The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Brain Sinner, by Alan E. Nourse This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. Title: The Brain Sinner Author: Alan E. Nourse Release Date: November 14, 2020 [EBook #63759] Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net *** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BRAIN SINNER *** THE BRAIN SINNER By ALAN E. NOURSE An invisible network of human minds lay across the country, delicately tuned, waiting breathlessly for the first spark of contact from the unknown ... from the unpredictable telepathic Alien. [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Planet Stories Spring 1955. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] The ship skimmed down like a shadow from the outer atmosphere and settled gently and silently in the tangled underbrush of the hill that overlooked the bend in the broad river. There was a hiss of scorched leaves, and the piping of a small, trapped animal. Then there was silence. Higher up, the sunlight was bright over the horizon; here the shadows had lengthened and it was quite dark. Far across the hills a dog howled mournfully; night birds made small rustling sounds through the scrub and underbrush. The alien waited, tensely, listening, waiting with his mind open for any flicker of surprise or wonder, waiting for a whisper of fear or recognition to slip into his mind from the dark hills around the ship. He waited and waited. Then he gave a satisfied grunt. Foolish of him to worry. All possible care had been taken to avoid any kind of alarm. He had landed unseen from Io. The alien stretched back against the couch, allowing his long, tight muscles to relax, as he sent inquiring feelers of thought out from the ship, probing gently and tentatively, for signs of the psi-presence. The landing, after all, had been assumed. Already the natives had convinced themselves that ships such as his were a delusion. Such simple creatures, to disregard the evidence of their own senses! There should be no problem here when the invasion began, with the preliminary studies already completed, the disguising techniques almost perfected. A primitive world, indeed, but a world with psi-presence already developing—a possible flaw in the forthcoming silent conquest. For psi-presence could detect other psi-presence, always, anywhere, despite any disguise. The alien knew that. It was the one universal denominator in all the centuries of conquest and enslavement in his people's history. Before they could come, they must know the strength of the psi-presence on this world. The alien moved, finally, beginning his preparations. In the center of the cabin an image flickered, swarming flecks of light and shadow that filled out a three-dimensional form, complete and detailed. The alien sat back and studied it through hooded yellow eyes—carefully, oh so carefully, for there must be no mistake, not here, not now. The scouts had come and gone, bringing back the data and specimens of the man-things necessary for a satisfactory disguise. Now the alien stared at the image, regarding the bone structure and muscle contour critically. Then, slowly, he began work with the plastiflesh, modelling the sharp angles of his members into neat curves, skillfully laying folds of skin, molding muscle bulges and jointed fingers, always studying the strange, clumsy image that flickered before him. It was the image of a man. That was what they called themselves. There were many of them, and somewhere among them there was psi-presence, feeble and underdeveloped, but there somewhere. He eyed the image again, and pressed a stud on the control panel, and another image met his eyes, an electronic reflection of himself. He studied it, and carefully superimposed the two, adding contour here and there, yellow eyes seeking out imperfections as he worked. There must be no mistake. Failure would mean disgrace and death, horrible, writhing death by dissociation and burning, neuron by neuron. He knew. He had officiated at executions before; delightful experiences, but not to be trifled with. He stared at the image again and then at himself. The skin tone was wrong. The yellow came through too clearly in places, and in this strange culture that color was reported to carry unpleasant connotations. He worked pale, sickly-pink stuff into his soft, wrinkle-free skin, then molded out the cheeks and forehead. Hair would be a problem, of course, but then there would be many small imperfections. He smiled grimly to himself. There were other ways of masking imperfections. At last he was satisfied. There was no way to bring the normal reddish color into the pale green lips; there was no way to satisfactorily prepare the myriad wrinkles and creases that crossed the skin of the man-things, but with a little skillful application of projection techniques it did not matter. The alien struggled into the tight, restricting clothes that lay in a bundle, carefully folded and pressed, at his feet. The hard, board-like shoes cut at his ankles, and the hairy stuff of the red-and-white checked shirt made him writhe in discomfort, but once outside the ship he was glad for the warmth. He stepped out onto the ground, and listened again carefully. Then he made certain arrangements with wires, and threw a switch on a small black case near the air lock, and began marching down the hill away from the ship. He would no longer need the ship. Not now. The underbrush grew thicker, and he fought his way through the scrub until he reached a roadway. It was not paved. A flicker of sour amusement swept through the alien's mind. They had been afraid that these simple creatures might try to oppose them! Yet the scouts had said that far to the East were great stone and steel cities—the places-of-madness, the scout had said. Perhaps. But here there was no stone and steel, only dust, and the ruts of wagon wheels, and a howling dog somewhere over the hill. The alien trudged on for almost an hour, trying to acclimate his legs to the fierce tug of gravity that pulled at him. And then he stopped short and listened. He heard them, then, in the depths of his