Patrick Wilkins

“ There was a guard outside the airlock of each of the warships, for the crews remained aboard constantly. These guards were standing around talking to friends or moving restlessly about.
The sentries saluted Aron as he marched by, for they could see the brass on his uniform gleaming in the dark. He found what he wanted, a group of four guards talking by one airlock. They snapped to attention as he approached.
The base had expanded so rapidly, with new units and men being shifted constantly, that Aron counted on the men not knowing exactly who the Captain of the guards should be. ”

“ People you have known suddenly become beasts. Your world has collapsed. And even if you know the reason, it doesn't seem possible, the reason is out of a textbook and unreal, but the disillusionment and despair are all too real. ”

“ Then you try to judge galactic politics and the decisions of a man caught up in the rip tides of these politics, when all you know is your own vicious lives. You are traitors as much as any man, for you have sacrificed your normal lives to dedicate yourself to the violent dead-end of a soldier of space. ”

“ There is the actual administration, with its members drawing set salaries and unable to draw luxury pay, to prevent graft; and then there is the Economics Commission, which controls luxury pay.
"This Economics Commission is a business. They invest in galactic corporations, such as ours, and make a profit. That's part of their money. Then—and here's the secret—any time a book is written, or fine merchandise produced, it must be sold on Lyrane at cost. But the government sells it throughout the galaxy for a profit, and keeps that profit to redistribute in luxury pay to Lyranian citizens. ”

“ This stipend was enough to cover all the basic wants of the individual.
"To procure luxuries, a citizen had to use the money he received for his good deeds or thoughts. Every time a man helped an old lady across the street, or came up with a bit of philosophical wisdom, he could record it with a central office and receive his luxury pay from the government.
"The purpose of the system was to make people emphasize virtue and quality in their lives. Instead of concentrating on profit for profit's sake, they would have to consider the inherent rightness and beauty of what they were doing." ”

“ Aron was still smiling when the blast of the Intelligence man's gun blew his head off.
As he left the station, all the agent could think of was one phrase he had heard many times jokingly; but now it became a grim accompaniment for his footsteps. Though he didn't want to hear it, it kept whispering through his mind every few seconds.
"Live fast, fight hard, die young—and have a radiation-rotted corpse."
Two hours later the United Empire fleet landed on Kligor. They came to claim the sixty ships lying waiting—waiting—in the peaceful valley that was still tainted with the smell of chlorine. ”

“ Why do the people feel they have been deceived, and by whom? Why are all the incorporated men in danger of their lives?"
"It is the corporation-men who have deceived the public." It was a flat statement by Erol, without rancor or sympathy. "They are, in consequence, subject to the wrath of the people who relied upon them."
The bewilderment in the young man's eyes deepened. "How could they deceive the public? Why? They had everything to gain from earning luxury pay for their stockholders. ”

“ When man had flung himself madly at the galaxy, he had diffused himself thinly over a macroscopic area. Some almost isolated colonies had developed the inevitable thirst for independence.
From local but violent wars between colonies, some semblance of order had been wrought. Now there were two sprawling interstellar empires, the United Empire—Aron and Martha were citizens—and the People's Republic. ”

“ Two human beings alone on this wild, lonely planet. Aron's mind suddenly snapped from that frame of reference—his subjective view of their position—to the scale of galaxies. It was a big planet to them, but it was a marble in the galaxy that man had discovered and claimed, and was now fighting with himself to retain. This aggregate of millions of pebbles was wracked with the violence of war, where marbles were more expendable than the microbes that dwelt on them. ”

“ Yes, I can understand all too well how you feel. It's really horrible when you have grown up in a society, learned about its every intricacy, its principles, and come to have faith in it—then see it suddenly disintegrate. ”

“ While the agent sat down with a puzzled look, Aron continued, "That is why, when there is combat between men, it will always be in doubt. Even though one side may be outnumbered, outmaneuvered and have all the military laws of advantage against it, that side can still win.
"You have made the one mistake, the perpetual mistake, of combat. You forgot about the psychological factor. The force that can make a man surrender when the odds are with him, or fight like a demon when it is hopeless. ”

“ Some of those people had their life's saving of luxury pay invested in the corporation-men, and when those men failed them, they lost their savings and their futures. Poverty is a treacherous catalyst, it makes men do weird and horrible things. Common tricks of psychology added to that, make the whole mess into a primitive society of revenge and hatred. ”

“ In a quieter tone, Aron went on, "It is easy to love a state like a woman, because a State is a woman.
"A love for State fulfills all emotional needs. The censorship of yourself by your super-ego, manifested in a desire for repentance or masoschism, this need is effected by dedication such as my lonely watch here.
"Your destructive tendencies, half of the love-hate primary drive of life, can be expressed by fighting and destroying an enemy. You can't destroy your wife because of laws, yet everyone wants to. ”

“ Florin smiled. "I do not feel that I have been betrayed. I know that the corporation-men, representing the most intelligent element of Lyrane, wouldn't do this thing without a sound reason."
Erol said, "Apparently you wish to throw in your lot with us, rather than the mob."
"My loyalty to my teacher and his associates compels me to do so. It is also my personal desire."
"You won't get any luxury pay for that loyalty," Yma snapped.
"That's unfair. You know Tomlin always advocated proper living from a moral obligation rather than for mercenary reward." ”

“ Kim made one last desperate appeal. "I firmly believe that this should be a Class AA emergency!"
"Your field of specialization is overriding your business sense, Kim. You are fascinated, as an economist, by this Lyrane system, and you would like to see us put it back on its feet so you economists would have a live experiment to observe. I'm sorry, but it isn't practical. You know how fantastically expensive a Class AA is, and no one planet is about to get it." ”

