cot in the office which you could use if you wanted.”

“I’d better not,” he said, wondering how long he would be alone should he yield to the suggestion. Not long from the look of her. “I’ve got to get on with the new book. And it must be near your end of shift. You don’t want me around when your relief comes.”

“It wouldn’t matter,” she hinted. “Sally is broad minded.”

“You’re the Head Librarian,” he reminded. “You have to keep up appearances. I wouldn’t like to do anything to cause you trouble.”

His concern touched her, the dear boy was always so considerate, sometimes too considerate. But artists were like that. They tended to live in a world of their own and the research must take all of his energies. He nodded when she mentioned it.

“It’s something I have to put up with,” he admitted. “There’s no other way. But honestly, Julia, I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

Which was true enough, he thought as she left him to get on with it. But in many ways he was becoming quite an accomplished liar.

CHAPTER 2

It was late when he left the library and what could be seen of the sky was a dull, angry pink from reflected lights, smog and cloud. Above the mess was clean air, the moon and stars and he realised that he had never seen them, not really, only as glittering dots on a television screen. Captain Cosmos, he thought sourly. Sergeant Starflight. Galactic General and the stomach churning Pirates of Pegasus, programmes in which stalwart heroes rescued nubile maidens from slavering monsters with tireless monotony. Writers, he mused. People who turned out stuff like that should be shot. And yet was he any better? Did the pap he plagiarised have any real, greater merit? Beneath the superficial veneer of educated gloss wasn’t he pandering to jaded appetites just as the television writers were?

Grimly he hefted the bundle of copied pages under his arm. This was no time to get philosophical and to doubt the value of what he did. The stuff had to be whipped into shape, edited, set in order and then neatly typed on virgin paper. With any sort of luck at all Drug Debauchery might actually ring the bell.

Duncan was home when he arrived. He lay sprawled on the bed, a tall, thin, ungainly figure in polka dot slacks and blouse. He was older than Kevin with a face seamed with cynical lines and eyes which always seemed slightly bloodshot. As a debt collector he worked at night and should have been working now. Pointedly Kevin glanced at his watch.

Duncan saw the gesture and shrugged. “So I’m an hour after time,” he admitted. “But I’ve got a shift off, I’m flat broke and my girl has let me down. Could you lend me a little?”

“No.”

“You got paid today.”

“I got paid,” Kevin agreed. “But I’ve got debts and expenses.” He dumped the pile of paper on the table. “And I’ve got to work,” he added. “I don’t want to be hard about this but we have an agreement.”

“The place is all yours until 9.00 tomorrow,” said Duncan. He reared up and sat on the edge of the bed. “I know it but I won’t be any trouble. You have the bed and I’ll use the floor. Hell, man, you wouldn’t want me to wander all night, would you?”

“No,” said Kevin. Territorial rights firmly established he could afford to be generous. “Did you get some coffee?”

“With what? I told you, I’m flat broke.”

“Then it’s lucky that I did.” Kevin produced a tin of synthetic Brazilian from a pocket. “How about making yourself useful?”

From above the rush of water in the miniscule kitchen Duncan yelled; “Something I forgot to tell you. Your agent called. I said you’d ring him back.”

“Ransom? You sure?”

“Round face, small beard, almost bald a scar over one eye and hairs growing from his ears.”

“That’s Ransom. What did he want?”

“He didn’t tell me. Call him and find out.”

Digging coins from his pocket Kevin paid the machine and punched the number. Ransom beamed at him from screen. “Kevin, my boy! You’re looking well! Everything going well?”

“You tell me,” said Kevin. “Made any more sales yet?”

“I’m trying, boy! I’m trying all the time! You know me, how I operate, never give the customers a chance to relax. I’m chasing them all the time. But it isn’t easy, boy. It’s a long way from that. To be truthful it’s damned hard. But I keep plugging, boy, you can be sure of that.”

“Good. Why did you call?”

“A break! A great opportunity! A fish I’ve been hoping to catch for a long time.” Ransom radiated enthusiasm. “You’ve heard of Felicita Marmot? A big wheel on the upper deck. A patroness of the arts, society charity organiser, backs select exhibitions and has influence where it counts. She read your book and wants to meet you. Take down the address,” he rattled it off as Kevin searched for a stylo. “Be there at midnight. And, boy, be ready to sell yourself. This could be the opening we’ve been waiting for. Contacts, interest the right people, but if any of them try to corner you refer them to me. Right?”

“Wait a minute,” snapped Kevin. “Which book did she read?”