Christopher Anvil - Strangers in Paradise

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STRANGERS IN PARADISE

CHRISTOPHER ANVIL

Our free catalogue is available upon request. Any Belmont/ Tower titles not in your local bookstore can be

purchased through the maiL Simply send 150 plus the retail price of the book and write Belmont/Tower Books,

185 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016.

Any titles currently in print are available in quantity for industrial and sales-promotion use at reduced rates.

Address inquiries to our Promotion Dept.

Belmont/Tower Books • New York City

Table of Contents

Part I.

STRANGERS IN PARADISE

A BELMONT/TOWER BOOK—October 1972

Published by

Belmont/Tower Books 185 Madison Avenue New York, N.Y. 10016

Printed in the United States of America

I. Disaster Landing----------.____ 9

II. "Thank You For

Your Consideration"_________ 11

III. The Killer Forest....._________ 13

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IV. City of Universal Care________ 15

V. At Home in Paradise..............___ 23

VI. The Want-Generator------------27

VII. The Technicians------.----------- 34

VIII. By Trial and Error____._____39

IX. Consider It Done___________45

Part II.

X. Return to Paradise----------------51

XL Something Didn't Work----------- 54

XII. Chaos____________________60

XIII. Deadlock_________________69

Part III.

XIV. The Dukes of Desire___.______79

XV. Surnamed The Terrible................ 87

XVI. Oggbad's Army_____________ 98 • _ _

Jr Oft M.

XVII. Triumph........................................104

XVIII. Trapped_______.__________..111

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XIX. The Bluff____.______________115

XX. Blackout _______._______......120

XXI. The Duke and the Usurper____126

XXII. Planetary Pilots ......__________131

XXIII. "Their Bearing is an Insult"........137

XXIV. "Your Grace May be Aware"......142

XXV. King and Emperor........................152

XXVI. The King's Legions ..._________157

XXVII. Interstellar Patrol..........................165

I. Disaster Landing

Vaughan Nathan Roberts, captain of the Orion which had just crash landed, crouched in the spaceship tender's

hatchway and held down the trigger of the Superlight rifle. The explosions in the confined space deafened him,

the air filled with pungent smoke, and a grisly haze of blood and fur whirled around him. There was a scream that

he heard as if through a layer of cotton, and suddenly the fading daylight of the forest clearing shone

unobstructed into the hatchway.

In the center of the clearing a huge gray creature shaped like a tiger, paused to take one quick lick at its torn

bloodied chest. Then it streaked to the right, past the brush and low branches that made a screen of leaves at the

forest edge.

The screen of brush and branches at the forest edge was broken by a grassy stretch under a tree with massive

limbs upraised to form the outline of a huge lyre. The limbs, which bore needle-sharp thorns longer than a man's

forearm, were arched so high that a rider couid have passed beneath on horseback. The tnorns, outlined against

the SKy, suggested upraised daggers poised to strike.

The huge cat shot under the tree in a blur close to the ground.

There was a faint twang.

The limbs whipped down, their outer ends spread out like a fan.

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The cat bounded clear an instant ahead of time to vanish

into the forest. Behind it the thick limbs, with a writhing motion like so many snakes, pressed their long sharp

thorns against the ground as if feeling for prey.

From inside the tender came the moan of one of the men hurt in the crash.

Roberts hurried to his side. He was worried about his men but he was even more concerned about the Orion.

He knew what was wrong.

One of the gravitor's coils had burned out.

It would have to be rewound.

Cassetti, the gravitor technician, was badly wounded. He pointed at the bulky technical manual, and Captain

Roberts understood that Cassetti wanted him to do the rewinding. But Roberts had other ideas. He patched up

Cassetti's shoulder and put him to work.

The rewound gravitor, to their relief, worked. But it worked with vibration, flexing of the coils, chafing of the

insulation, and strong gravitic stresses that squeezed and reshaped the metal of the gravitor wire itself. The

varying field created large-scale transient g-forces that would threaten ship, crew, and equipment as long as the

drive was on.

