Robert Heinlein - The Number of the Beast

"Do you disapprove, Sharpie?"

"On the contrary, Skipper. Do you want my guess?"

"Yes."

"Winged Victory was booby-trapped. And dear Doctor Brain, who isn't the fool I thought he was, was not aboard. Those poor people were killed so that he could disappear."

"Go to the head of the class, Sharpie. Too many coincidences... and they- the 'Blokes in the Black Hats'-know where we are."

"Meaning that Professor No Brain, instead of being dead in the Pacific, might show up any second."

"He and a gang of green-blooded aliens who don't like geometers."

"Zebbie, what do you figure their plans are?"

"Can't guess. They might fumigate this planet and take it. Or conquer us as cattle or as slaves. The only data we have is that they are alien, that they are powerful-and that they have no compunction about killing us. So I have no compunction about killing them. To my regret, I don't know how. So I'm running-running scared-and taking the three I'm certain are in danger with me."

"Will we ever be able to find them and kill them?"

Zebbie didn't answer because Deety and my Jacob arrived, breathless. Father and daughter were in jump suits. Deety looked chesty and cute; my darling looked trim-but worried. "We're late. Sorry!"

"You're not late," Zeb told them. "But into your seats on the bounce."

"As quick as I open the garage door and switch out the lights."

"Jake, Jake-Gay is now programmed to do those things herself. In you go, Princess, and strap down. Seat belts, Sharpie. Copilot, after you lock the starboard door, check its seal all the way around by touch before you strap down."

"Wilco, Cap'n." It tickled me to hear my darling boning military. He had told me privately that he was a reserve colonel of ordnance-but that Deety had promised not to tell this to our smart young captain and that he wanted the same promise from me-because the T.O. was as it should be; Zeb should command while Jacob handled space-time controls-to each his own. Jacob had asked me to please take orders from Zeb with no back talk....hich had miffed me a little. I was an unskilled crew member; I am not stupid, I knew this. In direst emergency I would try to get us home. But even Deety was better qualified than I.

Checkoffs completed, Gay switched off lights, opened the garage door, and backed out onto the landing flat.

"Copilot, can you read your verniers?"

"Captain, I had better loosen my chest belt."

"Do so if you wish. But your seat adjusts forward twenty centimeters-here, I'll get it." Zeb reached down, did something between their seats. "Say when."

"There-that's about right. I can read 'em and reach 'em, with chest strap in place. Orders, sir?"

"Where was your car when you and Deety went to the space-time that lacked the letter 'J'?"

"About where we are now."

"Can you send us there?"

"I think so. Minimum translation, positive-entropy increasing-along Tau axis."

"Please move us there, sir."

My husband touched the controls. "That's it, Captain."

I couldn't see any change. Our house was still a silhouette against the sky, with the garage a black maw in front of us. The stars hadn't even flickered.

Zebbie said, "Let's check," and switched on Gay's roading lights, brightly lighting our garage. Empty and looked normal.

Zebbie said, "Hey! Look at that!"

"Look at what?" I demanded, and tried to see around Jacob.

"At nothing, rather. Sharpie, where's your alien?"

Then I understood. No corpse. No green-blood mess. Workbench against the wall and flood lights not rigged.

Zebbie said, "Gay Deceiver, take us home!"

Instantly the same scene... but with carved-up corpse. I gulped.

Zebbie switched out the lights. I felt better but not much.

"Captain?"

"Copilot."

"Wouldn't it have been well to have checked for that letter 'J'? It would have given me a check on calibration."

"I did check, Jake."

"Eh?"

'~You have bins on the back of your garage neatly stenciled. The one at left center reads 'Junk Metal."

"Oh!"

"Yes, and your analog in that space-your twin, Jake-prime, or what you will-has your neat habits. The left-corner bin read 'lunk Metal' spelled with an 'I.' A cupboard above and to the right contained 'Iugs & lars.' So I told Gay to take us home. I was afraid they might catch us. Embarrassing."

Deety said, "Zebadiah-I mean 'Captain'-embarrassing how, sir? Oh, that missing letter in the alphabet scared me but it no longer does. Now I'm nervous about aliens. 'Black Hats."

"Deety, you were lucky that first time. Because Deety-prime was not at home. But she may be, tonight. Possibly in bed with her husband, named Zebadiah-prime. Unstable cuss. Likely to shoot at a strange car shining lights into his father-in-law's garage. A violent character."

"You're teasing me."

"No, Princess; it did worry me. A parallel space, with so small a difference as the lack of one unnecessary letter, but with house and grounds you mistook for your own, seems to imply a father and daughter named 'Iacob' and 'Deiah Thoris." (Captain Zebbie pronounced the names 'Yacob' and 'Deyah Thoris.')

"Zebadiah, that scares me almost as much as aliens."

"Aliens scare me far more. Hello, Gay."

"Howdy, Zeb. Your nose is runny."

"Smart Girl, one gee vertically to one klick. Hover."

"Roger dodger, you old codger."

We rested on our backs and head rests for a few moments, then with the stomach-surging swoosh of a fast lift, we leveled off and hovered. Zebbie said, "Deety, can the autopilot accept a change in that homing program by voice? Or does it take an offset in the verniers?"

"What do you want to do?"

"Same ell-and-ell two klicks above ground."

"I think so. Shall I? Or do you want to do it, Captain?"

"You try it, Deety."

"Yes, sir. Hello, Gay."

"Hi, Deety!"

"Program check. Define 'Home."

"Home.' Cancel any-all inertials transitions translations rotations. Return to preprogrammed zero latitude longitude, ground level."

"Report present location."

"One klick vertically above 'Home."

"Gay. Program revision."

"Waiting, Deety."

"Home program. Cancel 'Ground level.' Substitute 'Two klicks above ground level, hovering."

"Program revision recorded."

"Gay Deceiver, take us home!"

Instantly, with no feeling of motion, we were much higher.

Zeb said, "Two klicks on the nose! Deety, you're a smart girl!"

"Zebadiah, I bet you tell that to all the girls."

"No, just to some. Gay, you're a smart girl."

"Then why are you shacked up with that strawberry blonde with the fat knockers?"

Zebbie craned his neck and looked at me. "Sharpie, that's your voice."

I ignored him with dignity. Zebbie drove south to the Grand Canyon, eerie in starlight. Without slowing, he said, "Gay Deceiver, take us home!"-and again we were hovering over our cabin. No jar, no shock, no nothing.

Zebbie said, "Jake, once I figure the angles, I'm going to quit spending money on juice. How does she do it when we haven't been anywhere?-no rotation, no translation."

"I may have given insufficient thought to a trivial root in equation ninetyseven. But it is analogous to what we were considering doing with planets. A five-dimensional transform simplified to three."

"I dunno, I just work here," Captain Zebbie admitted. "But it looks like we will be peddling gravity and transport, as well as real estate and time. Burroughs and Company, Space Warps Unlimited-'No job too large, no job too small.' Send one newdollar for our free brochure."

"Captain," suggested Jacob, "would it not be prudent to translate into another space before experimenting further? The alien danger is still with us- is it not?"

Zebbie sobered at once. "Copilot, you are right and it is your duty to advise me when I goof off. However, before we leave, we have one duty we must carry out."