mind, somewhere on the other side of the hill. His eyes narrowed. No psi- presence there, but two of the man-things, beyond doubt. Other whispers, too dull, stupid, vagrant whispers flickering through his mind. Lower life forms, no doubt. Possibly a farm with work animals. The scouts had said there were such. He turned off the road and almost cried out when the sharp barbs of a fence cut through his tender skin. A trickle of green dripped down his arm, until he rubbed a poultice across it, and it became smooth and sickly-pink again. With a vicious jerk he pulled the fence out, post and all, and left it on the ground, moving through the woods toward the sounds he had heard. Soon the woods ended and he saw the dwelling across a broad clearing. Black dirt lay open in the moonlight. He started across. There was light inside the dwelling, and the dull, babbling flow of uncontrolled man-thought struck his mind like a vapor. There were other buildings, too, dark buildings, and one tall one that had a spoked wheel on top, and creaked and rustled in the darkness. He had almost reached the dwelling when a small, four-legged creature jumped up in the darkness, crying out at him in a horrible discordant barrage. The creature came running swiftly, and the alien's mind caught the sharp whine of fear and hate emanating from the thing. It stopped before him, baring its fangs and snarling. The alien lashed his foot out savagely; it crunched into flesh and bone, and the creature lay flopping helplessly, spurting dark wet stuff, its cry cut off in mid-yelp. The alien stepped onto the porch as the door opened suddenly, framing a tall, thin man-thing in a box of yellow light. "Brownie?" he called. "Come here, Brownie! What's the matter—" His words trailed off when he saw the alien. "Who are you?" "A traveller," said the alien, his voice grating harshly in the darkness. "I need lodging and food—" The farmer's eyes narrowed suspiciously as he peered from the doorway. "Come closer, let me get a look at you," he said. The alien stepped closer, concentrating all his psi-faculties on the farmer's mind, blurring his perception of the minute imperfections of his disguise. It required all his power; he had none left to probe the farmer's mind, and he waited, trembling. That could come later. The farmer blinked, and nodded, finally. "All right," he said. "We've got some food on the stove. Come on in." II Senatorial Councilman Benjamin Towne slammed his cane down on the floor with a snarl, and eased himself back down in his seat, staring angrily around the small Federal Security Commission ante-room. The American Council attaché standing near the door retrieved the cane, handing it to the Councilman with a polite murmur. Instantly he regretted his action when Towne began slapping the cane against his palm, short staccato slaps that rang out ominously in the small room. The Councilman was not in the habit of waiting. He did not like it in the least, and made no effort to conceal his feelings. His little green cat eyes roved around the room in sharp disapproval, resting momentarily on the neat autodesk, on the cool grey walls, on the vaguely disturbing water-color on the wall—one of those sickening Psi-High experimentals that the snob critics all claimed to be so wonderful. The Councilman growled and blinked at the morning sunlight streaming through the muted glass panels of the northeast wall. Far below, the second morning rush hour traffic buzzed through the city with frantic nervousness. The Councilman tapped his cane on the floor, glancing up at his attaché. "That Sanders girl," he snapped. "Give me her file again." The Council attaché opened a large briefcase, and produced a thick bundle of papers in a manilla folder. Towne took them and glanced through the papers, lighting one of his long, green-tipped cigarettes from a ruby-studded lighter. "How about Dr. Abrams? Was he questioned?" The attaché nodded in embarrassment. "Nothing doing. He ran us in circles." Towne's scowl deepened. "Did you give him the Treatment?" "He just wasn't having any, sir. Said he'd answer to a Joint Council hearing, and nothing less." "Stubborn old goat. He knows I've got nothing that will stand up in a Council hearing." Towne went back to the papers again, still tapping the floor with the cane. "Damn that Roberts!" The attaché glanced down at Benjamin Towne with some curiosity. It was easy to see how the man drew such powerful support from his constituents. There was something overwhelming about his appearance—the heavy jaw and grim mouth line, the shock of sandy hair that fell over his forehead, the burning green eyes, the stout, well muscled body. The attaché's eyes drifted down to the withered left leg and the grotesque twisted foot, and he looked away in embarrassment. What was so awe-inspiring about a crippled man who accumulated great power? Towne certainly had done that. Some said that Ben Towne was the most powerful man in North America. Some also said that he was the greatest man, but that was something quite different indeed. And some said that he was the most dangerous man alive. The attaché shivered. That was none of his business. If he went probing that line too far they'd be calling him Psi-High, and he liked his job too much to risk that. The inner door opened and a tall man with prematurely gray hair strode in, followed by a girl in her early twenties. "Sorry to keep you, Councilman," the man said. "No, no, don't get up. We can talk right here." Towne had made no effort to rise. He glared at the man, and then his eyes drifted to the girl and widened angrily. "I said a private conference, Roberts. I don't want one of these damned brain-picking snakes in the same room with me." The man nodded cooly to the girl. "Sit down, Jean. Councilman, this is Jean Sanders. If you're here about the Alien investigation, I want her to sit in." Ben Towne slowly set the papers down on the floor. "Record this, Roger," he said to the attaché. His eyes turned to Roberts. "I understand he slipped out of your hands again yesterday," he said with vicious smoothness. "A pity." Roberts reddened. "That's right. He slipped out