All that the crew of the Orion had had was bad luck.

But then Morrissey, a triumphant smile cracking his face, yelled out, "Sir, I've contacted the spaceportl"

Their luck was bound to change.

H. "Thank You For Your Consideration"

Roberts, feeling a sense of relief, seated himself at the communicator, noted that the screen had been knocked out

in the crash, and then spoke slowly and clearly:

"This is Captain Vaughan Roberts, T.S.M. Orion, Interstellar Rapid Transport Corporation. I have a wrecked

tender and three badly injured men in a forest clearing on the far side of a belt of cultivated land outside the city.

We're about forty miles from the spaceport. You can locate the position more accurately from our signal. There

are six of us, all told, and we'd appreciate transportation out of here. But what we need urgently is help for the

three injured men. How soon can you get an ambulance skimmer out here?"

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There was a brief pause, then a calm voice replied:

"I am always with you, Vaughan."

Roberts stared at the communicator. "Am I speaking to the spaceport?"

"No, Vaughan. This is the Planetary Control Center, Paradise City, Paradise."

"Put me in touch with the spaceport, please."

"We are in touch with all facilities, Vaughan."

"I have three badly injured men on board. How soon can you get help to them?"

"Standard transport can't reach your present location, Vaughan. If you will approach the city, you will make your

job and ours easier."

Roberts' mind seethed with unspoken profanity.

"The point," he said, "is that we crashed here. If we

should try to take off now, the best we could expect would be to crash again in a worse spot. We're calling on you

to respond under the standard Reciprocal Aid agreement, and send an ambulance skimmer out to pick up these

injured men."

"Vaughan, there is no air transport on this planet. All transport is by surface or tubeway."

Roberts sat back. Then he frowned at the communicator.

"Am I talking to a human, or to an automatic communications device?"

"You are speaking to the Human Liaison Circuit of the planetary computer. I am always with you, Vaughan. You

are not alone."

"We are humans," said Roberts. "We are not heavily armed. We have no armored vehicles to travel in. Do you

advise us to try to approach the city by way of this killer forest?"

There was a lengthy silence, then a different voice replied. "We cannot reach you by air transport, because we

have none. Wheeled mechanized ground transport, which we do have, cannot penetrate the forest. Other forms of

ground transport would require special fabrication and unacceptable expense. Hence we are powerless to aid you

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in your present location, Therefore, you must move yourself closer to the city to receive assistance from us.

However, to move yourself on foot through the killer forest would probably be fatal. Therefore we cannot advise

that you do it."

"Then," said Roberts, "can you put me in touch with some human who might offer help or advice?"

"This information is not available."

He glanced at Hammell. "How long can the men hold out?"

"I don't know. Cassetti is in pretty bad shape."

"If Morrissey can't fix that communicator, you and I will have to try to make it to that city tomorrow."

Hammell winced.

"Through that forest?"

"Can you think of some other way?"

"When—when would we be leaving?"

"If we're going to have any chance to get into the clear by sundown, we'd better leave at dawn."

IE. The Killer Forest

They snapped shut their faceplates and a few minutes later pushed through the broken branches at the edge of the

clearing.

The moment they were inside the screen of leaves a dense swarm of things, roughly the size of yellow jackets,

whined around their heads, banged against their faceplates, and dove at them viciously from all angles.

Roberts shoved a branch back out of the way, and there was a big gray nest on the trunk of a nearby tree, with

more of the things coming out in clouds. So far, the things hadn't managed to get through the armored suits, but

Roberts' confidence was shaken by the sudden realization that what he had taken for dead branches on the ground

were actually bones.

Methodically, they ripped the big nest to pieces. The insects responded with a fury that surpassed anything they'd

shown before. But as Roberts and Hammell continued to destroy the nest, the attacks faded out, and the insects

devoted themselves to carrying away small caterpillarlike forms that were apparently their young.

