Chapter 18 HOPIE

The crisis came upon us at a time not of our choosing. President Tocsin had of course discovered that I was on Ganymede-indeed, we had taken no great precautions to conceal that-and elected not to sit and wait for my action. He ordered the Jupiter Navy to quarantine Ganymede, and demanded that my sister and I be extradited to Jupiter for justice. Of course the justice he had in mind was execution for our violation of the exile. Naturally the Premier of Ganymede refused.

Accordingly, the ships of the Jupiter Navy moved into place about Ganymede-and warships of Saturn appeared in Jupiter space. Abruptly there was a planetary crisis, for both these maneuvers were technically acts of war. It was time for me to act, even if my sister had not completed her preparations.

When I received the news of the deployments I was- well, let me describe it as it happened.

"Hope," Doppie called, in her guise as Spirit.

I lifted my head from Rue's architecture. "Can it wait?"

"No," she said firmly.

Fortunately, I was clothed. I got up and went to the holo unit. There was Tocsin's head, talking. ". . . for the duration of the crisis," he was saying.

"Is that-?" I asked.

"Has to be," Rue said behind me.

Tocsin's visage was replaced by that of the Premier of Ganymede. "Tyrant, Jupiter is striking," he said without preamble. Then he paused, looking past me, as he tended to do when Rue was present.

I glanced about. She hadn't bothered to don her halter or blouse. "Go change,"

I told her, then faced the Premier. "What's the situation?"

He recovered his attention. "Blockade," he said. "Ships orienting on our planet. The poison demands your head."

"The poison" was the Saturnist name for Tocsin. "Then it is time for countercheck," I said, experiencing the excitement of the burgeoning crisis.

"Done," he said. It was not immediately apparent on our holo, but at that point the Saturn ships began to manifest.

"I'll give my address now," I said. I regretted having to jump the laser on Spirit, but we had known this could happen.

"Connected, Tyrant," he said grimly.

"I've got the phone," Rue said, and took Doppie's place. This was of course no business for Doppie, who was able only to emulate Spirit in appearance, not action.

"Good enough," I said, glancing across at her as I took my seat by the holo broadcast unit. And saw that she was still bare-topped. That was the sort of stunt only Roulette would pull! Well, she could set the pickup for head only, and no one would know. Of course it would seem strange when Rue answered incoming calls instead of my secretary Forta, but that could not be helped; it was the penalty for being caught unexpectedly.

My holo showed the great planet of Jupiter as seen from Ganymede, its clouds clear in their bands and convolutions. That was my signal that the override broadcast was operating. Virtually every functioning holo receiver on Jupiter would receive my broadcast, not the program it was tuned to. It would not take long for the Jupiter technicians to void this, perhaps only ten minutes, but that should be enough.

"Hello, people of Jupiter," I said in English. "I am Hope Hubris, your former Tyrant. I was exiled five years ago, but now I have returned to resume the government of Jupiter." I paused, glancing at Rue.

It took a few seconds for the reaction from Jupiter to start, because Ganymede is about three light-seconds out, and of course this broadcast was coming as a complete surprise to the planet. Many holo sets had a feedback mechanism, whereby the recipient could send a positive or a negative reaction to what he received. The positive would manifest as a musical note at my end, while the negative would be a somewhat sour bleep.

Of course I was concerned about the nature of the sound I would hear. I believed the people would support me, but could not be sure; politics is a treacherous business, and the public can be fickle. I had to have the mass of the people with me, or this would not work.

The sounds started. First a few bleeps, dismaying me, then some mixed notes.

Then, as if suddenly finding the range, the music came on loudly: hundreds, then thousands, then tens of thousands of notes, drowning out the scattered bleeps.

I smiled. "I see you remember me," I said, letting the music play as a background to my voice. "You also know that your current government has descended rapidly into corruption and incompetence. The good officials I installed have been replaced by creatures of the ancient sort, who are more interested in the public trough than in the public good." As I spoke, the music swelled steadily. I was reaching my audience, in the fashion I had, moving them though I could not see them.