clean." "No pictures, no identifications, no nothing, eh?" "I'm afraid not." Towne's voice was deadly. "Mr. Roberts, an unidentified Alien creature has been at large in this country for three solid weeks, and your Federal Security teams haven't even gotten near him. I want to know why." "I'd suggest that if you read our reports—" "Damn you, man, I didn't come here for insolence!" Towne slammed the cane down with a clatter. "You're answerable to the Joint Senatorial Council of the North American States for every wretched thing you do, and I'm ready to bring charges of criminal negligence against you in this Alien investigation—" "Criminal negligence!" Roberts jumped up, his eyes blazing. "My god, Councilman! We've thrown everything we have into this search. This creature has played us for fools every step of the way! We didn't even get a look at his ship. It blew up right in our faces! Do you realize what we're fighting here?" "I realize quite well," said Towne, frostily. "You're fighting an Alien who has slipped into our population, somehow, and just vanished. There's no way to tell what he wants or what he's doing. The potential danger of his presence is staggering. And you've fumbled and groaned for three weeks without even turning up a hot trail. You haven't even a coherent description of him—" "We're fighting a telepath," Roberts said softly. "An Alien with telepathic powers like nothing we've ever dreamed of. That's what we're fighting. And we're losing, too." The girl across the room stirred uneasily. Ben Towne's green eyes shot over to her viciously. "And you're using freaks like her to help him hide, I suppose." "Jean Sanders is not a freak." Roberts' voice grated in the still air of the room. "She's Psi-High, and she's the most valuable asset we've got in this search at the present moment. It's a real pity there aren't more Psi-Highs that have had her training." "And you sit there and tell me you'd dare use Psi-Highs in an investigation as critical as this?" Roberts sighed in disgust. "Councilman, you don't have any idea what you're saying." "I beg to differ," Towne's eyes flashed. "I happen to be aware that there are a group of individuals wandering around loose who will have this country in chains in a hundred years if they're allowed to develop as they please. Psi-Highs are a vicious menace, nothing more nor less. We can't help it that we have them. The fools in the government were blind two hundred years ago when they first started appearing, and psi-factors are gene-controlled. But they can't use their extra-sensory powers without training." He picked up the cane and leaned forward at Roberts. "Thanks to Reuben Abram's meddling over at the Hoffman Center, some of them are already developing their psi-faculties, learning to use a treacherous power that has no place in civilized society. Well, I don't want them working in Security! Is that clear enough?" Roberts sighed tiredly and leaned back in his chair. "You're confused a little," he said. "This is not the Rotary Club. It's not a Federal Isolationist rally, and it's not the Senate floor, either. It's just me you're talking to. And to my knowledge, you haven't succeeded as yet in removing all Psi-High rights. You've gotten laws through Congress to make them take tests and submit to registration; you've passed laws to prevent them from marrying; you've blocked their education and hamstrung their training and developement, but you haven't, as yet, been able to strip them of their citizenship—" "Not as yet," said Ben Towne. "And you can't, as yet, dictate the activities of the Federal Security Commission." "Not as yet." Roberts' eyes blazed. "All right. Now you can listen to me for a minute, Councilman, recording or no recording. We've got an enemy in our midst—an Alien we've never even seen. We can thank a psi-positive citizen out in Des Moines for spotting him in the first place. He had the sense and the loyalty to report it to us. Normal psi-negative individuals can't see him, can't identify him, can't even get near him. We haven't tried Psi-High agents against him yet but we're going to have to, whether you like it or not. Psi-negatives are strapped. The Alien can run circles around them. Our only hope of catching him is to use psi-positive agents, the best-trained we can get our hands on. Like Jean, here. And if you want to stop me you'll have to reorganize Federal Security to do it." Towne lurched to his feet, his face white. "I may do that, Roberts." He reached for his cane. "I may just do that." "You'll have to throw the Liberal Council out of office first. They're supporting me, and outvoting your American Council two to one." Towne gave him a shrewd look. "Better start watching the telecasts, and newstapes," he said bluntly. "Already there are rumors going around about a mysterious Alien fugitive. Oh, I know it's top secret, but you know how news leaks." He gave a nasty smile. "People get nervous about rumors like that, especially when the Administration denies them so sharply. You'd better catch him pretty quick." He nodded to his attaché, and limped to the door. Then he glanced back over his shoulder. "Be sure to watch the telecasts," he said, and slammed the door behind him. Jean Sanders stood up, white-faced and trembling. "What a vicious man," she murmured. "What did he mean, Bob?" Robert Roberts shook his head, and fished a cigar from a desk drawer. "I'm not sure that I know," he said slowly. III Paul Faircloth finished reading the teletape briefing just as the little jet plane slipped down toward the hangar slot in South Chicago. He slapped the spools into the erasure can and flipped the control switch to activate the distortion field inside the can. He stretched his legs, then, wondering vaguely whether he was going to come out of this whole mess alive. Jean's parting hug was still warm in his memory, and he remembered the worry in her big grey eyes as she had kissed him and said, "Be careful, darling. I wish I could go, too. I couldn't bear to have anything happen—" It was the first time she had ever actually spoken that word to him, and he was glad she had. Almost defiantly glad. She