That was not a problem. No one would hear him. It was the pine cones he feared. If he slipped on one, he would doom himself to an eternity of falling through space. Every assignment brought new challenges, taught him new tricks of using the vibration suit.
He passed from the sturdier oaks and spruces carefully, not venturing from each concealing trunk until he stuck his head out to be certain that there were no security police picketed about. It was easy, walking into a tree. Staying inside the trunk was the trick. For it was not simply dark inside. The suit's constant shine dispelled the subatomic darkness. It illuminated the wood that seemed to touch his very corneas. They didn't touch them, of course-nothing could touch them-but the very matter of the wood coexisted with his eyeballs. It made it impossible to keep his eyes open. The blinking reflex screamed protest.
And so Rair Brashnikov would close his eyes before he stepped inside. He paused to steel his nerves and pushed his head forward. When he thought his face had cleared the tree, he opened his black eyes.
Once, in a lightning-blasted pine, he miscalculated and opened his eyes on a rotted cavity swarming with termites. They literally crawled in his face. He shouted his fright, but of course no sound could carry beyond the suit's vibratory aura. He moved on, seeking other shelter.
Brashnikov made his way through the woods in this fashion, staying parallel to Merrimack Road. He came to an open area. Beyond it was the old white house he had been told about, the Sportsman's Club. But the intervening space he would have to clear was ope". There was a pond-Peverly Pond, according to his map-and he decided that it would serve him best.
Brashnikov walked stiffly to the edge of the pond and kept going. It was not quite deep enough to conceal him at first. He had to stoop so that the water covered his head. This was the truly frightening part of
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this penetration. Walking bent over presented him the ever-dreaded risk of losing his balance. If he fell, he would keep on falling. . . .
He walked through the pond, which was not much different from walking through water in a diving suit- except for the distressing tendency of some fishes to swim into his helmet.
When he emerged on the other side of the pond, he had a direct walk to the Sportsman's Club. He made for it, crossing the Merrimack Road, which ringed it like a driveway.
The house absorbed him as a sponge absorbs water.
Inside, once certain the place was deserted, Brashnikov turned off the suit. Dusty sheets covered massive furniture. Trophies adorned a cold fieldstone fireplace, and there were plaques on the walls. There were also windows which Brashnikov could use to reconnoiter the weapons-storage bunkers.
From the second floor he saw only the slanting grass-covered backs and sides of the nearest bunkers. They told him nothing. Major Batenin's instructions had suggested the best approach route and the bunker number-445-but nothing more. Still, that was more than Brashnikov had usually received. Often he got only simple marching orders: Go there and steal that. Do not allow yourself to be seen, and above all, avoid capture. It was not easy when the vibration suit sucked so much power from the battery. A nickel-cadmium belt battery would have been better, but Brashnikov would have had to carry several spares with him at all times. It was impractical. But in a country like America, cars-and therefore car batteries-were plentiful. It was just as easy to steal one in an emergency. After two years of experimenting, Brashnikov had come to depend on the Sears DieHard battery.
Brashnikov pulled off one of the thick gauntletlike gloves and checked his watch. Batenin had told him to wait until midnight, when the guard changed. It was
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nearly nine now. But as his eyes tracked the tall lattice-legged gun tower, and the great open spaces around the security fence, Brashnikov wondered if it would be possible even for him to slip up to Bunker Number 445 unseen. At night the suit's steady glow was like carrying a jack-o'-lantern. Worse, it was like being the jack-o'-lantern.
Brashnikov waited patiently. The guards climbed down off the tower like well-rehearsed spiders, their rifles slung over their shoulders. One came down a little after the other and seemed reluctant to go. But finally he disappeared down the utility road and was gone.
Brashnikov hesitated. Where was their relief? The solitary tower looked deserted, but it was impossible to tell. Its windows were smoked glass.
He decided that the relief team was for some reason delayed. It would be now or never.
Turning on the suit, he emerged from the lodge- first his head, then the rest of him.
Moving in a flat-footed run, he melted through the fence and across the green. The first bunker was Number 443. He moved to the next. It said 444. Good. He kept going until he came to the imposing black double door of Bunker Number 445. It looked like the entrance to some medieval castle with its massive external hinges and locking mechanism.