"Industrial efficiency has declined," I continued, following the script we had prepared. "The planetary debt is rising. Freedom of the press has been curtailed. In fact, the leading critic of my day, Thorley, is now in prison."

This time I paused for a full ten seconds to let the reaction manifest. It came like a crashing chord; I had indeed scored.

Rue was watching me instead of her holo, rapt. She was sending out signals of wonder and joy, delighting in the way I was moving the people of Jupiter. The monitor of the number of sets tuned in was rising rapidly; I had started on a preemptive basis, but now they were seeking me.

However, I knew that Tocsin would be barking orders between curses. I had only a few more minutes before I got cut off; I had to make them count.

"I was deposed by my wife, Megan," I said. "She believed I was abusing the power that I had, and that madness was distorting my judgment. She believed in the democratic process, and I was not honoring that. I have known many women, and some have been beautiful." I glanced across at Rue. The monitor of the holo indicated that she was now being picked up, nude torso and all. In six seconds the sound would go crazy! "But the one I most truly respect is my wife, and she is the one I still heed." I peered into the holo as if searching for a particular person, while the sound did indeed go crazy, on its delayed response to Roulette. "Megan! Are you on?"

The seconds passed, and abruptly the sound abated, as if every watcher were holding his breath. Then my wife did indeed appear, hardly even seeming surprised. She was older than I remembered her-but of course I had not been with her for fifteen years, and she was now past seventy. "Megan," I said to her. "Do you still oppose-"

But now Tocsin cut in. The delay meant that he had started earlier, but this was where I heard him. "Mrs. Hubris," he said. "You cannot allow this dictator to return!"

Now I was silent too, along with Jupiter, awaiting her reaction.

Megan turned her gaze on Tocsin, her ancient enemy. She said no word. Then she turned her back on him.

The holo cut off. Tocsin's technicians had established their intercept, and my broadcast could no longer get through. But it had been enough. Megan would not oppose me-and the people of Jupiter knew it.

I relaxed, for the moment. I felt my age after brief periods of effort like this. I had swayed the common folk of Jupiter to my support, in the way that I had, but it had required energy, and I was abruptly tired.

"It may take a day to restore communication and prepare for the next stage," I said. "Maybe you had better dialyze me now, so that I can be fresh tomorrow."

"I'll call the Gany unit," Rue said.

"No, Gany has problems enough getting the Saturn ships routed through," I said. "They have to come in via the tube, and then pass through the mine field; it's a tricky job of organization. They have to be in place when Tocsin threatens military action against Ganymede."

"Still-" she began.

"Damn it, enough of this ruse!" I snapped, my fatigue making me grouchy.

"Roulette is great, but now I need Forta." I crossed to her and put my hand to her face, my nails catching at the edge of the mask to pull it off.

She stood frozen. My nails raked across her cheek, scratching it. First the marks were white, then red.

Irritated by this intransigence, I attacked the other side of her face, determined to get the mask off. She did not resist me. Instead she began to sing, softly, with imperfect pitch but clearly enough. "Come all ye fair and tender maids / Who flourish in your prime, prime."

My fingers dug in to the side of her head, unable to find the seam. Where was it?

"Beware, beware, make your garden fair; / Let no man steal your thyme, thyme;

/ Let no man steal your thyme." The herb thyme was pronounced "time," and the double meaning was clear. It was Rue's song, the one we had given her in the Navy when I married her.

Impatiently I gave up on the mask and descended to her heaving bosom, seeking the seam there.

"For when your thyme is past and gone, / He'll care no more for you, you."

Women were of course apprehensive about the onset of age, the loss of the flower of youth, and with it the loss of the interest of the men.

I found the seam, caught it with my nails, and ripped forward. The seam came loose, a strand of pseudoflesh, leaving the main portion still attached to her body. Her breast rolled back and forth under my attention, flaking off powder, still seeming totally real. So I attacked the other-and that seam, too, ripped away in a strand.

"And every day that your garden is waste," she continued blithely, "Will spread all o'er with rue, rue, / Will spread all o'er with rue."