had said it aloud, and she had said so much, much more without words. Only vague shadows in Faircloth's untrained mind, but he knew the meaning of those shadows. A man was waiting down below on the platform for him. The hangar vault was dark and deserted. He took the agent's card and scanned it briefly. "Marino? I'm Paul Faircloth. Better give me a late briefing." Marino nodded. He was small and wiry, with catlike movements and exceedingly bright eyes under his jet black eyebrows. "We'd be wise to get on over while we talk," he said. Faircloth nodded and stepped into the little tube-car that was waiting at the end of the platform. It was a tight fit for two men, and Paul ducked by reflex as it gave a lurch and dipped down the chute into a narrow tunnel, hanging free and speeding ahead on its electronic guide beam. "Is the Condor Building where he was spotted?" Marino nodded. "In Center City, Chicago. First thirty-six floors are commercial, and the twenty above are residential. He's pinned pretty definitely on the forty-second, in a large residential suite. No idea why he chose it or how long he's been there—" He turned apologetic eyes to Faircloth. "I'm Psi-High—I guess you know. We've got him located and triangulated, and we can keep him pretty well pinned if he doesn't try to give us a shower. We're pretty sure he knows we're there." "Shower?" Marino nodded, grimly tapping his forehead. "A barrage, the works. This Alien's got a powerful psi. And I mean powerful. He gave it to one of our Psi-High men yesterday. It was savage. Nearly ripped him apart." Faircloth shivered. "But you can keep track of him." "Yes." Marino lit a cigarette with nervous fingers. "Roberts put Psi-Highs out to spot him, but he doesn't want any Psi- Highs in on the kill." His voice was flat with disappointment. "Political pressure, I guess. People couldn't bear to give a Psi-High credit for anything—" He glanced at Faircloth and reddened. "Sorry. No offense. It just slipped out." He bit his lip. "Anyway, that's what you're here for. Half a dozen other psi-negatives will help you. I hope God'll be helping you too." Faircloth grinned tightly. "Got you nervous?" "It's got me plenty nervous." Faircloth nodded again, rubbing a hand across his eyes. "All right. I want your best men, every one of them, to go in with me. I don't care whether they're Psi-High or not. Neither does Roberts; he's with you folks all the way. But we've got to get this creature and get him cold. He's slick. Is the building sewed up?" "Tight as a vacutainer." "Good. Keep it under cover, and try to keep the Psi-Highs from broadcasting any more than necessary." Marino gave him a queer look. "They'll do their best, of course." "Right." Faircloth ran a hand through his brown hair and loosened his tie a trifle. "As soon as the building is cleared from rush hour, I want the power shut off all over the building. Elevators, lights, everything. We'll be on the 41st floor, and a squad will be on the 43rd. We'll close in together." Marino shook his head. "I hope it works. They had him just as tight in Des Moines last week, and he slid right through." The man's eyes were worried. "We just don't know what we're fighting. That's the whole trouble. Even the Psi-Highs are up a tree." The car gave a lurch and slid to a stop. They stepped out into a shiny tunnel filled with people emptying out of the huge building above. The two men waited to board an express surface elevator, and stepped off on the main concourse of the Condor Building. The last sunset rays made a dazzling golden display on the banks of heliomirrors, and Faircloth blinked, shielding his eyes a moment after the softer light below. Then he glanced at his watch. "Let's coffee up," he said. "We've got a few minutes." They slid into an eating booth on the concourse and dropped in coins for coffee. It was so clumsy, Faircloth thought. Three and a half weeks since the ship had been spotted down along the Mississippi, and they were still just learning how clumsy they were. They had even thought that the visitor, whoever he was, had been killed in landing until the first Security Team had gotten to the ship. They'd gotten to within just ten feet of it when it had exploded. And even then they hadn't realized what they'd found, until the report came from Des Moines, and they started following up leads. They had followed the alien, true, from the first farmhouse where he had stopped the night he landed, west through the farm country to Des Moines, then northeast to the great Chicago metropolis. But when it came to contacting the creature or capturing him—Faircloth shook his head. Clumsy just wasn't the right word. He glanced at Marino, and then readied across the booth and buzzed for a newstape. He glanced over the Washington news hurriedly. Another upheaval in the Liberal Council. The Northern Democrats were trying to drum up Civil Rights Party and One World Party support for their new South American Developement program, and they weren't getting to first base. And there was another vicious attack by Ben Towne on the Hoffman Center's training program for Psi-Highs. Towne had even named Reuben Abrams as a leader there, and worked in some high-grade anti-Semitic innuendo into the association. Paul went tense, searching for Jean's name. It was not mentioned. He took a deep breath. If that filthy dog ever dragged her name into public. He finished his coffee, and gave the repeat button a vicious jab. Then his eye caught a small item with a Des Moines dateline, well hidden down at the bottom of the backside of the tape. He read it, frowning: WOMAN CHARGES PSI-HIGH CONSPIRACY Des Moines, Ia., 27 June, 2157. A woman whose name was withheld today placed charges against Miss Martha Bishop, 23, of Oak Park Section, Chicago, whose name is listed in the Federal psi- positive registry. The charge was made at local Federal Security offices, and accused Miss Bishop of mental interference. The victim, who allegedly had information concerning the rumors of an Alien visitor which have been persistently appearing lately, claimed that Miss Bishop had attempted to prevent her from reporting her