Harry Harrison - Star Smashers of the Galaxy Rangers

"One thing is," Jerry said, in a strange voice. "The Galaxy Rangers could be wiped out instead."

"Bite your tongue!" Chuck shouted. "What's got into you that you should be talking like that?" Jerry chuckled evilly, and his tongue flashed in and out like a serpent's, and his voice dripped venom when he spoke. "That's just about the size of it. What's got into me. . . ."

"He is possessed by a Lortonoi!" Lord Prrsi shouted. "I can detect the alien presence stronger than I have ever detected it before."

"Yes, the Lortonoi are here, and it is the end of the ballgame for you libertarian, religious swine. We are taking over. We have won!"

"What do you mean?" Chuck gasped, inadvertently stepping back from his occupied friend.

"I mean that this is the moment we set the stage for. We wanted all the forces opposed to us to be gathered together at the same time so we could destroy them. They are here now and will be destroyed by the Fligigleh forces we command."

"You forget about the Fligigleh forces you don't command," crowed Troceps, striding forward. "I hope you people won't mind, but I am afraid I will have to open up your friend like a sausage with one blow of my clawed heel. This Lortonoi must go."

"Stop!" Lortonoi-Jerry commanded, and very much to his own surprise, Troceps stopped. "Now, at last, the truth can be revealed. We can control any Fligigieh mind. We just said we couldn't in order to get this great big war going. We arranged that both sides would be so evenly matched that they couldn't destroy each other so that they would have to build bigger and better fleets. They have done this and put together these two fleets. Supplied by the unlimited resources of Cotorra, they are unstoppable and unbeatable. And now the fleets will be combined. Everything has been planned from the beginning. There was one little hitch there when the Earthling appeared with the cheddite projector, but we took care of that as you see. We stole a projector and used it in battle so that the Fligigleh scientist could come up with a defense. We've done it, we've got it made, the galaxy is ours, we cannot be stopped and . . . STOP!"

He bellowed this last at John who had taken the golden sphere out of his shirt pocket and was about to press the button.

"I was waiting for that," Jerry-Lortonoi sneered. "This was the one weapon we were afraid of. Krakar. Now we know all about it, ha-ha. So, go ahead and press the button!"

But, strain as he might, John could not. His finger was only a fraction of an inch above the 'press me' button – but it would not descend. His body shook with the effort as he strained with every fiber of his being to push that finger down – but it would not! The Lortonoi brain was the stronger, and that evil creature was just toying with him, for it had absolute control. Struggle was useless. Chuck jumped to help him, but long before that help could arrive John watched, horrified, as his hand opened and the golden sphere dropped to the floor.

Where the heel of his boot slowly ground it into gleaming fragments.

Grinding all their hopes along with it.

"I said it was our ball game!" Jerry sneered victoriously. "So, at last, in this moment of supreme triumph, we can at last reveal our presence and our real identity. I am here, among you, the Lortonoi you have been seeking. Do you not see me?"

There was a shuffle throughout the ship as Ranger drew back from Ranger, eyeing each other with suspicion, fingering their weapons. Lord Prrsi eyed along with the others, and he used his immense mental powers as well.

"It is here," he muttered. "I can sense that, but my mind is clouded by its presence, for the Lortonoi mental powers are beyond all others. Yet I swear I cannot find the enemy although I have scanned the minds of all here."

"All?" Jerry asked. "Not quite all."

"Yoo-hoo!" A powerful thought blasted through every mind at once. "I see you!"

Now their eyes were drawn across the room and down. Down toward the table. Down toward the bowl of water. Down to the little green turtle that was waving its tiny claws at them.

"Pishky . . . you!" Troceps gasped.

"Lord Pishky, if you don't mind. Member of the Lortonoi Council of ten, now rulers of the galaxy. How we fooled you – and how we hate you! You, you great lumbering creatures with fingers and hands and tentacles and that kind of thing. While we, with the greatest brains the galaxy had ever seen, are trapped in these tiny worthless bodies. How we loathe you! We have tried to breed for size and such, but whenever we do, like the turtles we planted on Earth, size brings with it mindless stupidity, so that experiment has stopped. We decided instead to use our powers to enslave and destroy you all, and at last, after millennia of effort, the day of conquest is at hand. The Lortonoi have won!"

After the first numbed surprise every creature in the ship surged forward, each fighting for the chance to get the Lortonoi under his heel. But their efforts were doomed. For, still laughing, the tiny green turtle gripped their minds and threw them back. It was defeat indeed.

"I don't want to die! I'm getting out of here!" John gasped, and turning the cheddite projector on himself, he vanished.

"The first rat leaves the sinking spaceship," Lord Pishky sneered, which is very hard to do if you are a turtle. "He has gone back to the fleet, but since the fleet is due to be destroyed in a few microseconds, it will do him no good. Already we Lortonoi are taking over the opposing Fligigleh space fleets and making them one. How we have laughed at you from our security as your pets! We controlled your thoughts so that you liked us and kept us around, preparing yourselves for the moment of your destruction. Now the end is at hand, the fleet approaches, so if any of you want to have a last prayer – I won't allow it! Ha-ha! How we hate you God freaks. Prepare yourself, for the end is at hand."

"Oh, no, it's not," John said, appearing suddenly in the middle of the cabin. He was dressed in a spacesuit and was carrying a sack over one shoulder. "You'll never get away with this conquest, not while I have this!"

He reached into the sack and withdrew a long, red, succulent shape and waved it over his head.

It was a kosher garlic salami!

"Are you out of your mind?" Jerry gasped, speaking for all of them, free to speak for himself again now that the Lortonoi no longer needed him for a mouthpiece.

"Not as mad as you think, Jerry, my boy. When you all tried to attack Pishky, the mad little green turtle Lortonoi, awhile back there, I had the glimmerings of an idea deep down. I acted instantly before Pishky could read my mind and while it was still mostly involved in holding you all off. I suppressed the thought and instead felt immense fear, which, you will understand, was not hard to do. Then I thought of escape, fleeing to the fleet, grabbing a ship and running, yes, I would do that! I turned the cheddite projector on myself, and the Lortonoi, fooled for the moment, let me go. But once back in the fleet, I abandoned all thoughts of flight and set about my real task. I got into a spacesuit and used the cheddite projector to go back to the space battle around the Chachka golden sphere. I almost didn't make it, the battle is raging worse than ever, but I managed to align the projector precisely and made it inside the dome in one jump. After that the rest is obvious. The Chachkas read my mind, discovered what had happened, and upon the instant decided that the time had come at last, after all the millennia, to use Krakar." He waved the salami again. "And Krakar is here, within the salami, which is a disguise."

"Well, it will never be used." Pishky radiated the powerful thought, and instantly everyone in the ship was frozen. "Except perhaps by us. Now – hand over that salami, and you, get a knife and let us see what this device looks like."