Flight of the Maita Supercollection 3: Solving Galactic Problems Collector's Edition Read online

  "Something must be done – or should it? Why not allow them to settle most of the problems, let the waves circulate around the vacation worlds, then let them begin to believe they had won some kind of battle – and set them against one another?

  "The man waited and watched and stirred and planned until it all came around. He was feeling pleased with himself because he could do all of this without involving anyone else. He was a fool. He will probably always be one.

  "Now E and F were going to kill off A through D!

  "The man didn't want bloodshed, but knew there had already been a lot of it and much worse. His dilemma was that it could spread and innocent people would be hurt. This must be handled in a way to keep it confined to a certain strata of society, but how to do it?

  "Then the great good luck of this man came again to the front. There was a planet experiencing difficulties with senseless assassinations. It was a new world directly in the sights of the emperor, himself! Everyone knows Maita will brook no interference in these things. He would, by all the talents in figuring chance the man had, send a team of investigators there. By all the odds he would go himself with Z and Thing or he would send Tabori R. DeSixtee. Maybe both! – the important thing being a direct line to the ear of the emperor be opened. The emperor personally fought to free these vacation worlds from pirates and he damned well wouldn't let another form of pirates take them away from him!

  "The man needed an anomaly. Something that would appear to be incongruous to the investigator, so he would check. The person he checked must have a firsthand story of the syndicate operating on the vacation worlds. There was a problem on Sentah where the board of directors were staying. That had to be in the focus of the problem.

  "I understand the dear friend of this man who went to that world under attack was contacted for a far different reason than was originally planned, but that has proved to have no merit at all. He was contacted! It had worked!

  "You see, this man started to build a dream, the dream turned into a nightmare. Now the dream is back. The response to all of this is very exactly what the man planned. The emperor became personally involved and sent his investigators, who were able to break up the whole criminal operation from the top down. It can't possibly hold together now! Only Thing, here, has the ability to do the same thing again, but now the empire or the VWPA can move to prevent it.

  "I know Chief Inspector Neels on Sentah is in the employ of the board of directors. None of it could have happened after the first casino was purchased without his wholehearted and greedy cooperation. The man would like for the empire to know that.

  "There is no more board of directors, but the man knows how the system works and he knows all the contacts. Neel's greed, like was once the case of the man we have been discussing, knows no bounds. He must be stopped. The man now knows he had the real treasure at the first step onto this world. He had friends, some criminal in some ways, but all true friends.

  "Now we can discuss the possibilities of prosecution of that man if you like."

  [ There is no way we could prosecute the man at this point, because the last who could have implicated him on the probe are dead. ]

  "You couldn't prosecute that man if they had lived to take the probe," Dlort argued. "He didn't do a thing that was deliberately criminal."

  "Then that man would take the probe?" Kit asked.

  "That man would not!" Moodad said, sharply. "That man has found friends, almost lifelong friends, who it is stated are criminals – or were criminals. That man must consider those friends."

  "You could take the probe," Z suggested. "We could give you a list of questions which you would answer. Only the machines would ever know any of it. We could first remove the recorder unit. The machine would indicate only if you were being truthful or lying on those specific questions asked."

  "If I could trust you I would do it," Moodad replied. "This whole thing came about because I trusted."

  [ I, Thing, Mentan, citizen of the Maitan Empire and of Empire Center, personal representative of the Emperor Maita, do swear that only machines will ever know of any testimony you offer to give to the probe and that only those questions given to you on a list before the session will be asked. I do swear the recording device will be removed from that machine and the machine will make no record whatever of any of your testimony. These things I swear in the name of Emperor Maita. Is that good enough an oath? ]

  Moodad stared at the pile of feathers that was Thing, smiled, and said, "If you will personally ask those questions and will swear that no one but yourself and machines will know the questions or answers it will do nicely."

  [ So sworn. Kit, call the floater to bring a probe unit here. Moodad will supply the place for this session, as he will know better than anyone which place has real privacy here. He may call in his own technician to guarantee the recorder is removed from the probe. ]

  "You can remove the recorder," Moodad said. "If there's one thing certain in this galaxy it's that no one would swear an oath in the name of Maita and dare to break it!"

  "Maita does have a vicious temper in those cases," Z agreed. "That's precisely why there are no such cases in the past three hundred years. Come on, Kit, let's you and Dlort and I go look at the view from up here."

  Maita would monitor the probe, of course, even if it was all on fastcom. Maita might be halfway across the galaxy on the plague investigation, but Thing had told the exact truth. Only machines would ever know the answers unless there was a direct lie and that machine would record nothing. Maita was a machine, but it wasn't that machine!

  Two hours later, Thing, Z, and Kit climbed aboard T6 right there in the courtyard. Dlort and Moodad bid them good fortune and went back inside. The story had apparently been true in all details – and Z had been right from the first. It had been a problem on Sentah, all along.

