Fantastic Voyage - By Isaac Asimov Page 0,1

got to believe They're as smart as we are; that for every trick We've got, They've got a counter-trick; that for every man We've got planted on Their side, They've got one planted on Ours. This has been going on for over half a century now;

We've got to be evenly matched, or it would have been all over long ago."

"Take it easy, Al."

"How can I? This thing now, this thing Benes is bringing with him, this new knowledge, may end the stalemate once and for all. And with ourselves as winners."

Reid said, "I hope the others don't think so, too. If they do ... You know, Al, so far there have been rules to this game. One side doesn't do anything to back the other side into a corner so tight he has to use his missile buttons. You've got to leave him a safe ledge to step back on. Push hard but not too hard. When Benes gets here, They may get the notion They're being pushed too hard."

"We have no choice but to risk that." Then, as the afterthought plagued him, "If he gets here."

"He will, won't he?"

Carter had risen to his feet, as though to begin a hasty walk back and forth to nowhere. He stared at the other, then sat down abruptly. "All right, why get excited? You've got that tranquilizer gleam in your eye, doctor. I don't need any happy pills. But suppose he does get here in seventy-two -- sixty-six minutes. Suppose he lands at the airport. He's still got to be brought here, to be kept here, safely . . . There's many a slip . . ."

"Twixt the cup and the lip," sing-songed Reid. "Look here, general, shall we be sensible and talk about consequences? I mean-what happens after he gets here?"

"Come on, Don, let's wait for that till he does get here."

"Come on, Al," mimicked the colonel, an edge appearing on his own words. "It won't do to wait till he gets here. It will be too late when he gets here. You'll be too busy, then, and all the little ants at Headquarters will start rushing about madly, so that nothing will get done where I think it needs to be done."

"I promise ... " The general's gesture was a vague one of dismissal.

Reid ignored it. "No. You're going to be unable to keep any promise you make for the future. Call the chief now, will you? Now! You can get through to him. Right now, you're the only one who can get through to him. Get him to understand that CMDF isn't the handmaiden of defense only. Or if you can't, get in touch with Commissioner Furnald. He's on our side. Tell him I want some crumbs for the bio-sciences. Point out there are votes on this. Look, Al, we've got to have a voice loud enough to be heard. We've got to have some fighting chance. Once Benes gets here and is jumped by all the real generals, damn them, we'll be out of commission forever."

"I can't, Don. And I won't. -If you want it straight, I'm not doing a darned thing till I've got Benes here. And I don't take it kindly your trying to put the arm on me at this time."

Reid's lips went white. "What am I supposed to do, general?"

"Wait as I am waiting. Count the minutes."

Reid turned to go. His anger remained under tight control. "I'd reconsider the tranquilizer if I were you, general."

Carter watched him go without comment. He looked at his watch. "Sixty-one minutes!" he muttered, and groped for a paper-clip.

It was almost with relief that Reid stepped into the office of Dr. Michaels, the civilian head of the Medical Division. The expression on Michaels' broad face might never move higher than a quiet cheerfulness accompanied by, at most, a dry chuckle, but, on the other hand, it never dropped lower than a twinkling solemnity that never took itself, it would seem, too seriously.

He had the inevitable chart in his hand; or one of them. To Colonel Reid, all those charts were alike-, each a hopeless maze; and taken together, they were hopelessness many times compounded.

Occasionally, Michaels would try to explain the charts to him, or to almost anyone-Michaels was pathetically eager to explain it all.

The blood-stream, it seemed, was tagged with a trace of mild radioactivity and the organism (it could be a man or a mouse) then took its own photograph, so to speak, on a laserized principle that