"Damn it!" I hissed through my teeth. I took hold of her right breast with both my hands and pulled, trying to dislodge the pseudoflesh. But the thing would not yield; it drew her body along after it, causing her to fall into me.

"A woman is a branching tree, / A man a singing wynd, wynd; / And from her branches, carelessly, / He will take what he can find, find; / He'll take what he can find."

I became conscious of our situation. I was standing there, her breast in my hands, holding it against me, as if it were some large fruit from her tree, while she sang her song despite the discomfort she was in. This aging but still beautiful and desirable woman who loved to be brutalized. The welts on her cheek were now burning brightly.

What kind of mask did that?

I stared at her, the realization coming at last. "There is no mask," I said, aghast. "No pseudoflesh."

"Abuse me some more, Worry," she invited me, her eyes shining.

"You put on those strips to fool me," I continued. "And the makeup powder. To make me think-"

She brought her head to mine and kissed me. No wonder the emulation had been so apt! It had been Roulette all the time, playing herself!

I jerked my face away. "Why should you do such a thing? I demanded angrily.

"Making a fool of me like that?" I took hold of her shoulders and shook her.

She let her head rock back and forth, as if being violently thrown about.

"Ravish me, Tyrant!" she whispered. "I've always loved you since you mastered me!"

And so she had arranged to switch places with Forta. Forta had emulated Roulette and departed with my sister, while the real Rue had remained to seduce me. Because, even after thirty-five years, she still loved me and desired me. Spirit and Forta had understood, so had facilitated the ruse.

Would I have acceded if I had known? I wasn't sure. I had desired Rue thoughout our separation, but once she had married another man, I had known she was no longer for me. That man was dead now, but still I saw her as his.

But the emulation of her had been all right; I could take any woman in emulation, knowing she was really Forta. That had been a most intriguing game.

Now I knew Roulette for what she was: a woman in her fifties who had used cosmetics not to change her identity but to make herself seem more youthful, both to please me and to resemble a younger woman emulating an older one. And I had indeed been pleased; Rue had given me an excellent time. Until I demanded what she could not provide: the dialysis. She was not trained for that, so had evidently elicited the Premier's aid to finesse it. That had been her undoing.

"Ravish me!" she repeated, and now her eyes were overflowing. She had submitted to my scratching and pulling without reaction, but now she was crying-and I was the only man she ever cried for. She had given her tears to me, during our marriage, and that had been as significant a submission for her as when I had raped her, for she valued her heart more than her body. Now she stood exposed, her desire for me manifest. Was I to reject her?

Hardly! What I would have done had I known at the outset I did not know, but that had become academic. I had had much joy of this woman in emulation; now I could have the same joy of her in reality. It was, I thought, similar to my affair with Amber, the teenaged girl whom I had known intimately first in the helmet-feelies, then in the flesh. Rue was a masochist, but it was sexual expression it led to, not rejection.

"You deceived me!" I said, slapping her face, not hard. "Do you know the penalty for that?"

"My maidenhood!" she exclaimed, kissing me again. She dropped her skirt, and I dropped my trousers, and suddenly we were doing it where we stood. This position can be difficult and uncomfortable, and even impossible if the woman resists, but it can work if she cooperates and knows what she is doing. Rue knew. She leaned back against a wall so as not to have to be concerned with balance, and supported me as I thrust into her, and this time she was as ready as I. We kissed deeply, and just before I climaxed I nipped her on the tongue, and I felt her react below. She went crazy against me, and her body convulsed about my member, bringing me off within her. I cannot claim it was the best climax I have had, for the awkwardness of the position did detract, but it was highly satisfactory, and not only on the physical plane.

"Oh, lover, thank you!" she said, kissing me a final time. "I did so much want to have you, as me." Then she broke, for the vertical position does not allow a woman much time to clean up. She retreated to the bathroom while I got back into my trousers.

Then I became aware of Doppie. The calls had continued to come in during our intermission, for it was only the planetary broadcast that had been jammed, not the phone service. She had taken over the phone, fielding those calls as Spirit. I had made love to Rue in Doppie's presence.

