Secret of the Lost Race.

by Andre Norton.

Chapter One.

JETTOWN, PORT OF N'YOK, where strange wares were sold for the amus.e.m.e.nt, fair or foul, of crewmen out of s.p.a.ce, and those who preyed upon them, and the elite who took their cut from the predators in turn. There were circles within circles on the streets, an intricate social organization which would have amazed the city dwellers beyond the rigidly drawn, yet physically unmarked, boundaries of that sinister blot edging out in a triangle, its base fronting on the scarred landing ap.r.o.ns, a narrow tongue licking "up-town."

On the streets a man's life might depend not only on his wits and toughness of body, but also on the development of a sixth sense of impending trouble. Sometimes an uneasy foreboding swept the whole area. That eerie disturbance was alive tonight, though the hour was early and few of the big spots were fully open.

Kern's SunSpot was, but the boast of the SunSpot was that it never closed. The air, tossed about but not in any manner really renewed by the conditioners, was tainted with old smoke, the aroma of weird drinks, and the old, old smell of over-crowded humanity. The big central room was as always with Step and Haggy on duty at the bar. A few of the girls were already drifting in.

Yet the young man, seated alone at the star-and-comet table, his counters in a neat rack before him, the unopened packs of kas-cards at his elbow, checked the highly illegal force-blade in the soft folds of the wide silken sash about his flat middle. His shoulders moved under the loose-sleeved jacket which covered his ruffled shirt as if he were flexing his muscles in prelude to some attack. Trouble-he could taste it, smell it-this was going to be a bad night.

He snapped on the play light above the table. Under that carefully adjusted radiance his thin face was that of a boy, wearing the faint, indecisive cast of adolescence, almost of youthful innocence. That face was worth a lot to his employer. Kern valued Joktar for his face, as well as for the keen brain behind it, and the clever, knowing hands which obeyed that brain. Kern trusted his head star-and-comet dealer as far as he trusted anyone-though that was a limited distance.

Joktar knew that his game was checked at intervals, and that a variety of sly traps had been set for him. A good many dealers in the SunSpot had come to sudden and sometimes messy ends. At least three had been delivered to the Emigration men. Kern had seen to it that all his employees were made fully aware of such object lessons. So far Joktar had run straight, not for any ethical reason since ethics were not learned on the streets, but because playing a straight game with a vip was simply good insurance.

He admired Kern's executive abilities without developing any personal liking for the man. And so far the boss of the SunSpot was the only stable thing Joktar had known in this dangerous world. He had been at the SunSpot most of the life he could remember, which was a short one for he did not even know how old he was. Though strangers always undercalculated his age by a half a dozen years or more.

Since that peculiarity added to his value to Kern, he welcomed it. Though when some buck lost at the tables and turned nasty he was apt to try to take on the "kid" for an easy smash. Accordingly Joktar had acquired a well known and respected proficiency with a force blade, and had other knowledge of odd forms of personal combat learned from tutors who had picked them up all around the galaxy. As a result Joktar of the SunSpot was now reckoned one of the deadliest infighters on the streets, though he was no call-out man with a ready challenge.

Click, click, the counters with their emblazoned stars, their glittering diamond-paint comets, moved under his slender fingers. He built a small tower, lowered it chip by chip.

Every nerve in him was responding to the unseen menace-waiting.

"The E-men are out..."

That was a whisper from beyond the table light. Joktar glanced up from his pile of counters. Hudd, the banker from the one-two table, stood there. He was a new man, but too much of a pusher. Joktar gave him another week here, perhaps a day or two more, then he'd push too far, ask one question too many and Kern'd take steps. He wasn't a police plant. So he must be a spotter from one of the other vips; somebody could be planning to pull a climb-up on Kern. Joktar smiled inwardly. How many had tried that game in the past? Almost as many as the counters in his racks. Kern had had a long run and no crack showed yet in his organization.

"They're sweeping?" he asked Hudd as if it did not matter in the least.

"The growl is that they're going to make a big pull."