  Lahlee leaned against Z's shoulder as the ship pulled away from the dock. Moodad and Dlort walked back along the dock to the street to get into the car and to be driven back to the house where Z stayed the past four days with Lahlee. He was amazed at the variety of people who came and went in that house. Everyone knew Moodad and Dlort and brought all their problems and triumphs to be shared with them.

  Like some corny old movie, Moodad had come full circle back to the time when he first discovered life was no good unless shared. Z tended to feel like that when he found special relationships on his own. He very seldom felt this kind of closeness. That was one of the things one gives up whenever he accepts the virtual immortality Maita gave to its crew. His closeness was generally shared with the machines and with Thing. Their deep love and sharing was a real thing, but he could never really understand any of them and they couldn't understand him.

  Well, Lahlee couldn't either, but.... He had come a long way. Now he could see the immortality was truly a curse, yet he had given up so very much for it. More and more he knew that.

  He had gained much, too. What he had was so much more than any Earthman had ever known before. The question was whether or not it was worth it.

  He supposed it was. Not living as long as he chose. That part wasn't really all he thought it was going to be. It was a little bite of time here and there that held the meaning.

  Etel, now Lahlee. The Maitan girl who had stayed with him for four years on EC and then had gone back to Plamaita. Now Lahlee would spend the remainder of her vacation as Z's guest on EC. She would ride to EC and later come back here to Frim on the emperor's own ship. That huge, platinum-plated ship! Her excitement was beautiful to see, but she would tire of him very quickly.

  That wasn't cynicism, just truth. They were new and different to each other and could enjoy that difference. They had a certain respect and a caring for one another, but it wasn't love. Not by a long shot.

  Kit and T6 had gone to Perfect 3 to wait for Tab and TR, who would be back there in a few hours. They had solved the problem of the Tlessarian brain ships, it seemed.

  Z was no longer ashamed to say he wor
ried about his mechanical friends. He had grown up. He could tell a machine he loved it and could mean those words. He could say those words to Thing without embarrassment.

  Why was it so much harder to hear them say the same words to him?

  Maita wanted Z and Thing to go on the exploration trip in fifteen days or so. They were both anxious to be going. Kit was as delightful a friend as T6 had proved to be. It was going to work very well for everyone.

  Z had known the loss of his old friends, such as Ape and Joe and ET. He knew how T6 felt when Rimalt died and, yes, a machine, T6, felt sorrow and grief as much as any organic.

  Thing was on Menta, visiting its family.

  Z hadn't thought about Thing as having a family before and was confused about the family unit when there were four sexes. Thing said families knew each other and met once in awhile, but it was no big deal.

  Kit said the Mentan's famous mental abilities were needed in such a society – to know what relation each of the family were, what with quarter brothers and quarter sisters and worse!

  Sisstuh had first said it, if Z remembered correctly, but Tous and the Zulians and so many others said the same thing.

  The magnificence of a person can be measured in the scope of his dreams.

  Moodad could get back to his dream. The vacation worlds now had strong safeguards to catch gangsters and criminal syndicates before they ever got started. The VWPA had a new safeguard to stop another Neel from ever getting into the position where he could aid any such organization. There was that to be gained even in such a sordid thing as a crime syndicate. Another small patch on the fabric of the empire. It was holding together very well, and was getting stronger in many ways.

  Maita was agonizing about the probe, but that was an endless debate. That was one of those things where the rules had to be bent constantly and where decisions were needed on individual cases. It was back to the point of stopping harm to many people being more important than the rights of one individual.

  Z had started believing there was no place where there was any excuse for using the probe except by permission, but had come around to believing to act in that manner sacrificed the rights of everyone to be safe and secure to the right of one person to privacy. He still believed a person had the right to privacy, but now felt the right to privacy wasn't invaded if the reading were done by a machine. If guilt was shown, then that guilt in certain very specific types of crime should be known. Only that one crime, not all the petty little shameful details that are a part of almost everyone's life, but which are silly to others. The probe was much more likely to prove innocence than to prove guilt, in most cases.

  It was a strange galaxy. It always would be a strange galaxy.

  Soon Maita, a platinum plated spaceship, Thing, a squarish rubbery ball with tentacles (And an intelligence much too high to measure) and Z, an Earthman, would go out to explore on the outer rim of the galactic central sphere while Tab and Kit, two robots, would go with their own intelligent ships to solve detective riddles and other mysteries.

  These beings shared their lives.

  The empire was a huge sharing thing. It was just a matter of growing up and learning those things you get from your greed have no meaning. What you give is what counts. There is no purpose to personal accumulation, whether that hoarding is money or anything else. The motive assesses the value or becomes the primary agent of devaluation. The universe owes nothing to anyone. Life isn't made up of debits and credits. That's a false doctrine leading to only emptiness.

  Z knew a great emptiness. He had been searching for three hundred years for something to fill that void. At the same time he knew he had more than most beings ever could know. There was also the fullness of his friendships and the knowledge he had proven his worthiness to exist if any ever had. For many years he thought the emptiness was the longing for Earth, but he went to Earth to discover the homesickness was superficial and he didn't much care if he never went back.