information. After failing in this attempt, Miss Bishop was charged with using her psi-powers to erase the information from the woman's mind. Miss Bishop could not be reached for comment. Mr. J. B. Dunlap, spokesman for the Liberal Senatorial Council in Washington, has repeatedly denied that the rumor of alien visitors has any basis in fact. Nevertheless, the charges against Miss Bishop are being investigated fully— Faircloth crumpled the tape with a snarl and returned to his coffee. Finally he nodded to Marino. "Drink up," he said, "and get in touch with your men. It's time to go." Ted Marino left for the elevators to corral his men, arranging to meet Faircloth in the concourse five minutes later. Paul found a visiphone relay booth, and sank his long, lean body down in a relaxer facing the screen. The last of the rush- hour people were still drifting by in the corridor; Paul watched them anxiously. Then he gave a nervous laugh, forcing himself to relax for a moment. If only Jean were here! He battled an impulse to call her. Finally he dialed the priority code for the Federal Security Commission offices in Washington. The relays clicked, and the code carried him through the front-line secretaries without any trouble. He gave a sigh of relief. He was in no mood to argue with secretaries. A moment later he was blinking at Roberts' tri-di image on the screen. Roberts' face looked haggard. He nodded to Faircloth. "You got there, then. Good. How does it look, Paul?" "Everything's just real nice," Faircloth growled. "They think they've got him pinned. The building here has a central power source, and we can bottleneck the whole place if we time it right." "Don't miss, Paul." Roberts' voice was tense. "Whatever you do, don't miss." "What's the matter?" "Ben Towne has worked his way into this." "Oh, god!" "Well, I can't help it, there was nothing I could do. He has the whole American Council behind him, and the Liberals can't hold out long on negative results. Towne has the whole picture now, and if we don't wrap it up fast, things here in the Capitol are going to blow sky high." Faircloth scowled. "Did you see the newstapes tonight?" "You mean the Bishop girl in Des Moines?" Roberts nodded unhappily. "Got the report from Des Moines on it this afternoon. Trumped up from beginning to end. I tell you, Towne is not playing around. I don't know how he plans to work things, but I'm afraid that story was just a starter. He'll do everything he can to tie the Alien up with the Psi-Highs in the public eye—and you know Ben Towne when he gets rolling. He'll play this rumor business up to the hilt. And the way things are in the Senate now, that could mean real trouble." "Who's controlling Security news releases?" Roberts gave a short laugh. "Take a guess. Just one guess. Don't miss tonight, my friend." Faircloth nodded and signalled off. He sat swearing quietly to himself for a few moments. Then Marino came by, and he swung out into the hall again, glancing at his watch. "Ready?" Marino nodded. "Got the squads placed on the 41st and 43rd. Power goes off when we step off the elevator on the 41st. Okay?" Faircloth grunted, and spread out a floor plan of the 42nd floor. "Is the building all clear?" "All the commercial levels, yes. And autolocks go on all the doors but the one we want when the power goes off." "Good. At least we shouldn't have residents underfoot. You've got Psi-Highs posted outside the building?" "Yes, in 'copters. Circling the building fairly close, out of sight range of the 42nd." "All right. We'll move in on him as soon as the power goes off. I want cameras going everywhere—in the corridors, in the stairwells, even in the 'copters outside. If there's a slip-up, I want to see where he goes, and especially I want a picture of him. A good picture of him. Maybe he can fuzz up human eyesight, but he'll have a hell of a time fuzzing up a camera. Let's go." They stepped on the elevator, felt it rush up to the 41st floor. They stepped off. As the door closed behind them, the whirring motors died, and the lights went out. Faircloth led the way swiftly to the closed stairwell where they met four other men, one with a motion camera. "Cover everything," Paul said sharply. "If you see him, stop him with a shocker, not with pellets. We want him alive." He opened the stairwell and started up with the men behind him. Moments later they met part of the group from the 43rd; they started swiftly down the dark corridor toward the pinpointed residential suite. And then, like a savage blow, a wall of fire exploded in Faircloth's brain. He gave a scream and jerked out his arms in an agonized convulsion. He fell forward on his face. Wave after wave of searing agony burned through his brain; he jerked on the floor, trying to scream again, unable to force a sound through his twisted lips. He heard shouts around him, and a whistle shrilled; there were running feet. Somebody tripped over him, tumbled to the floor with a bone jarring crash. Three shots rang out even as he dragged himself to his knees. He was blinded; he had never felt such horrible, driving pain, and he clawed along the wall as more footsteps echoed frantically in the corridor. Suddenly Marino was shaking his arm, and together they burst through the open door of the suite as a roar of derisive laughter tore through his mind. Faircloth opened his eyes and saw the empty room through a burning red haze of pain. He collapsed on a chair, exhausted, as Marino threw open all the doors. He gave a shout down the hall and others came running. Unbelieving, Faircloth stared around him, then looked frantically at Marino. "You—you got him on the stairs?" Marino shook his head miserably. "Nobody could see him. Not a soul." The hoarse laughter grew louder in Faircloth's ears. "The cameras!" he gasped. "Three of them are smashed. I don't know about the rest—" "You're certain?" Marino didn't answer. The answer was obvious. The Alien had slipped away like a ghost in the night. IV Robert Roberts was waiting, nervous as a cat, when Faircloth arrived at the Security office. There were deep circles under his pale grey eyes, and a dark stubble on his chin. He