A big pull. And the news pa.s.sed to him him by Hudd. Joktar added one point to the other. Could this be an oblique warning? Why? Hudd was no friend of his. So why did this newcomer wish to pull any of Kern's men out of an E-net... unless he had a future use for him. Only... Joktar had not been approached lately with any offer to change allegiance. He always reported such to Kern, knowing that at least half were tests. This a new one? by Hudd. Joktar added one point to the other. Could this be an oblique warning? Why? Hudd was no friend of his. So why did this newcomer wish to pull any of Kern's men out of an E-net... unless he had a future use for him. Only... Joktar had not been approached lately with any offer to change allegiance. He always reported such to Kern, knowing that at least half were tests. This a new one?

"Pa.s.s the word." He stubbed the light b.u.t.ton swept his card packs and counters into the wide drawer of his table and sealed them there with the pressure of his thumb in the lock slot. He stood up, slim, small, boyish, his cool eyes surveying Hudd with aloof speculation.

The other met that stare with a calculating intentness, as if the younger man was a hand held by a too-lucky player. His lips parted as if he would add to his warning. But Joktar had already turned away with the controlled litheness of a blade roan, to cross to the lift which served Kern's private apartment above.

Orrin was on guard aloft. A stocky, solid man, not yet run to seed, trained as a s.p.a.ce marine before he left that service under circ.u.mstances which made him useful to Kern. Orrin whirled, his blaster half out of the holster, as Joktar stepped from the anti-grav plate. He laughed a little raggedly, and slapped his weapon back.

"Better sing out on the way up next time, kid. A man can lose half his brain pulling a quiet come-in like that."

"You got the jumps? Well, the signs are up... trouble." Orrin's boots shuffled, his broad face was unusually sober.

"Yeah, there's a feel. You got a nudge for the boss?"

"Maybe so, maybe no. Call me in."

Orrin snapped the lever of the visa-plate, waved Joktar before it. The whirr of the answering buzzer came as a panel slid into the wall. The dealer flipped the force blade from his sash into Orrin's waiting hand. For anyone to pa.s.s Kern's door armed was to face inanimate sentries who eliminated without question. Human guards could make mistakes, Kern's last line of defense never did.

"What's the nimbler Kern's lank form sprawled on an eazee-rest. His voice was soft and the tone came from his thin, concave chest. He was dressed in street finery. His lavishly embroidered brightly colored clothes did not hide the angular lines of his ungainly body. Similarly, his long, curly, gray-brown hair, and the thatch of sideburns that grew to exaggerated points on his sunken cheeks did nothing to soften his sharp features. He pointed and Joktar sat down on a footstool-a concession.

"Nothing as yet," the dealer answered the question.

Kern's silence was an invitation to elaborate.

"I have it that the E-men are on a big pull."

"Yes," Kern yawned. "That would stir up the streets. Who spilled? One of our runners?"

"Hudd."

"Hudd. Well, well, well. Did he make this growl to you personally?"

Joktar smiled, an engaging, boyish expression, until one noted the coolness of his eyes. "He was meant to, wasn't he?"

He fully expected agreement from Kern. Every time he had spotted one of the boss's checks, Kern admitted readily enough that the test had been his idea. But this time the other shook his head.

"Not my hand, boy."

"Hudd's a plant," Joktar stated firmly.

"Certainly. But for whom, and why? Such small mysteries make life interesting. Well let him run on the string a little longer until we discover who holds the other end. So he made a point of warning you..."

"I haven't had any offers recently." Something in Kern's expression brought that out of Joktar almost against his will, and he felt self-contempt for offering that avowal.

"I know that. How long have you been here? Fourteen... no, it must be fifteen years now. And yet you still look like a dewy-eyed kid. I'd like to learn that trick, it's a neat one for our business. Yes, it was back in '08 that that doll staggered in here with you pulling her along. You were a smart brat even then. I'd like to know where you came from."

An old crawling chill touched Joktar. "You had me psyched, didn't you?" .