  He then thought it was because he wouldn't have a true and lasting love in his life for a woman, but he truly and deeply loved the Maitan girl. The emptiness was there for the entire four years she had been with him. (He didn't know he was the father of her son, now a father himself. He wouldn't be ready for that, even after three hundred years.)

  He had grown some more here on Frim. Moodad had shown him how the emptiness was filled if ever it was. He had to accept it wouldn't be filled for him because it was the reaching for, not the attaining of, a great dream. Moodad had reached his dream and was filled. Z's dream wasn't within the grasp of possibility to hold. Moodad's dream was defined and known, he set out to fulfill that dream, did so, and was now truly happy. Z's dream was unreachable for the very reason it was not defined. He didn't know what it was!

  He didn't envy Moodad. He was happy for him because the dream and its end were there and because Moodad had accomplished it all, but now Z felt there was no reason for Moodad to go on. It was done. Z would continue to go on because he had a responsibility to Maita and Thing, therefore, his dream must always be beyond his grasp. Life would be intolerable, otherwise. He was very seldom philosophical. He was the type who acted now and thought later, but, as stated earlier, he had finally grown up.

  He had known only one time when he felt he may have reached his goal and when he may be fulfilled. That was when the Pweetoos were destroyed and Maita and that tyranny's people were freed. He was accepted by a select group and was a part of that group. It was the first time in his life he felt he had any personal worth. It was the first time in his life he opened himself to emotional sharing. It was the first time he ever had any reason to believe the fact Steven Parker Zutec existed was important to anything. Looking back, Z could see how easy it might have been to stop then and there. He would now be much like Moodad. Fulfilled and happy.

  No, he would have been dead for two centuries or more, because that was stagnation in its worst form. There simply would have been no reason to continue. The sense of adventure would be gone, the love for others would have become fixed. He wouldn't have ever been able to enjoy the games they played. Without the deep respect and caring for one another the jibes and insults would hurt and cause retaliation. The fun would have died.

  Life was that more than any of the other things now. It was great fun!

  With an entire galaxy to explore, life couldn't become a bore. To play with Thing like small children, running around in Maita, hiding to spring out at one another, was an important part of the fun. Maita would complain about it, but would instigate, at the same time. Maita liked playing children's games as much as anyone else.

  Z walked Lahlee up onto Maita and the ramp slid in. The door closed, they went into room two, which was very comfortable, then to the pilot's dome. Maita would stop beyond EC to show her the magnificence of those three stars set at the points of a perfect triangle, each its own color with the single planet at the center of the figure.

  Those people, never met and never known except through that one work, had dreamed a huge dream. They had established this figure in space as a beacon to others, saying, "We are here! Come to us!"

  Z looked at Lahlee, strolling around the dome, and shook his head. She had proved to be a fascinating person. She had learned everything about the sea and about ships and was living a sort of dream of her own, though the automation took much of it away. She had notices out among the traders she was seeking employment as a captain or deck hand on a more primitive world without all the automation. Tlorg would accept her, but as a demon. They weren't yet ready to meet otherworlders except as fantasy creatures.

  She would be happy there and would play the role of demon very well. They still had a few pirates on Tlorg, along with kings and sorcerers. They were at that stage of development. Z halfway decided to try to talk Maita into setting something up, though he knew it would never happen. Maita wouldn't take that kind of chance, but the argument may stimulate it to find what she wanted.

  Z looked around the dome and felt
warm and at home there. He couldn't begin to think of all the adventures Maita and the dome were a part of. All of those beings who had shared that dome at one time or another seemed, for a moment, to be there, smiling and sharing stories of the crazy things that had happened and the peoples he'd met.

  Maita flashed out of TTH drive at the best spot for Lahlee to view the EC system. The dome cleared (It must be opaqued in most TTH planes. The normal mind couldn't comprehend the extra angles and the viewer would quickly go mad) to show the sight. Lahlee gasped. Z was awed every time he saw it, too.

  Maita once brought the Parf, Tous, and several of his friends here and had stayed in exact synchronization with the spinning of the system for more than eighty hours. The painting Tous made was hanging in the Emperor's Art Gallery on EC and the one painted by Bette was hanging in Z's bedroom.

  Any painting by a Parf is unmatchable, and those two paintings were superb, even for that standard. Somehow, there was more in those paintings than there was in the actual viewing. Maita said it was because the artists paints it as he sees it and what makes an artist is seeing things differently.

  There were paintings by several Parf, several Zulians, and several Woost in the Emperor's Art Gallery. It was said to have a painting there was, beyond question, the highest honor any artist could attain.

  That was part of the equation. There must be excellence in the dream. It must be vast and awesome, but must have excellence, or it will fail.

  Maita took them into its hangar on EC and they disembarked. Lahlee asked if she would meet the emperor directly, but Z had to disappoint her by saying no one could meet the emperor directly and know who he was. That was an old rule that wouldn't be broken for any reason. It served well to hide the fact Maita was, in fact, the spaceship.