The "Saint" smiled; the fact was illumined as if with an inner light.
"Peace, Varon! There's no need to speak for we have the information.
You gave it to us--piece-meal--I must say." He smiled with kindly
humor. "But you gave it. We have synchronized and correlated what you
told us in the transmitter before you went to the Paradisiac, and your
later message from the shore."
"_That voice ... that voice!_" The thought blotted out all else in
Julian's mind. It could not be, it was incredible, and yet, no one
else in his experience had just that tonal quality ... those ironic
overtones....
"You probably wondered," the "Saint" was speaking again, "when you saw
our signal, how the Dekkan fleet could be above Ganymede unchallenged.
Look!" He activated a telesolidograph standing by the side of Julian's
bed.
"Every inhabited Moon has its fleet here tonight, my son. When we
flashed them the news you gave us of the laboratory where the _Plague_
germs were kept, and of the incredible plan of the Dynasts--the
Mutants, they came on at full power. Enough to blast Ganymede out of
its orbit! The plan was the most fiendish, the most ingenious weapon of
war ever conceived! You must have guessed it of course ... for fifty
years they infected our people in slowly increasing numbers, until at
last they let loose the Plague."
"Narda ...." Julian began as memory agonizingly came back.
"That is the name you kept repeating with every other word in your
delirium," the stranger smiled. "A Techno-Star, as we found out. She of
course, will be one of the very first to be given the antidote, Varon."
"Antidote...." Julian's voice was opaque with wonder, it was as if his
heart had lurched in his chest.
"You brought it," the silver-haired stranger replied. "In the
_Panagran_ vial you took from the Arch-Mutant. Our scientists
are already reproducing it. It acts both as an immunizer and an
antidote. The Mutants had to develop it as a safeguard for the native
Ganymedeans. It was the only way they could be assured of even their
reluctant loyalty. And the Mutants didn't dare war against the
Ganymedeans--they still possess ancient weapons that the Dynasty
could not cope with. I wish we could obtain some of them," he sighed
wistfully. "What a strangely stubborn race...."
But Julian was scarcely listening, an upsurging volcano of hope had
set his whole being afire with the immortal, singing flame. Narda ...
himself!... He closed his eyes against the tremendous psychic strain.
"Once more open war has been averted by a hair's breadth--I'm a little
bit sorry, in a way, _Serenity_."
Julian opened his eyes startled. "Serenity? You mean '_Control-Facet_.'
You _are_ Astran, aren't you?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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