C. M. Kornbluth, page 5
“Oliver’s” reply was to pace off a precise four meters and hurl the broken-off knob at the monster. He took a full windup, and rage for five thousand years of slavery and theft drove his muscles. The cyclops eye broke and spilled; the cyclops staggered in circles, screaming. Barker closed in, twisted the side-arm from the monster’s convulsed hand and gave him what Third Seat, Second Tier, had got.
The roomful of men and women rose in terror, screaming.
“Quiet!” he yelled at them. “I’ve talked to some of you about this. You saw what happened. Those things are blind! You can strike them from five yards away and they’ll never know what hit them.”
He snatched up one of the fuses and rasped off the cap; it began to flare pulsatingly, not very bright, but intensely hot. He held it at arm’s length and it scorched the hair on the back of his hand. “These things will dazzle what sensory equipment they do have,” he yelled, “and you can confuse them with noise. They’ll be coming to get us in a minute. All you have to do is make noise and mill around. You’ll see what happens when they come for us and then we’ll go hunting!”
IN LESS than a minute his prediction was verified. A squad of the cyclops crew burst in, and the screaming of the Earth people left nothing to be desired; the creatures recoiled as if they had struck a wall. From six meters away Barker and the Stosses carefully ignited the flares and tossed them into the squad. They made half-hearted efforts to fire into the source of the trouble, but they were like men in a darkened boiler workswhose darkness was intermittently relieved by intolerable magnesium flares. Lakhrut’s side-arm made short work of the squad.
Barker ripped their weapons from their fingers and demanded: “Who wants one? Who wants to go hunting? Not you, Miss Trimble; we’ll need you for later. Stay in a safe place. Who’s ready for a hunting party?”
One by one, twitching creatures remembered they were men and came up to take their weapons.
The first hunting party worked its way down a corridor, hurling fusees, yelling and firing. The bag was a dozen Cyclopes, a dozen more weapons.
They met resistance at a massive door with a loophole. Blasts from a hand weapon leaped through the loophole, blind but deadly. Three of them fell charging the door.
“Warm it up for them,” Stoss said. He snatched a dozen fusees, ducked under the fire and plastered himself against the door. Meticulously he uncapped the sticks and leaned them against the door, one by one. The blast of heat drove Barker and his party back down the corridor. Stoss did not collapse until he had ignited the last flare and wrenched open the door with a seared hand.
Through the door could be seen staggering cyclops figures, clawing blindly at the compartment walls. The Earthmen leaped through the brief, searing heat of the dozen flares and burned them down.
In the A’rkhovYar language, a terrified voice spoke over the ship public address system: “To the leader of the rebels! To the leader of the rebels! Return to your propulsion room and your crimes will be forgiven! Food will be doubled and the use of the Pain discontinued!”
Barker did not bother to translate. “Let’s head for the navigation room,” he said. ‘Try to save a couple of them.”
One hour later he was telling the commander and Gori: “You two will set courses for Earth. You will work separately, and if your results don’t agree we will put you each in a chair and hold down the button until you produce results that do agree. We also have a lady able to check on your mathematics, so don’t try anything.”
“You are insane,” said the commander. “Other ships will pursue and destroy you.”
“Other ships,” Barker corrected him, “will pursue and fail to overtake us. I doubt very much that slave ships can overtake a ship driven by free men and women going home.”
“We will attack openly for this insolence,” snorted Gori. “Do you think you can stand against a battle fleet? We will destroy your cities until you’ve had enough, and then use you as the slaves you are.”
“I’m sure you’ll try,” said Barker. “However, all I ask is a couple of weeks for a few first-rate Ph.D.’s to go over this ship and its armaments. I believe you’ll find you have a first-rate war on your hands, gentlemen. We don’t steal; we learn.
“And now, if you please, start figuring that course. You’re working for us now.”
The Slave, C. M. Kornbluth