greeted Paul with a silent handshake; then they went back into the rear office, with its modern panelled wall looking out across the valley to the tall white buildings of the Capitol. Once it had been an inspiring sight to Faircloth. Now he hardly even noticed. A rocket rose in the morning air, leaving its white vapor trail like a pillar of cloud behind it. The weekly Venus rocket, probably, or maybe one of the dozens of speculator ships off for Titan. Faircloth scowled and sank into a relaxer with a sigh. "I'm sorry, Bob," he said. "It was a bust. I couldn't help it." Roberts mixed a drink and shoved it across the desk to Paul; then he touched off the end of a long black cigar. "What's done is done," he said sourly. "You thought he was sewed up, and it turned out that he wasn't." He turned worried eyes to Faircloth. "What we've got to know is why he wasn't sewed up. Something went sour. What was it?" Faircloth was silent for a long moment. Then he said: "I think the whole approach is sour." "Very possibly. How do you mean?" "I mean we're outclassed, that's what. This Alien is out of our league—way out." His eyes caught Roberts'. "He's a telepath, Bob, and I don't mean halfway. He's not just a feeble, groping, half-baked, half-trained, poorly developed Psi- High human. I mean we're dealing with telepathic power no human Psi-High ever even dreamed of—" Roberts' lips were tight. "Exactly what happened in Chicago?" "That's just it, I don't know." Faircloth sprang to his feet, his face white. "Look, Bob, the building was virtually escape- proof. The boys had every exit guarded three ways from Sunday. The power was off in the entire building, and there was no way he could get out short of walking through walls. And we had the walls guarded just in case he could. We got him sewed up, and then we went in to get him, and WHAMMO!" Faircloth clenched his fists, trembling. "I don't want to go through that again, Bob, not for anything. It was murderous. And the horrible part of it was that he wasn't using his full power on me. What I got was just a gentle rap on the knuckles—" "And he slid through." "Clean. Smashed the cameras; got away without leaving a trace." Roberts shook his head, and fished a folder from his desk. "He didn't smash all the cameras." He shoved the pictures across to Paul. "See what you make of those." Faircloth blinked at them. There were several frames, obviously printed from motion film. Pictures of a man-like figure running down a passageway. The face was not visible. "Not much help," said Faircloth. "Gives us a clothing description, maybe. Nothing else. He certainly looks human enough!" Roberts nodded sourly. "At that distance anything would. Can't even get reliable measurements. And you didn't even see him?" Faircloth shook his head. "Like I said, the whole approach is sour. You're never going to get him this way." "You've got some ideas, I suppose?" "I have." "Well, thank God somebody has." Some of the tiredness left Roberts' face. "Let's have them." Paul Faircloth lit a cigarette and slowly shook his head. "Sorry," he said. "First I want some answers. Straight answers about a certain individual." Roberts' eyes narrowed. "You mean Ben Towne." "That's right." Roberts scowled and threw down his cigar. "All right, I'll tell you about Ben Towne. It isn't pretty. Frankly, this Chicago fiasco was the break Towne has been waiting for. There were Psi-Highs involved in that raid. Towne knows it. And he's going to build a story of Psi-High alliance with the Alien that will carry him to the White House." Faircloth nodded grimly. "Does he have any conception of the dangerousness of this creature?" Roberts snorted. "Of course he knows it! But Ben Towne is obsessed with a single idea, and it twists everything he thinks into horrible distortion." He leaned forward, staring at Paul. "Benjamin Towne wants to wipe psi-positive faculties off the face of the Earth. He hates Psi-Highs. Oh, I don't know the motives behind it. Maybe the fact of his own imperfect body makes him hate what he considers a sort of super-perfection appearing in the human race. It's a false premise, of course. The predisposition of certain people to high extra-sensory powers is neither a perfection nor an imperfection. "It's just another tiny step in the evolutionary chain. It happens to be a dominant gene factor, and in our society it happens to put the Psi-High in a slightly advantageous position in comparison to psi-negatives." Roberts threw up his hands. "But the motives don't really matter. Towne was smart enough to realize that there were lots of people who hated and feared the expansion of Psi-Highs in our society. He started fighting against it, and he's ridden that fight right into the Chairmanship of the American Senatorial Council. If he can split up the Liberal Council just a little bit, he can throw them out of office, and move his American Party right in." "And where does the Alien fit in?" Roberts shrugged. "It's obvious, isn't it? Towne has taken an issue and split the country wide open with it. And now, along comes a visitor from the stars, an Alien visitor who steps out of his ship and just disappears like a spirit into the population. An Alien who is fully telepathic. Towne can control the news releases; he has the power to decide on the security classification of information about the Alien. It's been kept top secret up 'til now. But Ben can control the news, and he can tie Psi-High humans and a vicious enemy Alien together so neatly in the public mind that every Psi-High in the country will be in danger of his life. It's political dynamite, and Towne is controlling the fuse." Faircloth's face was white. "And if the Alien is caught?" "All the better for Towne. Then the 'rumored' liason between Psi-High humans and invaders from space can be 'proved.' Towne is in the driver's seat." Faircloth nodded bitterly, and stood up, shaking the creases out of his trousers. His face was grim. As he reached for his hat, his hand was trembling. "That's just about the way I had it lined up, too," he said. "Good-bye, Bob. Have a nice hunt." "Sit down, Paul." "Sorry. I'm not working on Ben