“ Aron took interest, demanding that the man start from the beginning again as he had missed the introductions due to slight surprise.
"I said I am Karl Rondwell, an agent and representative of the People's Republic, being a member of the Intelligence department of her imperial navy," the man replied.
"The first question is, naturally," Aron said, "How the Hell did you get here?"
A slight smile. "Your much-vaunted defenses that are supposed to be able to snuff out the mightiest fleet, these defenses are easy to pass—for one man." ”

“ They certainly need it to support a planet."
"That's the easiest part of it. People would use their luxury pay to establish businesses. At these businesses men could work their five hours a day to get their commodity pay. It was not only possible, but mandatory that such businesses develop. There were two types: mass production of commodities, with a regulated profit in commodity pay; or specialization and production of fine merchandise that was sold at cost, but which the government paid for in luxury pay in proportion to its quality as thoroughly tested. ”

“ Where could they get men with the intelligence and ability required to operate one of these stations and cope with situations such as I've faced here? Where would they get such men to renounce the brilliant careers they could have amongst civilization with such capabilities?"
"Damn it! Stop playing games. Spill what you've got to say!"
Aron looked at him coldly, searchingly, "Since you are attached to the Navy I imagine you've clocked many hours in space." When the agent nodded, Aron said, "Then, if you are lucky and show enough sense, you will become a TA man." ”

“ Kalgor, capital of the Galactic Empire, is not, as one would expect, one solid city. As a matter of fact, it is more suburban and rural than many farming planets.
The reason is obvious if but considered. The galactic government and the equally large galactic businesses are so immense that they must be distributed throughout the whole galaxy, with only the very cream of the hierarchy located on Kalgor. Thus, each company would have only one small building—but with a communication web that enfolded macroscopic enterprises.
Universal Relief Incorporated was typical of this arrangement. ”

“ And at every turn, every election, guided by citizen-agents who would never have seen political power under the old status quo.
"The future of this plan is even more fascinating—putting Lyrane on an industrialized economy, when Lyrane has never had industrial potential, gumming up the works with embargoes and tariffs; and a bureaucratic, leech-like government that will sop up everything in taxes.
"It's a masterpiece of planning—of planning the permanent financial and moral destruction of a planet." ”

“ They can take it if they want to, but it's hard to find the right woman; and even then she must want to take it by being with the man she loves, or perhaps it is psychological—martyring themselves to gain a subtle control of that man, which they all want to do.
"When you get a woman who can't, or doesn't want to take it, she can pull a beautiful crack-up. Without friends to appreciate her martyrdom, with a husband who refuses to acknowledge it, she sometimes uses the supreme martyrdom to gain recognition."
"Instinct tells me to slug you in the teeth," Aron said, "but apathy forbids me." ”

“ This luxury pay, issued in a different currency than the commodity pay, could be used in any way a person saw fit. Some people naturally developed the idea of investing stock in a particularly virtuous or intelligent person. Every time that person did a good deed, the stockholders received a dividend from his luxury pay. All of the scientists and philosophers, therefore, became corporations in themselves, with as many as five thousand people holding stock in one man. ”

“ You wouldn't know that, or the reasons for it, unless you knew my whole life—and not just the events of my life, my whole psychological life."
"Of course we couldn't know that," the enemy agent said, "but we could go on general rules of human behavior, and those rules deny the fact that a man can love a state more than a woman."
"Good God!" Aron exclaimed. "What training do you Snooper boys get? You don't even know the rudiments of psychology. Intelligence men—ha! All you know how to do is steal papers, kill in the dark and be suspicious of everyone all the time." ”

“ For once a man, who has been a stable entity in a stable organization, develops and believes a strange and contradictory idea—the result is inevitable. Misunderstanding, resentment, hate, violence. The cycle carries on from there with its own momentum. ”

“ Aron barked. "They rot your cells, weaken the blood, ruin the body. A man can spend about five years as a spaceman, about twenty months of which is spent in actual space. Twenty months and the man is doomed.
"If the man is smart he can become a space officer, then when he retires at twenty-five, he can land a good job with the TA. He doesn't want anything to do with civilization. ”

“ The fate of one planet, more or less, is irrelevant.
"Galactic Aid's method of destroying us for that advantage was very crude and very simple; but effective because of its simplicity.
"As you know, the ratio of corporation-men to citizens here is very disproportionate, and the economy of the planet is vested in comparatively few individuals. These few people were the ones Galactic Aid attacked.
"They sent their agents to the corporation-men, my father included, and told them to stop research, writing, art, or whatever they were doing to earn their luxury pay. ”

“ Aron was unmoved by his threats and denunciations. The Intelligence man was going to kill him, certainly, but the officer wanted to make him suffer first, to make him squirm.
When one man has defeated and completely made fools of a galactic empire, killing is too simple.
"We weren't stupid enough to try to coerce you with pure logic," the agent was saying to Aron. "We knew you must have a large amount of patriotism to even take such a thankless job as this Kligor post." ”

“ How could these incorporated individuals get any luxury pay for themselves if they had to hand it out to their stockholders?"
"The administration would allow for that. A person received luxury pay in proportion to the number of stockholders that he claimed. The government had to do this since they indirectly were investing in these corporation-men—but I'll explain that later.
"The corporation-man lived off the original investments of stockholders, with some of the stock solvent for sales. In this way, the individual would profit from "good-doing" by receiving many new investments." ”