That had been unkind, for Doppie was smitten by me too. She was as old as she seemed to be, and hardly foolish, but I did not need to read her to know that she would have traded places with Rue if she could. It is a mistake to assume that older women have no desires; they are merely more careful about showing them. In fact, the desire in age can be greater than that in youth, in women and perhaps in men, too.

I had never intended to take advantage of Doppie. Now I realized that I had done her wrong. "Doppie, I owe you," I said to the back of her head.

She did not turn, but I knew she heard and understood. Her hurt turned to joy.

Then she contacted the local dialysis unit, and I went for my treatment.

The appearance of the Saturn ships had nullified Tocsin's siege of Ganymede; the Jupiter Navy was now outgunned in this region of space. Ploy and counterploy; it was not the first time this had occurred here. But now the Saturn ships were spreading out to menace Jupiter itself. That was the muscle behind my takeover of the planet: my words were merely the declaration of intent, while Saturn was the mechanism. I had of course cleared this with Khukov. He had hesitated to make an attempt on Jupiter, lest it provoke mutually destructive war, but Spirit and I had believed that the Tyrant could do it without that dread result, and that we had to do it. The Triton Project needed the resources of Jupiter, and Tocsin had made it plain that the present government would never join.

How had the Saturn ships been able to spread without molestation? That was where Spirit's advance work came in. Naturally Tocsin had ordered action, heedless of the consequence-but somehow the task forces ordered into action had gone astray. Orders had been confused, and foul-ups had occurred. Not one Jupiter ship had fired on a Saturn ship. That was part of what had kept Tocsin occupied during the interim; he had realized that the Jupiter Navy had been partially subverted.

Of course it could not be as simple as using projection to bring Saturn vessels of war within Jupiter's defensive perimeter. The true balance of terror lay not with the ships but with the subs. Largely invisible, the subs of each planet surrounded the other, ready to fire their missiles and lasers and blast the enemy cities out of atmosphere or space. The System had lived for centuries under that threat, and no one liked it, but there had been no way to escape it.

Until now. That was another reason that the Triton Project was so important.

It was why this terrible risk was necessary.

My first broadcast had preempted the holo sets of Jupiter and Jupiter-space.

Tocsin's forces had in due course zeroed in on it and jammed it out. But within a day we were ready for the next move: we had located the sources of the jamming, and could nullify it, temporarily. I was ready for my second broadcast.

I made it. "This is the Tyrant, again," I said. "As I explained yesterday, the government of Jupiter has been corrupted, with the same bloodsuckers feeding on public resources as were there before the Tyrancy existed. I do not blame my wife for this; she did what was right. I blame the corrupt leader who sidled back into place the moment he was able. That is Tocsin, who has twice brought to ruin the good that my wife has tried to do. I charge him with treason against the planet of Jupiter, and I require him to step down and turn himself in for justice. How say you, Tocsin?"

Of course the man was listening. This second broadcast had caught him as flat-footed as the first, because he thought he had nullified this sort of thing.

He had reckoned without my sister's thorough preparation, and had not yet realized that it was the technical staff of the Jupiter Navy that was nullifying the jamming signals.

Tocsin, thus challenged, came on. But he seemed neither astonished nor dismayed. It was not an act; I read him, and found that he believed he had the upper hand. Why was that so?

"Tyrant, you think you have won," he rasped. "But you've lost. You think your friend on Saturn supports you, but he doesn't."

"He supports me," I asserted before Tocsin's words concluded, so as to minimize the delay. "At such time as he does not, he will let me know first.

But I am merely borrowing the Saturn fleet for this purpose; I am acting as the representative of the Triton Project, and will govern Jupiter as a supporting planet, not as a conquest of Saturn. On this we have agreed; there will be no Saturnist interference in the affairs of Jupiter."

But before I was done, he was speaking again. "You fool, he doesn't support you because he can't support you!" he shouted. "Do you want to know why?

Because he is dead!"

Now I was shaken. "What?"

"Check with your staff," he said gloatingly. "Chairman Khukov was assassinated this morning. The news is leaking out."

Rue switched her phone to the Premier of Ganymede. He looked drawn. "It is true, senor," he said. "We learned of it an hour ago, but did not wish to undercut your effort."