"Sure. And by a medic who knew his stuff. All he got from you was babble about a big ship and the port here. That doll was queer, too. I sure wish she hadn't died before Doc could run her through the hoops and really learn something. Doc swore you'd been blocked, that you'd never be able to remember more than he got out of you under a talky shot."

"Why did you keep me here, Kern?"

"Well, boy, I like puzzles and you're about the best I've ever got my hands on. You grow a little bigger, but slow, and you keep looking like a kid, yet you've got a brain that ticks fast and straight and you don't get smart ideas. You're about the best dealer I've ever seen spread out the cards. You don't take to dames, nor to rot-gut, nor to happy-smoke. Just you stay the way you are, boy, and we'll rub along without any flareback. So, this growl is that the E-men are out? Set up the house warning."

Joktar went to the panel of switches on the far wall, pulled three. Throughout the SunSpot now the general alert would go up. Not that Kern should have anything to fear from an E-raid, he paid in enough each quarter to equip fifty colonists and that was a matter of official record.

"Could it be Norwold, I wonder? He's been reaching lately. If he's due to get the blast..." Kern squirmed out of the soft eazee-rest. "Tip that flutter to Pa.s.sey, he's our spot-man at Norwold's tonight. Tell him to be ready to flit if there's a raid, but also, he's to watch where Norwold plants those two new dolls-we could use 'em here."

"Right." Joktar went out, collecting his blade from Orrin as he pa.s.sed. He wondered about Kern's guess that Norwold would be netted. You could could buy your way out of the E-pens, but the price was so high only a vip or a vip's favorite could unpocket enough. The E-men raided to obtain the cheap labor needed to open up a frontier planet. Colonists volunteered, pa.s.sed rigid tests; emigrants were dispatched by force: neither ever returned. To be caught in an E-raid was the most blighting fear which overhung the streets: processed, drugged, sent out in frozen sleep from which some never awakened, to endure slavery on an alien world. buy your way out of the E-pens, but the price was so high only a vip or a vip's favorite could unpocket enough. The E-men raided to obtain the cheap labor needed to open up a frontier planet. Colonists volunteered, pa.s.sed rigid tests; emigrants were dispatched by force: neither ever returned. To be caught in an E-raid was the most blighting fear which overhung the streets: processed, drugged, sent out in frozen sleep from which some never awakened, to endure slavery on an alien world.

Colonists were heroes. To be an emigrant one merely had to be alive, reasonably healthy, and in possession of an undamaged body-undamaged that was in the sense that one had the proper number of arms and legs. A good many men on happy-smoke went out in deep freeze. Supposing he was netted, would Kern unpocket to get him out of the pens? He doubted it.

Joktar was on the anti-grav plate when the alarms went, setting up a noiseless vibration which tingled through the flesh, nerves and blood of every man and woman under that roof. Raid, E-raid?-here Raid, E-raid?-here! So, Hudd bad given him a straight growl after all!

He slammed his hand against the controls of the grav plate, sending it up instead of down. Too late to try to reach the low runs. There was only the roof way.

But he slowed the plate at the third level. What about Kern? Orrin waved him back when he would have gone to the boss's door.

"Boss says scramble!"

The guard crowded on beside the dealer. Kern, alone, of those in the SunSpot, had the power to negotiate with the raiders. But how had his espionage system failed so badly that they had been jumped without any real warning? Was Hudd in E-service? No, he wouldn't have given a warning if that were true. Joktar asked a question of Orrin.

He shrugged. "Don't ask me me where the snap came, lad. For all I know the boss pulled this flare-back himself. He didn't spout any fire when we got the alarm." where the snap came, lad. For all I know the boss pulled this flare-back himself. He didn't spout any fire when we got the alarm."

Joktar's brain chewed that. He could see no possible cause for Kern to open the SunSpot to raiders. On the other hand the boss had a love for the devious which could be satisfied by this roundabout way of removing some subordinates. Joktar thought of the more prominent employees, trying to pick out any Kern might hold in disfavor.

