Keith Laumer - Zone Yellow

There ensued several days of euphoric mutual congratulations, punctuated by brilliant social events. Finally, I took Swft aside and told him it was time for me to go.

He agreed, and apologized for the delay, but said it had taken time to round up all the escaped humans roving the countryside, and to prepare enough travelers to carry all four hundred nine of them. I was surprised there were so few, but it seemed humans had proved unexpectedly hard to capture. I just had time to see Minnie for a moment and ask her how she felt about a Ylokk-Imperium alliance; she didn’t quite know what that was, but when I explained, she was delighted. She’d led a strange life so far, but it hadn’t affected her naturally happy disposition, though she did weep a little when she realized Candy and Unca Mobie would be leaving soon. She gave us all fancy starburst medals that would look fine on our dress whites, I thought.

I was asleep in the luxury suite I’d been ushered to. Just before dawn, there was a knock at the barred door. I went over and asked, “Who’s there?”

Swft answered, and I opened up. He and a few other ranking officers moved aside, then he stepped forward and clapped me on the shoulder, and told me, “All is well, Colonel. Her Majesty requests and requires your attendance, and that of Lieutenant Helm and Doctor Smovia at breakfast on the south terrace in half an hour.”

Minnie kept us waiting―about ten seconds. We were standing by the balustrade of the terrace, looking down at the wildflower garden spread out below, with the city beyond and the hills in the distance. The same topography as back home in the Zero-zero line, but a very different place. Even from this distance we could see the volunteer cleanup crews clearing up the trash deposits left in the streets by years―how many no one was quite sure―of Two-Law domination. The former Two-Law bully-boys were doing most of the really dirty work, spurred on by the ungentle citizens whom they’d terrorized for so long.

“That Grgsdn is still at large,” Andy remarked, as if reading my thoughts. “He won’t take this quietly. He roused the populace once when all was stable and running smoothly. What’s to prevent him from doing the same again―like Napoleon’s Hundred Days, after he’d been exiled to Elba?”

“The Army is working over the country very carefully, Andy, as you well know,” I reassured him. “Surely they’ll pick him up soon.”

Minnie arrived at a run, and threw herself at Helm. He returned her embrace happily, and for a while they talked baby-talk and stared at each other. She stepped back and did a twirl. “Is not my clothing pretty, Candy?” she demanded.

Then the anxious-looking captain of the guard detachment arrived and got in front of the excited girl and apologetically asked her to remain with the escort. She said she would, and took his hand and patted it. He yanked it back as if she were red-hot. “Majesty!” he choked. “It is not proper!” Then he shut up and backed out of the Presence.

“Prp is such a ninny,” Her Majesty Minnie said. She came over and leaned on the balustrade beside me.

“Now, Uncanul,” she began before giggling, “I know you want to take your people home; I don’t know how Unca Swft and I will manage without you, but we must face that.”

“Minnie,” I replied, “what’s this ‘Unca Swft’ stuff? Who is he, really?”

“General Lord Swft is my uncle, the Prince Royal,” she told me. “He should really be the emperor now; I’m not qualified. My parents, Emperor Wqk and Queen Tzt were assassinated, you know, at the same time I was k-kidnapped.” The tears started. I patted her awkwardly, and Marie came over and embraced her.

“Right,” Andy said heartily, “Time to go!” He leaned over Marie’s shoulder to say:

“Goodbye, Baby: I know you’ll be a marvelous sovereign. I have to go now.”

“Candy,” she wailed, and Captain Prp was there in an instant, eyeing Helm with hostility, one thin-fingered hand hovering over the butt of his disruptor pistol. Minnie blinked back the tears and said, “Captain, if I ever again discern on your face an expression of less than total respect and affection for our honored guests, it will be permanent latrine detail for you. Begone!”

He stumbled away, and I covered my confusion by blocking off old Gus, who was pushing forward with his big mouth all ready to start braying about “time to go.”

“Fall in there, Gus,” I ordered him. The rest of our little band of heroes formed up our usual square formation, even though its original purpose, the protection of Minnie in the center, was now obsolete. We said some good-byes and went along to Skein Operations. Minnie wanted to come with us, at least that far, but Smovia and Helm managed to dissuade her by promising to come back to visit as soon as possible.

The equipment in the big, echoic shed wasn’t entirely unfamiliar; at least the feel of the place was the same as that of the Net Garages erected on the same spot back home. I was again, for the thousandth time, aware of how strong the affinities were that existed across all the continua, tying together the multitude of alternate realities arising from a single primordial source. Evidently, the pattern was set in the instant of the Big Bang. I went to the nearest traveler, a twin to the one Swft had lost back in Sigtuna. The first batch of enslaved human captives were already on hand, perhaps a hundred people standing in a confused huddle by a big mass-transfer unit. Gus and I went over and I waved away the instant bombardment of questions in a dozen languages.

“We’re going home,” I told them, while Ben conferred earnestly with some of the slaves with whom he and Marie had worked. They quieted down, and I went on to tell them that the war was over and there was no need to kill the Ylokk technicians working nearby, and that they were, in fact, preparing our transport. A small, ferretlike fellow in a yellow smock came over and introduced himself as Technician-in-Chief Plb, and asked if I would care to inspect the transport. I would. I told Andy to keep our passengers together and quiet, and I went and looked over the big, boxy machine, just like the one I’d seen back in Stockholm Zero-zero, discharging Ylokk troops into the city streets. It wasn’t luxurious, but there was room for all on the padded benches, and the front office was manned―or Ylokked―by a competent-looking fellow who reported all systems go. I waited until the rescuees were loaded and then waved our party into the smaller unit I’d picked for our own use.

“What about all the others?” Smovia wanted to know. “I heard you talking to Swft about repatriation, but failed to gather the gist of the matter.”

“In return for the lessons you gave to the volunteers,” I told him, “Swft agreed personally to see to the orderly return of all captive humans to their respective points of origin. The last traveler will carry a cargo of gold bars as partial compensation to them for their inconvenience.”

“Do you think we can really trust Swft, once we’re gone?” Helm wondered.

“I’m certain of it,” I answered him, “and so is Minnie.” I looked at Smovia and the others.

“Sure,” they agreed. “Her Majesty will see to it.”

“But what about this Grgsdn?” Andy demurred. “He could still start trouble.”

I wasn’t paying much attention; I was looking at something over in a roped-off corner of the big shed. I strolled over for a closer look. Tarps were hung from some ropes to afford a half-hearted gesture toward privacy. I went between the tarps and was looking at an old-fashioned (maybe twenty years out-of-date) model Net Shuttle. It was partly disassembled, apparently under study by the Ylokk. It was thickly covered with dust, so it had been here the best part of that twenty years.