But Tocsin had known. How was that? I read the answer in his bearing: he had known because he had arranged it. While I was setting up for my second address, he had not been idle; he had implemented an assassination plot he must have had ready for some time. I realized too late: all he would have had to do was make a deal with the nomenklatura of Saturn, and they would have done the job for him. The deal would not have any benefits for the people of Jupiter or Saturn, just for the henchmen. Even threatened as they were with extinction as a class, the nomenklatura would not have dared do such a thing on their own; but with Tocsin ready to take the credit, they had surely been happy to act. They had known that they could not get rid of me while Khukov remained in power.

Khukov had sent me out to organize the Triton Project and establish System support for it, because my safety could not be guaranteed on Saturn. What a fool I had been not to realize that he himself remained as vulnerable!

Suddenly, at one foul stroke, Tocsin had nullified everything. For without Khukov, my position lacked the support of Saturn; the nomenklatura would resume power there exactly as Tocsin and his minions had done on Jupiter, and they were not my friends. The Triton Project would be scuttled or perverted, and the riches of the galaxy would go, not to solve the problems of the System, but to enrich the illicit powerholders of the major planets.

Tocsin watched me in silence, a cruel smile playing about his homely face. He was savoring this moment of victory over the man who had deposed him once and threatened to do so again. All Jupiter was watching.

What could I do? It was true that without Khukov I could not direct the Saturn fleet, and without that fleet I could not take over Jupiter. The Jupiter fleet had been neutralized, not converted; now its admirals would reassert themselves, rallying to Tocsin.

"Damn it, sir, you know what to do!" Roulette snapped.

I turned to her. Today she was more decorously garbed, with only some deep cleavage, her trademark, showing in front. "I do?" For I was genuinely at a loss. I wished my sister were here; she would have had some course of emergency action.

"Take over!" she said.

"But without the Saturn fleet-"

Tocsin, listening in, smirked. The time-delay seemed not to register; it was as though he were responding to my last words, instead of to my prior stunned silence. "I will accept your surrender," he said. "For the justice of Jupiter."

"Not Jupiter," Rue said, "Saturn!"

I don't claim to be fast on the uptake when caught by surprise; I'm sure I was better in my youth. "But I have no-"

"Saturn is without a true leader," she said. "Their people will trust you before they trust Tocsin. Strike now! It's yours to take! Like a willing woman!"

That last analogy may have seemed unkind or irrelevant, but it scored with me.

Perhaps it was my recent discovery of Rue herself, unveiled after her masquerade. The people of Saturn did generally support the Tyrant, whose policies had revolutionized their agriculture and industry, and whose Triton Project promised them the Dream. Suddenly I understood.

"Saturn fleet!" I rapped. "Chairman Khukov is dead. He supported me; I still support him. I am doing what he wanted to be done. I am assuming direct command of the fleet. You will answer to me exactly as you have been doing." I did not ask the commanders of that fleet, I simply told them, not giving them the chance to think about it. That was the way it had to be done: swiftly, before contrary orders could arrive from Saturn.

"Jupiter Navy," I said next. "I am similarly assuming command over you. I hereby depose your present admirals, and elevate those of my choosing.

Specifically, Admiral Lundgren is retired as of this instant, and Admiral Emerald Mondy restored to that command."

"You can't do that!" Tocsin protested. "You have no base! No authority!"

I ignored him. I continued to name particular admirals for retirement and restoration, drawing on the names we had reviewed. When I had covered them, I said: "You will cooperate with the Saturn Navy to safeguard the planet of Jupiter from attack. My aide, Roulette Phist, will provide the details of the transition and assignment." For Rue was conversant in a way Forta would not have been with the protocols of the military; she had been a ranking Navy wife for thirty years, and part of the Tyrancy as well.

"Countermand!" Tocsin exclaimed, realizing what I was doing. "There is no legal basis for this action!"

He was correct, technically. But too late. "I am not basing this on legality, but on power," I said. "The officers of the Jupiter Navy know what is best for the Navy, and the people of Jupiter know what is best for Jupiter.

