Outland Page 19

  O'Niel sighed, his expression unreadable, and turned. He strode out of the Club with half a thousand eyes fastened to his back. He didn't notice them because they didn't exist.

  Gradually conversation resumed, subdued and self-conscious.

  Lazarus turned to one of the dazed bartenders. "Bourbon and soda, fatso, and snap it up. I've got some catching up to do."

  O'Niel walked into the squad room. The next shift was waiting there, wondering what had happened to Ballard. There was some whispering when they saw O'Niel. He ignored them utterly. None had the temerity to speak. After awhile, they slowly filed out of the room and left him alone.

  The keyboard was waiting. He stared thoughtfully at the activated screens, then typed briskly.

  MESSAGE TO O'NIEL, CAROL G.—STATION GREEN. FROM O'NIEL, W.T.—IO.

  ARRIVING IN TIME FOR FLIGHT. KEEP TICKET WARM. JOB DONE. KISS PAUL FOR ME. LOOKING FORWARD TO SLEEPING WITH YOU FOR A YEAR.

  O'NIEL, W.T.—END TRANSMISSION.

  He spent another hour alone in the office, programming a chip. When he was through he deposited it in a receiving slot in the front of the console.

  Then he rose and walked out of the office for the last time . . .

  Epilogue

  The chip entered a security transmitter. The transmitter broke down the contents of the chip into a regularized pattern of electrical impulses which were metamorphosed into a stream of photons and shipped out across the vacuum.

  Relay stations picked up the stream, powerful lasers at each, regenerating the message and casting it onward through the void. Eventually the stream arrived at a security receiver, was sucked in and rearranged as electrical impulses.

  The impulses were automatically fed into a computer which decoded them. It was quite a long message, very explicit, and detailed. People arrived to study the re-integrated patterns. They began to move in response, slower than the impulses but quickly nonetheless.

  Circuitry flashed. New patterns were shunted to and fro around the solar system. Many people became aware of them. Those so apprised reacted excitedly, but for very different reasons.

  The Outland Transport was cutting the orbit of the asteroids when it was passed in space by a succession of tight-beam transmissions jumping from one booster station to the next.

  Eventually this fresh stream of information arrived at the central Security Depot on Station Green, the center for Trans-Jovian operations.

  The receiver there performed the magic of turning light into electric pulses which activated a computer, which activated a screen printer, which informed the uniformed people gazing at it of certain interesting facts.

  ANALYSIS OF DATA PROVIDED BY O’NIEL, W.T., MARSHAL RETIRED. LAST DUTY POST IO, CON-AMALGAMATED MINE.

  RESULTS

  1) RECOMMEND TRANSFER LAZARUS, MARIAN L. DR. IO INFIRMARY TO STAFF, COPERNICUS GENERAL, LUNA.

  2) INDICTMENT OF FOLLOWING, MULTIPLE CHARGES, WARRANTS ISSUED FOR:

  SHEPPARD, MARK B—IO

  APUNRA, KURAT—GANYMEDE

  VELAR, GWEN L.—STATION GREEN

  JURGENSON, KNUT S.—COPENHAGEN, NORTH EUROPE, EARTH

  MENDOZA, JORGE X . . .

  It was a very long list, and almost as satisfying to the men and women who watched it unfold on Station Green as was the warmth of the woman O’Niel held tightly next to him in the bed on board the transport . . .

  Table of Contents

  CONTENTS

  OUTLAND

  I

  II

  III

  IV

  V

  VI

  VII

  VIII

  IX

  X

  XI

  XII

  Epilogue