Towne's payroll." "I think you are," Roberts snapped. His eyes flashed, and he sat up straight behind the desk. "You're going to work with us, and you're going to follow through to the bitter end. You and Jean both." Faircloth's eyes darkened. "Jean is not involved in this." "I am afraid she is. Just as deep as you are. And you and Jean are going to do what I tell you in this investigation whether you happen to like it or not. That is, if you ever want to marry Jean—" Faircloth whirled on Roberts, his eyes blazing. "What do you mean by that?" he said softly. "What are you trying to say?" Roberts' eyes caught Paul's, and held them. "I'm saying that you happen to be a Psi-High, Paul. And I just happen to know it." Paul Faircloth sank down in the chair again, staring at Roberts' face. There was silence in the room for a long time. Then Paul said, "That's a pretty bad joke, Bob." Roberts nodded sharply, his eyes twinkling. "I'll say it's a joke. It's a colossal horse laugh—on Ben Towne. He was so sure that that private file of his contained the names and histories of every psi-positive individual in the country! It's a horse on you, too. It's against Federal law to forge examination papers, Paul. It's against the law for a Psi-High to be unregistered. Both state and Federal registration are required. And it's against the law for two Psi-Highs to be married, regardless of their stage of developement. Jean's work with Dr. Abrams has developed her powers amazingly in the last couple of years. Yours must be pretty crude, in order to keep them hidden so well—" "You've gone out of your mind," said Faircloth flatly. "Sorry, my friend. I'm afraid not." "But you have no proof—" "True, its strictly a hunch, and a little personal investigation. You were through school when the registry law went through, and you must have found somebody to leak the examination to you early. How you did it, I neither know nor care. But all I need is a good strong suspicion to subpoena you over to the Hoffman Center for a test." He smiled at Faircloth. "Care to have me call Dr. Abrams? He's got some nice definitive tests—" Faircloth's eyes fell. "That won't be necessary." He sighed, and sank wearily back into the relaxer. "I knew it would be spotted sooner or later. I even thought for a while that Marino had spotted it." "He had." Faircloth nodded listlessly. "All right. What do you want, Bob?" Roberts' eyes were excited. "I want you to work with me. I think we can get this Alien and sink Ben Towne's raft at the same time. There's no single person in the country as dangerous to Towne right now as an unregistered and unrecognized Psi-High. And that's just what you are. And with you and Jean working this thing as a team, I think we can turn the capture of the Alien to the benefit of all Psi-Highs." Faircloth nodded slowly. "It could be done if my ideas are any good. And they certainly would require Jean to put them across." "Then you're with me?" "Okay. You've got the aces." Faircloth gave a defeated grin. "I'll probably hate you for this but let's get Jean over here and do some planning. The first job on the docket is to pin this Alien and keep him pinned." V Jean Sanders tossed her pencil down on the desk and flopped down cross-legged on the floor. "I think we're going around in circles," she said disgustedly. "Three separate circles," she added, with an owlish glance at Bob Roberts. "All right, we're tired," the Security chief sighed. "We've been at this for hours." "It's here," Faircloth said stubbornly. "We've got all the information we need, if we can only pin down the application. Or at least we've got enough information to make a start." "The more I see of the whole business," said the girl, "the more it looks fishy to me." She lit a cigarette thoughtfully. Her face was slender, with black brows and big grey eyes, and her slim figure made her look sixteen. "And it gets fishier and fishier the more we talk." Paul nodded. "Exactly. There's something that we aren't seeing or realizing or that we just don't know about this creature." "Well, let's try classifying what we do know," said Roberts. "We've got a picture that isn't worth a plugged nickel. We've got a few photos of the outside of the ship before it exploded. We know that he's psi-triple-high, fully telepathic, with the ability to fuzz up his observer's perception of him." "Disguise," said Jean. "It isn't perfect. He needs that to hide the wrinkles in the disguise." Faircloth walked across the room, staring at the walls. "Then there's the ship. It was found near Gutenberg, Iowa, on a bluff overlooking the Mississippi, three months ago. That's a fact. Farm kids found the ship but didn't go near it. Scared stiff. Told their father and he called Security. I don't suppose there was any way of telling how long the ship had been there?" Roberts shook his head. "Biologists and geologists both had a whack at it, but the explosion destroyed all the flora and ground area within twenty feet of it." "Well, anyway, no occupant of the ship was found, and no trace of where the occupant might have gone. Security sent a scout squad down to photograph the ship and it blew into a million pieces." "That's right." "How many of the million pieces were recovered?" "About ten. Magnesium alloy. Told us nothing." Faircloth nodded. "Okay. Then the Psi-High report came in from Des Moines, and you turned up the farmer and his wife who saw the Alien the first night. What was their name? Bettendorf, I think. Jacob Bettendorf. Rather dull folks. They fed him and sent him on his way. Noticed nothing odd, but the farmer said his eyes felt tired all the time the creature was there. How did their description jive with the others you've gotten?" Roberts shrugged. "The same—or I should say, uniformly different. Nobody seems to agree. It's obvious that they don't actually see him in any detail at all. They just think they do." "You know," said the girl, suddenly, "that's one of the things that bothers me. A lot of those people out there are Ben Towne's stoutest supporters. They don't like Psi-Highs. They keep their eyes open for people that act like Psi-Highs— you know, the