Participation in the Triton Project is best."

Then I launched into the major aspect of my presentation. "As many of you already know, Chairman Khukov of Saturn had a Dream," I said. "He shared it with me, and I am sharing it with you. It is the Dream of peace and prosperity for all men. It is the abolition of oppression, restriction, and hunger. One thing has prevented all men from possessing most of the things they desire, and that thing now threatens to eradicate man entirely. That thing is war. We squander our resources in the effort to make weapons with which to destroy each other. If those resources and that effort had gone to secure the good things for mankind instead of for war, we would all be better off than we are.

Except for those who profit from the misery of others." I glanced at Tocsin.

He was no longer on the holo, but my audience would understand.

"Earth was on the verge of self-destruction back in the twentieth century," I continued. "Only the onset of the gravity-shield, that enabled man to expand from Earth to the Solar System, enabled us to avoid that fate. The gee-shield made it possible to lift objects of any mass from the surface of any planet, and to approach the giant planets without being trapped or crushed by gravity, and to enhance the gee on moons locally to match Earth-norm. All else followed from that single breakthrough. The System was apportioned to the several nations of Earth according to their natures and the nature of the available territories, and the expansion of several centuries commenced. In that time the threat of war abated; the resources of each nation went to the development of its major colony. Only in the past century has our past returned to haunt us, as our cultures reenact the conflicts that threatened to destroy us before. We have filled the Solar System, and the pressures of increasing population and diminishing resources, coupled with the absolute folly of warfare, are threatening again to destroy us. We have to have a new direction for our energy, to avert forever the negative consequences of our nature. We have to look outward, not inward; to reach for new riches beyond our current knowledge, instead of competing and eventually warring for larger shares of a shrinking pie. When that very competition destroys the resources we seek."

I gazed into the holo of the planet of Jupiter, knowing that my eyes were fixing on every person watching. "This is the Dream that Chairman Khukov had, and that I share, and that the entire System must share. It is the Dream of the colonization of the galaxy itself. We have made the technological breakthrough; we can travel to the stars. By means of the light drive we can reach any other point in space at the speed of light-and no matter how far that is, how long it takes, we shall not age in the process. I have used this drive a number of times; it is like stepping directly planet to planet. I am confident that if we use this method to travel to the stars, and to the planets of those stars, it will be no different; it will be in effect instantaneous. Any one of us could board a ship today, and be in Sirius tomorrow, and return the day after, no older. Or anywhere else in the galaxy.

The risk is minimal, because now we do not even need a receiver; our ships are to be self-receiving. This is how I came to Ganymede, despite the defenses of Jupiter. Our ships will set out fully equipped for colonization, as they did when they left Earth for Jupiter; they will expend virtually no fuel in transit, only some for the process of rematerializing at the destination. If no suitable bodies for colonization are found, new projection stations will be set up, and the ships will travel as readily elsewhere. It is true there will be challenges, and losses-but perhaps no more than there were in the colonization of the Solar System. The rewards are potentially much greater.

War will be a thing of the past, for each nation can have an entire system to colonize, or a complex of systems. There will be no need for competition for resources or living space. Only for peaceful trade between systems. This is the Dream, and this is what I bring to Jupiter. The rest of the Solar System has embraced it; only Jupiter remains excluded-because of the selfish desire for continued power of a few leaders. I am here to remove those leaders and bring the Dream to Jupiter. Are you with me, people of Jupiter?"

Now we turned on the response feedback circuit. It hardly seemed to take six seconds; a roar of music came forth. There was no question: the people were with me. They wanted the Dream.

"It's a lie!" Tocsin shouted. "He's just making it up so as to seize power for himself!"

He was the one who was lying. But I was ready to counter this, regardless. "I need no further power for myself," I said. "My time is limited. I seek this power only as the means to the end of the salvation of the future of humanity.

