Free When They Come from Space by Mark Clifton Page B

capacity to turn to his own advantage. He shook his massive head angrily, and shrugged off the weakness. He would not, he could not allow such an idea to take full form in his mind. He would be no better than the goddam rabbits he despised if he did.
    But there could be no doubt about one thing. The Black Fleet was getting ready for the kill. And he didn't see one single angle for getting in on the winning end of it, somehow.
    If there were only some way he could get next to the projectiles, deal with them. They must want something. They had to want something. There must be minds inside those discs. And where there were minds capable of all this, there were also minds capable of working the angles. Patriots and enemies? These were rabbit words, dog words. Humans, men, real men, the boys on top, they negotiated and dealt and worked the angles among themselves. They dealt themselves in and divided up the pot, each one grabbing all he could, and recognizing each other's right to take what he could get.
    There must be minds like that in those discs. Capable of dominating the whole Earth in three days, as these were, they should also be capable of recognizing one of their own, and his right to be in the pot—himself, accustomed to dominating, one Harvey Strickland.
    So if they wanted to dominate the Earth, why didn't they deal? Why weren't they putting out feelers?
    Why weren't they putting out feelers?
    A new thought crept in to horrify him. What if they had been doing just that? Hell, they could have taken over that first night. So what else could be the meaning of all that pointless appearing and reappearing? What if they were hovering there now, from noon until near dusk, waiting, waiting for him to respond to their feelers?
    And he didn't know how!
    The frustration, exasperation pumped powerful shots of adrenalin into his blood, made him forget to wheeze and groan in protest against gravity pulling at his fat. His rage sent him waddling, almost running, out to the garden surrounding his house on top of the building. He watched the fading sky, followed the projectiles—as if by the very power of his eyes he could make them take notice of him, come to him, deal with him.
    They wanted to control the people, didn't they? They hadn't killed any of them off, so they must want them preserved for some end. Well, he controlled the people. He owned ‘em. They'd have to come to him in the long run.
    Or did they figure to just highjack the lot of them, right out from under him?
    In a new surge of fury he kicked at some summer asters, a careless symbol of his wealth and power; for the space they occupied was more valuable than gold. Their feathery heads, purple and red and white, broke at the blow from his foot—as easily as the wills of pampered people broke when he put his foot down. The weakness of the plants teased him into sadism; he stamped on the bushes with his foot, ground the foliage down into the soil. He gave a final, harder kick at the thought of his gardener who would survey the damage with sad, patient eyes—and make no comment about it.
    Up there among the circling, black discs, there wasn't a single anti-missile missile; not one. Not even a goddam interceptor. There wasn't any sound of anti-aircraft fire. They'd given up trying to fight. The people were like his gardener. When it was all over, they'd clean up the mess, and plant something else, and hope. He snorted in disgust as his mind gave him the picture of the terrible and futile patience of people who can't do anything but try—and hope.
    Goddamn it! Why didn't his phone ring? He'd put in another call to Washington. Why didn't the operator get him through? He thought of going back in, picking up the phone, needling the operator about it. But he knew the response, the goddam operator would whine and snivel.
    "Mr. Strickland, sir, I'm trying, sir. All I can do is try, sir. The military, sir, is using all trunks for the defense of the nation. But I'll keep trying,