Brashnikov shut his eyes and put his head in. When he opened them, he saw only subatomic blackness. The gritty interior of the door was in his face. It was obviously a very thick door. He took a chance and walked into it. Craning forward, he opened his eyes again.
The faint shine of the suit illuminated a dark empty space. He stepped in.
He found himself on a bare floor. The walls were a pale gray, like newly poured concrete. A telephone was mounted on a bracket; otherwise the area was empty.
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There was another door beyond. It was like an air lock. He walked up and put his head into it.
Rair Brashnikov saw the object of his mission at once.
It stood on a pedestal in the center of the next room. Clearly this room was where nuclear bombs were stored. But there were no nuclear bombs stored here now. Instead two thin spotlights mounted on the ceiling crisscrossed downward to illuminate what looked to be a scale model of a futuristic boomerang-shaped jet. The model was transparent, as if cast in clear Lucite. It had a wingspan of perhaps a dozen feet. Only the wheels, the innards of the transparent dual wing turbines, and the tiny figure of a doll pilot were visible.
According to the briefing Major Batenin had given him, this was a small-scale version of a plane actually in development. It operated by radio control and could in fact turn virtually invisible when powered up and sent aloft, just as later full-scale versions would.
Stealing it should be a simple task, Brashnikov realized. But before he stepped into the vaultlike area, he checked the walls for guards or video cameras.
He saw none. The room was dim, even with the spotlights, which cast only a wan light. There was a hazy quality to the air, as if many people had been smoking in a poorly ventilated room. Brashnikov noticed one peculiar thing. Tall bluish mirrors hung on three of the walls, one to each wall. They reflected the bizarre sight of his glowing soap bubble of a face sticking to the wall like a leech.
Satisfied that the mirrors were harmless, Rair Brashnikov stepped all the way into the room. He walked carefully to the pedestal. The details of the craft, as he got nearer, were exquisite.
"Kmhseevah," he breathed in admiration, suddenly wishing that there were two planes. He would enjoy having such a toy for himself. But keeping this one for
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himself was out of the question. Batenin would kill him. Literally.
Brashnikov stopped before the pedestal. He looked around one more time, uneasily. He felt eyes upon him. But again, he was certain there were no video cameras. And he was obviously alone. Except for the pedestal-mounted model and the tall wall mirrors, the room was bare.
He turned off the suit. The fabric loosened and the unpleasant vibration in his teeth came and went quickly.
Smiling beneath his crinkling membrane of a helmet, he reached for the aircraft model.
His heart leapt up into his throat. His fingers went right through it!
Brashnikov tried again. But again, his hands merged with the craft's hull unfeelingly.
Frowning, he wondered if the suit was still somehow operating. Perhaps he hadn't turned it off all the way. He forced the rheostat angrily.
Now it was off for certain. He grabbed for the plane. But again his hands touched only air.
His unease rising, Rair Brashnikov turned the rheostat the other way. He felt the familiar vibration anew. Okay, he thought to himself, suit is operating. I must remain calm. This should be simple. Now I will simply turn suit off.
He twisted the rheostat the other way. The vibration ceased. Brashnikov reached for the aircraft. His fingers touched it. But they felt nothing. He clenched his hands, but the model stayed in place. Nothing he did disturbed it. Its gleaming immobility seemed to mock him.
Rair Brashnikov felt a ringing in his ears. Something was wrong. Something was terribly wrong. He was insubstantial no matter what he did. What had gone wrong? Was the suit malfunctioning? Was it about to go nuclear? Or-and this somehow seemed to him infinitely more terrible than going up in a boiling ball
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of atomic fire-had his body become stuck in the vibratory pattern of the suit? Was he doomed to forever walk the earth a living ghost? It was too horrible to contemplate.
Brashnikov had no time to contemplate the possibility any longer, for on opposite walls two of the blue floor-length mirrors shattered with a single sound.
Brashnikov wheeled. He saw the tiny Oriental in black coming at him, his skirts flying, his face tight with anger.