Before I die, I want to establish the Dream for everyone." Then, forestalling Tocsin's objection, I undid my belt and dropped my trousers, remaining on holo broadcast. "You see, I am no longer healthy," I said as I undressed. "I have lost my kidneys, and am sustained only by hemodialysis, because my system rejects all other mechanisms. Here are the scars on my legs where my blood has been tapped; here is the bandage that secures the loop that taps into my blood at present." I undid the bandage and showed the blood-filled tube. "The doctors will be able to verify the validity of this condition," I said, lifting my leg so that the tube showed clearly. "I have only a few years to live, because my sites are running out; when I can no longer be dialyzed, I shall die. I have no further use for power, other than to forward the Dream."

I had won my point; the feedback reaction showed that. The people of Jupiter were with me, and, perceiving that, the officers of the Jupiter Navy were stepping down and stepping up according to my listing. My bloodless coup was proceeding. I had been out of power here for five years, but I had been in power for ten years before that, and active elsewhere in the System in the interim, so the people knew me. They knew what kind of government I stood for, and it was clear that it was superior to what they had now. They also knew they could trust me to tell them the truth, and the truth I was telling them was the Dream. The victory was not yet complete, but it was clearly going to be mine. Rue had done what was needed when she told me to seize the initiative despite Khukov's death.

But Tocsin would not yield gracefully, if at all. He knew the people did not support him, and that the Jupiter Navy was no longer his instrument. But he had a ploy yet to make. "Tyrant, you know that the balance of terror is not in the conventional planetary navies, but in the fleets of subs," he said.

"Jupiter subs surround Saturn, and Saturn subs surround Jupiter. Either fleet can destroy either planet. The Jupiter subs answer only to me-and the Saturn subs do not answer to you. I can destroy Saturn, and you cannot prevent it."

"Saturn subs," I said into the holo. "I know you are receiving me but will not answer. The man you answer to is dead, assassinated by parties as yet unknown.

But I swear to you that I, as the representative of the Dream that Chairman Khukov made, will in due course root out the assassins and destroy them. To do this I must govern Saturn for a time, and this I will do, until a successor can be named who is guiltless in the assassination. Support me, and I will do this. The blood of the guilty will course through the streets of your cities.

No other person can make this promise and keep it; you know that the nomenklatura are even now scrambling for new power, and if they did not engineer this crime, they surely support it. The same is true of President Tocsin here. In any event, you have heard him threaten to strike directly at Saturn. Accept my authority, and accept my order now: If any signal travels from the White Bubble toward Saturn, destroy the White Bubble instantly.

I returned to Tocsin, whose face was turning ashen as he assimilated this news. He knew that at least one of the hidden Saturn subs would accept my directive, because it made sense: destroy the man who ordered the destruction of their home planet. He could send the order, and they could not prevent it, but he would be dead an hour before the order reached the vicinity of Saturn.

That was not the way Tocsin liked to operate.

Now I spoke to Saturn, knowing there could be no response within hours, but knowing what that response would be. "People of Saturn, I, Hope Hubris, the Tyrant, am assuming the office vacated by my friend Khukov, who is dead. My purpose is to stabilize the government of North Saturn and bring the assassins to justice. The fleets of Jupiter and Saturn support me, and I am preventing the Jupiter subs from attacking the planet. In the interim I appoint Khukov's most trusted deputy to maintain the present government on a standby basis, until my return to Saturn." I named the deputy; he was a competent and loyal man who did not aspire to power for himself.

My power over these planets was being constructed largely on bluff and imagination, but it seemed to be working. In this moment of crisis, they had no better figure to turn to. It was the special magic I had with any audience.

They knew they could trust me to do as I promised, and I promised justice and the Dream. It was an easy compromise to make.

But Tocsin was not yet finished. Indeed, he seemed to have recovered his bravado. "I have a little ace in the hole here, Hubris," he said nastily. "You don't dare order this dome destroyed." Technically, it would be the Saturn subs that destroyed it, needing no further order from me, but they would not act unless he did. If he did not send the order to Saturn, only my direct action could put him away. "Bring out the prisoner," he called, turning his head to the side.

In a moment a woman was brought forward. I sagged with dismay: it was my daughter Hopie! She was now a woman of thirty, pretty enough, with her dark hair flowing about her face. I had adopted her as a baby, and she favored me in a number of physical and mental ways. She had always been the delight of my later life. Tocsin evidently believed that this hostage would protect him.