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Roberts and Hammell finished the nest, marked the trees prominently, carried away the stump, detoured around

another stump several times as large, then stopped and looked back. The way into the clearing now seemed clear,

even if they came back with damaged suits. Roberts, however, glanced at his watch.

"Fifty-five minutes, and we've traveled a few hundred feet."

"We could have done worse," said Hammell. "What bothers me is that roaring noise."

Through the trees at the edge of the open space poured a sheet of small bright-green insects. Behind them loomed

a bright-green ridge the height of a snow bank. There was a continuous crackling sliding noise from nearly every

direction.

A bright-green cloud of flying insects passed low overhead to drop all around them—and on their suits, and

helmets, and faceplates—and for an instant Roberts was treated to the sight of waving claws, stings, jaws, and

barbed wing-covers. And then they had flown away after the others, and a fresh cloud loomed out from the crest

of the bright-green bank.

"Too close," said Roberts. "Let's get around to the side if we can."

After a hard struggle through the trees, with frenzied animals darting past them in all directions, they finally

found themselves standing in a forest stripped of leaves and a part of its bark, with nothing green in sight save for

the crescent-shaped, bright-green wave before them.

Roberts checked his compass.

"They're headed southeast," he said above the roar. "We want to go east. If we follow, they might lead us out of

the forest."

Hammell nodded. "Good luck, for a change!"

They looked around at where the bright-green swarm had turned back from the bare soil, as light reflects from a

mirror, and was traveling now to the southwest.

Cautiously, they raised their faceplates, breathed deeply, and then took slow sips of water from their canteens.

"What's the name of this planet again?" said Hammell.

"Paradise," said Roberts drily. "Let's hope the city fits the name a little better."

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IV. City of Universal Care

That evening, they cached their spacesuits, guns, knives, packs, and canteens near the branch of an irrigation

ditch close to the spot where water gushed up out of a supply pipe into the ditch. They looked around to note the

identifying features of the spot, waded the irrigation ditch, and headed toward the city, counting the rows of crops

as a guide to help find their way back to this spot. As they walked, the buildings began to loom over them, mostly

unlit themselves, but lighted from below by bright street lamps. And now a new change became apparent,

Hammell sniffed sharply.

"Garbage. We're approaching this place by way of the dump."

Roberts shook his head.

"We don't dare change direction. We need the name of that street just ahead, so we'll know how to get back to the

cache if we need to."

They plodded on and the going got worse. Now they were in the dump. They squelched through it, ankle-deep,

knee-deep, as rats foraged around them. The street lamps up ahead, protected by heavy wire mesh, cast a glow

over the details of the scene that they could have done without. Then they plunged and heaved up the steep

embankment at the edge of the street, where on the far side the big buildings stood, each the size of a city block,

and each separated from the next by a space of the same size.

As they staggered out onto the street, Roberts, though now so tired that each step was a fight, led the way to the

battered street signs affixed high up on the corner of the nearest building:

477th St.-Agrtcultural B Ivd.

Something crashed to the pavement, and Roberts looked blankly around.

A chunk of paving block hit the building beside him, the flying bits stinging like hail.

What happened next wasn't clear to either of them, perhaps because of the long hike, perhaps because this was so

different from what they had expected. Somehow, they were surrounded by a jeering crowd of children, some of

them carrying broken bottles. Someone let fly a chunk of brick that barely missed Roberts. The others at once

rushed in. From somewhere came a loudspeaker's roar, shouted warnings, the loud blast of a piercing whistle.

And then there was a glare of yellow light in Roberts' eyes and an authoritative voice was accusing him of

starting a riot. He was seized, there were angry shouts and curses, he saw a flash of bright light from bicycle-type

wheels, a blur of blue-painted metal and a large white number, there was a stretch of blankness, and then a heavy

resounding clang.

Roberts and Hammell sat up dazedly, to find themselves on cots in a cell.

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Dizzily, Roberts tried to get to his feet. Now that they were here, there was something they had to do. Something

— but what was it?

