Harry Turtledove - In the Balance

Russie sat down in the chair. It and the table in front of it were the only human-sized pieces of furniture in the room. One of the Lizard guards stepped up behind Russie, set the muzzle of his rifle against the back of the Jew’s head. Zolraag wasn’t playing games, not any more.

Moishe wondered who had typed-and probably written-the script. Some poor human, accommodating himself to the new masters as best he could. So many Poles, even so many Jews, had accommodated themselves to the Nazis as best they could… so why not to the Lizards as well?

The words were what he’d expected: sycophantic praise for the aliens and for everything they did, including the destruction of Washington. The Lizard studio engineer looked at a chronograph, spoke first in his own language and then in German:

“Quiet, all-we begin. Herr Russie, you speak.”

Russie whispered the Sh’ma to himself one last time, bent low over the microphone. He took a deep breath, made sure he spoke clearly: “This is Moishe Russie. Because of illness and other personal reasons, I have not broadcast in some time.” That much was on the paper in front of him. What came next was not: “I doubt I shall broadcast ever again.”

Zolraag spoke German well enough to realize he’d deviated from the script. He waited for the bullet to crash through his skull. He wouldn’t hear it; he hoped he wouldn’t feel it. It would disrupt the program, by God! But the Lizard governor gave no sign he noticed anything wrong. The bullet did not come.

Russie went on, “I have been told to sing the praises of the Race’s destruction of Washington to point out to all mankind that the Americans had it coming because of their stubborn and foolish resistance, that they should have surrendered. All these things are lies.”

Again he waited for some reaction from Zolraag, for the bullet that would blow his head all over the studio. Zolraag just stood there listening. Russie plowed ahead, squeezing as much as he could from the Lizard’s strange forbearance: “I told the truth when I said what the Germans did in Warsaw. I am far from sorry they are gone. To us, the.Jews of Warsaw, the Race came as liberators. But they seek to enslave all men. What they did in Washington proves this, for any who still need proof. Fight hard, that we may be free. Better that than subjection forever. Good-bye and good luck.”

The silence in the studio lasted more than a minute after he stopped. Then Zolraag said, “Thank you, Herr Russie. That will be all.”

“But…” Having prepared himself for martyrdom, Moishe felt almost cheated at failing to attain it. “What I said, what I told the world…”

“I recorded, Herr Russie,” the Lizard engineer said. “Go out tomorrow; your regular time.”

“Oh,” Moishe said in a hollow voice. Of course the broadcast would not go out tomorrow. Once the Lizards listened to it carefully, really understood it, they’d hear the sabotage he’d tried to commit. The shadow of death had not lifted from him. He would just have to wear it a little longer.

In a way, it might have been better had the Lizards shot him now. That would have been quick. Given time to reflect, they might come up with a more ingenious end for him. He shivered. He’d overcome fear once, to say what he’d said. He hoped he could nerve himself to do it again, but feared the second time would be harder.”

“Take him away,” Zobaag said in his own language. The Lizard guards led Moishe out to one of their vehicles parked outside the studio. As they always did, they hissed and complained about the few meters of frigid cold they had to traverse between the bake ovens they thought comfortable.

Back in his flat, Russie puttered around, read the Bible and the apocryphal tale of the Maccabees, cooked himself supper with bachelor inefficiency. He,did his best to sleep and eventually succeeded. In the mornmg he heated up some of the potatoes he hadn’t finished the night before. It wasn’t much of a last meal for a condemned man, but he lacked the energy to fix anything finer.

A few minutes in front of the appointed hour he turned on the shortwave set. He’d never listened to himself before; all his previous broadcasts had gone out live. He wondered why the Lizards chose to alter the pattern this time.

Music-a martial fanfare. Then a recorded tag: “Here is free Radio Warsaw!” He’d liked that, back when the city was freshly out from under the Nazis’ bootheels. Now it seemed sadly ironic.

“This is Moishe Russie. Because of illness and other personal reasons, I have not broadcast in some time.” Was that voice really his? He supposed it was, but he didn’t sound the way he did when he listened to himself from inside, so to speak.

He dropped that thought as he listened to himself go on: “I sing the praises of the Race’s destruction of Washington. I point out to all mankind that the Americans had it coming because of their stubborn and foolish resistance. They should have surrendered. For any who still need proof, better subjection forever than to fight hard, that we may be free. What the Race did to Washington proves this. Good-bye and good luck.”

Russie stared in blank dismay at the speaker of the shortwave radio. In his mind’s eye, he saw Zolraag’s mouth falling open in a hearty Lizard guffaw. Zolraag had tricked him. He’d been ready to give up his life, but not to live on to be used to another’s purpose. Suddenly he understood why rape was called a fate worse than death. Had his words not been raped, employed in a way he would have died to prevent?

Distantly, abstractly, he wondered how the Lizards had managed their perversion of what he’d said. Whatever recording and editing technology they’d used was far ahead of anything men could boast. And so they’d threatened him with what seemed a sure and grisly end, let him make his defiant cry for liberty, and then not only smothered that cry but held up the surgically altered corpse to the world and pretended it had life. As far as the rest of mankind could tell, he was a worse collaborator now than ever before.

Rage ripped through him. He was not used to feeling anything so raw; it left him giddy and light-headed, as if he’d drunk too much plum brandy at Purim. The shortwave set brayed on-more propaganda, this time in Polish. Had the fellow talking really said these words in this order? Who could tell?

Moishe lifted the radio over his head. It fit in the palm of one hand and weighed hardly anything-it was of Lizard make, a gift from Zolraag. But even had it been a heavy, bulky human-made set, fury would have fueled his strength and let him treat it the same way. He smashed it to the floor as hard as,he could.

The lies the Pole was squawking died in midsyllable. Bits of metal and glass and stuff that looked like Bakeite but wasn’t flew in every direction. Russie trampled the carcass of the radio, ground it into the carpet, turned it into a forlorn puddle of fragments that bore no resemblance to what it had been a moment before.

“Not half what the mamzrim did to me,” he muttered.

He threw on his long black coat, stormed out of his flat, slammed the door behind him. Three people along the corridor poked their heads out their doorways to see who’d just had a fight with his wife. “Reb Moishe!” a woman exclaimed. He stomped past without even looking her way.

Lizard guards still stood at the entrance to the block of flats. Moishe stomped past them, too, though he wanted to snatch one of their rifles and drop them both bleeding to the sidewalk. He knew just what the muzzle of a Lizard rifle felt like, jammed against the curly hair at the back of his head. What would it be like to hold one in his arms, have it buck as he squeezed the trigger? He didn’t know, but he wanted to find out.