Unfortunately, he was right. I simply could not knowingly order the destruction of my daughter, though the fate of worlds hung on it. Hopie was the closest thing I knew to posterity, and that carried increasing weight as the end of my own life span approached. Apart from that, I loved her. Tocsin had, with his unscrupulous cunning, fixed on the one thing that would balk me completely.

"Don't do it, Daddy," Hopie said. "Don't let him have his way. I can die if I have to."

But I couldn't order it. Tocsin, gloating to the side, knew it. "Now back off, Tyrant," he said. "I won't give the order to destroy Saturn; I don't have to.

I just need to put you under arrest."

How could I deal with this? Tocsin would never yield his hold on Hopie; he would squeeze her for all she was worth. I knew this, yet I could not let her be harmed. It was ridiculous to be caught by this elementary ploy, but I was.

I remembered Hopie as a baby in my arms, and as a child sharing visions with me, and as a teenager trying to manage the Department of Education. I remembered her blazing anger when I took as mistress a girl who was younger than she. She was my daughter, in every sense that counted, and I could not sacrifice her.

"You don't respond, Tyrant?" Tocsin inquired. "Then I will encourage you. I will have your agreement, now, to surrender yourself for arrest, or I will have this woman dispatched before your eyes. Guard!"

And at that a female guard stepped up, carrying a laser pistol. There were of course other guards in the White Bubble, who could fire at anyone anytime, but this was being presented for effect. Slowly the woman raised her pistol, until it pointed at Hopie's head.

And I think I would have wet my pants, had I had any urine in me. I did not, of course; that was why I required dialysis. My shock was not from the direct threat to Hopie; it was because that guard was familiar.

"Go ahead, shoot me," Hopie said, though she was shaking with reaction; her bravado was evident for what it was. "Then you'll have no hostage, and you'll be finished." Which was true, but not the whole truth; I could not let her be shot at all.

But I would not need to. Suddenly I knew why this elaborate hoax on me had been perpetrated: the substitution of Roulette for Forta. I had thought it was at Rue's behest, because she wanted to make love to me once more. Certainly that much was true, but Spirit had had other reasons to do it. She had known that my face-off with Tocsin could come to this, so she had, in her meticulous way, prepared for it. She had fashioned what in chess was known as a discovered check.

"Your time's up, Tyrant," Tocsin said. "Make your commitment now, or I will give the order."

"Give your order, hemorrhoid," I said.

It took those six seconds for his double take to manifest, but it was worth it. Tocsin could not believe that I had said what I had said. But I had.

Meanwhile, I was already speaking again. "And that order will be your last, because that laser is not pointed at my daughter, but at you. I doubt that you can order your other security guards to take out either my daughter or my secretary before you die."

Tocsin actually gaped when this news reached him. "Your what?"

Now the guard put her free hand to her face and drew off her mask, her laser never wavering from its target, which was Tocsin. The scarred features of Forta Foundling came into view, never more beautiful than at this instant.

Only she, with her superlative powers of emulation, could have infiltrated this bastion, but she had done it.

I was of course to receive credit for a strategy bordering on genius, because of this ploy. But I had not known it was in the making. My women tend to do that to me; it is a type of conspiracy that seems inherent in their nature. I don't suppose I have cause to object.

Tocsin stared at her. Now he knew he had lost. He was not the suicidal type; he always made the best deal he could, in whatever circumstances existed.

"Exile," he said.

So he would back down, in exchange for exile, which meant no trial, no direct punishment. He didn't deserve it-but if his guards obeyed him, he could still exchange his life for that of Forta and Hopie. Two for one. It wasn't worth it to me. "Granted," I said.

"We await your ship," Tocsin said simply. He knew I would keep my word, however much it galled me. He had lost the planet but preserved his freedom. I would arrange for him to be sent to the planet of his choice, and that would be that. Meanwhile, I would soon be reunited with my secretary and my daughter. That seemed as important to me, at this moment, as the conquest of worlds.