The plate came to a stop and Joktar's palm flattened on the wall where the heat of his flesh, as well as the patterns on his finger tips, unlocked a door for them. Ahead was a narrow corridor. The tingle of the alarm snuffed out. Orrin snorted.

"They must be close. Let's hope most of the boys made it in time."

At the end of the corridor a series of toe and finger holds led them to climb a shaft. Topping that they would be directly under the roof. Of course the E-copters would be waiting up there, but the refugees would have fog bombs to handle that situation.

"You got a good lay-up, kid?"

Joktar's sixth sense p.r.i.c.ked. Why did Orrin ask that? Every employee of Kern had his own hiding place for the raids.

"Any reason not to try the regular?"

"Dunno," Orrin sounded uneasy. "Just wondered... if the boss did set this one off... well..."

Yes, Kern could have betrayed every bolt hole, every hideout. The trouble was, as Kern's man, he had no choice now. He'd have to follow the set pattern of escape already learned. All other avenues would be the property of Norwold's crowd, or Dander's or Rusanki's and so closed to outsiders.

"Better speed up, they'll be puffing soon," Orrin warned.

Yes, the raider would loose narcotic gas into the building, following that with the "shake-up" of sonic vibration: an efficient combination to clean out the building. Joktar pulled up to the section where he crawled on hands and knees under the sh.e.l.l of the roof. It was dark here, he would have to locate the fog bombs by touch.

His outstretched hand swept across a row of egg-shaped objects. Joktar wriggled one free and nursed it in his left hand, his other going to the blade in his sash.

He hunched close to the end of the pa.s.sage, his shoulders now under the trap door. Heaving it up an inch or so he looked out. The glare of raid lights dazzled his eyes. Bringing the small bomb up to that gap he triggered its control and rolled it out A second egg followed the first. Then there was a pain twisting at him nerve and muscle: a warning of what would be agony in seconds to come. The sonics were on below.

"Get going!" Orrin shoved him. The fog was curling up from the eggs, cutting down visibility.

"Now!" Orrin's hand at his back half propelled him through the trapdoor. Apparently the ex-marine was more sensitive to the vibrator.

Joktar went in the half-crouch of the experienced knife fighter. The fog formed an envelope about them, a mist into which E-men would not dare to blast for fear of shooting their own men.

The dealer made for the far side of the roof. He must swing over, out, and down; a way not to be taken blindly by anyone who had not practiced that maneuver. Then, a short dash to another concealed door and the rest of the escape route tailored to Kern's orders.

Joktar leaped into the whirling blank of the cottony mist. He lighted on solid footing, sped on to the door. There was no sound of Orrin behind, perhaps the guard had not dared to make that jump into nothingness. For a moment the dealer hesitated, and then the first law of his jungle prevailed: in a raid it was each man for himself.

A panel swung under his hand. He plunged through only to be pinned in a spearhead of brilliant light. Joktar's last coherent thoughts, as he went down under the full impact of a stun ray, was that he must have been included on Kern's list of expendables after all.

Joktar did not open his eyes at once. He let the senses of hearing and smell relay the first information of his new quarters to his brain. He knew he was not alone; a moan, a grunt, a querulous mumble to his left, a.s.sured him of company in misfortune. The smell of closely packed and none-too-clean humanity backed up that deduction.

He concentrated on his last clear memory, he had burst through the proper bolt hole, straight into the arms of a reception committee. So, now he must be in the E-pens. For a moment wild panic shook Joktar's control. Then he forced himself to open his eyes slowly, to lie still, when every inch of him, mind and body, clamored for action. But his first lesson on the streets had been the need for patience- that and the folly of fighting against over-whelming odds blindly and without plan.

Letting his head roll to one side he obtained a floor level view of his present quarters. Haggy from the SunSpot lay next to him, a drooling thread of saliva spinning from his slack mouth. Haggy, and beyond him was a stranger wearing the grimy skin which spelled happy-smoke addiction.

There were two more, both strangers and drifters, the sort easily swept up in any E-raid. But to find Haggy a fellow captive, that meant that more than one bolt hole of the SunSpot had been tagged. Haggy was not one to linger after the alert was on. Were all of Kern's senior employees here?