The next thing he knew, there was a clatter of the cell bars that jarred him awake, and a loud voice issuing from a

kind of robotlike form on wheels ordered them to get up, eat the bowl of paste thrust through the cell bars, and

get ready to report for their hearing.

A few minutes later, the cell door clanged wide open, and they were rushed out.

Directly in front of him stood a far larger metal box, on low massive wheels, with a variety of antennas sticking

up,

and mouthpieces, viewscreens, and receptor heads thrust out toward him under the glowing sign: CRIMINAL

COURT.

From this maze of screens and speakers, a voice was murmuring, ". . . fingerprints, palm prints, retinal patterns,

total body index: not on record. Conclusion unavoidable that this individual is not native to this planet."

"I've been trying to tell you that," said Roberts. "We had gravitor trouble. We headed for the nearest repair

facility, got here crippled, couldn't raise any response on the communicator, and half-a-dozen of us came down in

the ship's tender. The tender cracked up in a forest forty miles from the spaceport. Three of my men were badly

hurt. One 'of us stayed with them and two of us hiked out for help. When we reached your city, here, we got

chunks of cement slung at us, a gang of kids went for us, and then your iron gendarmes arrested us for causing a

riot."

"Unsuitable attire," snapped a voice from the metal box to Roberts' right.

Then a speaker in front of Roberts was murmuring, "On basis of correlation of statements of both accused,

overall probability of guilt is 0.2, necessity of making example 0.1. Therefore adjudge innocent, transfer to

Immigration."

At once, a loud voice announced, "We find the accused innocent of all charges brought against him."

From Roberts' captors, to either side, came low murmurs of discontent.

The large roboid before him said sternly, "This case has been transferred to Immigration for disposal. Relevant

information of interest to applicant: 1) No individual not already a citizen will be compelled against his will to

become a citizen. 2) Due to food and material shortages, no one not a citizen will be fed, sheltered, clothed, or

otherwise allowed to become a charge on the planet, until otherwise decided by the due and constituted

authorities." There was a brief pause. "Name."

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Roberts blinked. Apparently he would nave to become a citizen in order to exist while arranging for repairs.

Before Roberts could say a word he was rushed up a gravity-lift, down a hall and shoved into a room—where he

was weighed, measured, photographed, fingerprinted, palm-, toe-, and footprinted, retinagraphed, his mouth pried

open

and teeth examined—and then he was presented with an identification card and run down the hall to a window

where ration books popped out of slots onto a counter. Next he was hurried out to a store full of huge vending

machines and outfitted with a new set of clothes.

Roberts and Hammell found themselves outside, holding their own clothing wrapped in big bundles, and each

wearing a kind of loose long-sleeved blouse, loose long pantaloons, ill-fitting shoes, and a long-billed, high-

topped, floppy cap.

Roberts looked sourly up the street at the, milling crowd, then glanced at Hammell. Do you have any ideas?"

"I wouldn't know an idea if one banged into me," growled Hammell. "I'm so mad I can't see straight."

"We need to get in touch with someone in authority. If any human on this planet has authority."

"Yes," said Hammell. "But how?"

"If they have any kind of public communications system here, there ought to be a directory."

While they were trying to think where to look for one, a large mobile metal box stopped in front of them, and

abruptly shot its antennas to full height. Metal covers on its side snapped back and a dazzling yellow light flashed

in their faces. A set of long flexible metal arms whipped out, a mesh-covered speaker snapped, "Spot check," and

with a quick flip of the metal arms the robot emptied their pockets onto the sidewalk. Next, it rapidly felt them all

over, then jerked loose the bundles they were carrying, so that they spilled open in the street.

"Nonexplosive: clothing. But nonstandard. You have receipts for these?"

"Of course," said Roberts. "Yes, certainly."

"Produce the receipts."

"They're on board the spaceship Orion. We wore these clothes on board Orion, came down to arrange for repairs,

got sent to Immigration, and then got the clothes we're wearing now. These clothes in the bundles are the clothes

we wore when we came down."

"Spaceship visits are rare, improbable. It follows that this

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