way we're likely to nod and start answering a question before a person gets it half asked—or the way we sometimes forget our expressions when we've had an accidental peep at some sweet innocent young girl's inner thoughts. Those people can spot that. But the Alien went right through. Not even a suspicion." "He got into the city fast, though," said Roberts. "City folks are likely to be a lot less observant than country people." "All right," said Paul. "That fits well enough. Now, since he destroyed his ship, we can assume that he is planning to stay a while. That probably means that there have been others before him. He's too confident for an advance scout. He knew he could mingle, and stay, and observe, and learn, and get away with it. Probably his job is to accumulate information, detailed information about human beings, and with full blown telepathy he must really be making hay. And unless I miss my guess, the information he wants most of all is information about Psi-Highs." Faircloth faced Roberts and the girl. "This is beginning to add up now. I don't think we're going to catch him in a dragnet. No matter how skillfully it's laid. No matter how many Psi-Highs we have on it, and no matter how well trained they are." Roberts looked disgusted. "Then you're saying that we aren't going to get him, period." "Oh, no. I think we can catch him. At least I've got an angle that's worth trying. We'll have no way of evaluating it first, because of the nature of the thing, but in the end we'll either have the Alien or we won't, and I think there's a good chance that we will. If we keep playing the Chicago game we'll lose every time." "But what went wrong in Chicago?" Roberts cried. "Nothing, except that we were licked before we started. Look at it this way. He's outguessed us every time. And if you analyze that a little, it's not really surprising that he has because he's telepathic. He does not need a twenty-page report and a road map to know what's going on around him. All he needs is a hint. Just a bare touch of man's mind, a slight flicker of contact, and he has enough of a head start to sit down and figure out everything that's going to happen from then on. Just like a chess game. You play along and suddenly your opponent makes a move that reveals a whole gambit which you hadn't been able to see before. But our Alien friend spots the gambit on the basis of the first move instead of the tenth. We make a move and he has it pinned. He knows we operate along fairly logical lines. He can follow out the logical possibilities before they happen, and there's no possible way we can trap him. Psi-Highs or no Psi-Highs." Roberts scowled at him. "Then what do you propose?" Faircloth grinned. "It should be obvious by this time. We feed the computer with all the evidence we have, and let it meditate a while and plot out a supremely logical approach to trap the creature on the basis of what we know of him now. Then we take that supremely logical approach, and change it a bit. We change it into a completely illogical approach." The call they were waiting for came through at three o'clock one morning, after they had almost given it up in despair. It had been a long, heartbreaking wait. Time after time Faircloth had pleaded that they must have been very close in Chicago, closer than they realized, that the Alien was just temporarily frightened, because there had been no sign, no due to the Alien's whereabouts, no sign that he was even in existence since the Chicago raid. Yet Faircloth felt sure that sooner or later the contact would come. It was possible, of course, that the change in the search pattern had worried the Alien. Logically, a dragnet should have been set up in Chicago, and the entranceways to all the large cities guarded carefully. That was what the computer had said. "Probability is very strong that the Alien desires to remain in a city, but suggests that Chicago may not be the optimum location for him. Recommended heavy Security measures be taken in Chicago and surrounding cities of size. The probability is very high that the Alien is seeking some specific information. Advise close control of all spaceports, air, and rolling-road escapeways—" And so forth. That was what the computer had said. Of course, the computer was far from infallible, but its analysis and recommendations were utterly logical on the basis of the information given it. That was exactly why they were carefully ignored. It was a gamble, and no one was more aware of this than Faircloth. All Security personnel were withdrawn from the Chicago area, Psi-High and otherwise, except for a small crew headed by Ted Marino, who were scattered throughout the city. A gamble, but it was not entirely guesswork that made Paul so certain that the Alien, if left quite alone, would try to make contact with a Psi-High mind sooner or later. Of course, that conclusion itself was the result of logical reasoning. No matter what efforts were made to remove logic from the approach, it crept in. It had to creep in. It was logical that a telepathically sensitive creature visiting a strange planet would seek to learn something about the segment of the population that could expose his presence. He would seek signs of his own kind of thought. Paul knew too well that a Psi-High mind that was cut off and alone was a sick mind. That was why Psi-Highs always settled in the cities, why they sought each other with such fierce, desperate clannishness which in itself had bred suspicion of them in the minds of psi-negatives. It was not a matter of choice, with them. It was a desperate need. And Paul knew how overpowering that need could be. No, logically, the Alien would make contact with a human Psi-High, sooner or later. It would not be difficult to keep control of such a contact. The Psi-Highs were very few, numbering in the hundreds, scattered in colonies in the larger cities of the North American States. With painstaking care each one was contacted and warned, and those in Security Service were spotted in the most likely places for the contact they were waiting for. The roads were left free, and the airports and spaceports were not ch...