Time was one factor which must be reckoned with. Joktar tried to remember whether there had been E-ships waiting in port. But then such a raid usually occurred only when there was a ship ready. No use housing and feeding emigrants at government expense.

A man might escape from a planet-side prison. However as far as Joktar had ever heard there was no escape except a buy-out from the E-pens. Unless you could prove that you were an honest citizen in good standing with a job. They were careful on that point nowadays, ever since the big stink when they had swept up the son of a councilor who had been doing some sight-seeing on the streets and shipped him off to the stars. Now there was supposed to be a double check on the status of emigrants and that was when a buyout could be arranged. But for that a man had to have some one working from the outside.

Kern? Joktar considered the possibility of help from the boss. He thought there was a thin chance, a very thin one, of that. And a man clung to any chance at a time such as this. He had no weapon, they had taken his knife, and the very possession of such a blade would count against him. His hands explored-yes, they'd taken his purse, his other small belongings. But what he wore beneath his shirt, the one thing which he had carried out of his misty childhood, that was still on him.

"Attention!" That impersonal bark out of the air overhead was like a whip-snap. "You will come out through the door immediately!"

Chapter Two.

As A SECTION of the wall opened Joktar felt the warning twinge of a vibrator. The captives would leave, all right, or twist in agony. He got to his feet, stooped to shake Haggy. The barman moaned, opened bleared eyes which became terror-stricken as he grew aware of his surroundings. Lurching free of Joktar's hold, he staggered to the door. The dealer followed, to be caught up in the web of a tangle field. He could still walk, in fact he had to, since he was being drawn down a brightly lighted corridor, but otherwise he could not raise a finger.

The E-men had all the props. But then, why shouldn't they? The Galactic Council was solidly behind this emigration policy which worked two ways. First it got rid of the drifters and those outside the law on the civilized worlds, and second, it helped to open new planets. Thus both problems were settled to the satisfaction of all but the victims, who had no political power anyway.

Haggy had pa.s.sed through another door ahead, now it was Joktar's turn. The barman was in the process of stripping off his gaudy clothing under the supervision of a bored medic.

"All right, you there," the same man spoke to Joktar, "strip."

Joktar regarded him mutinously. They had relaxed the tangle field, but if he tried to jump the medic, they would slap it on again and they could tighten those lines of invisible energy to choke the breath out of a man's lungs. No use fighting when there wasn't the smallest chance to win. He dropped his jacket, unwound his belt sash. No chance to palm anything since they must have a spy spot on him. But, as his shirt followed his jacket, the dealer's hand went to the disc hanging on a chain about his throat.

"Hand that over, you!" the medic was alert.

For the first time since the momentary panic upon his awaking in the pens, Joktar's control came close to snapping. He stood breathing a little raggedly. The medic clasped one hand into a fist and Joktar staggered, bit his lip against an answering cry. That vicious squeeze of the tangle was a warning. He tossed the disc to the medic, who allowed it to fall to the floor and kicked it away spinning.

So he was processed after Haggy, run through the examination machines, his brain busy with escape plans as impossible as they were fleeting. Then, wearing a coverall of coa.r.s.e red stuff, vividly visible, he was steered into a cell with five others, all strangers.

They were fed from mess kits slid through a wall panel. And there was little talk among them. These were all young, Joktar noted, but of the drifter cla.s.s, spineless hangers-on such as could be picked up by the hundred in the streets. He squatted back on a bench, the mess tin on his knee.

"Hey!" one of his cellmates sidled down the bench. "You worked for Kern, didn't you?" There was a malicious twist to his half-grin. The gap between his sort and a man who was employed in one of the big spots was an ocean wide.

"Me, I usta run for Laffty 'fore he got wiped off the books," he added in a spurt of half-defiance. "Saw you in the SunSpot layin' 'em out. Think Kern'll unpocket for you now?" His grin grew wider.

Joktar shrugged, chewing methodically at the tasteless mess on his plate.