Hard-Luck Diggings: The Early Jack Vance, Volume One by Jack Vance Read Free Book Online Page B

dimensions with a thought, snap him out of existence, out of memory—”
    “Perhaps because you are a god,”came the Antagonist’s taunt, “and of pure”—another confusing concept, a mixture of energy, divinity, force, intelligence. “The man is but a combination of atoms, and moves through the oxidation of carbon and hydrogen. Perhaps if you were as he, he might face you hand to hand and defeat you.”
    A curious tenseness stiffened the mental atmosphere. Han’s thoughts came sluggishly, tinged for the first time with doubt.
    “Let that be the third trial,” said the Leader composedly. Han gave a mental shrug. One of the towering shadows shrunk, condensed, swirled to a man-like shape, solidified further, at last stood facing Kelly, a thing like a man, glowing with a green phosphorescence like the heart of the Seven-year Eye.
    The Antagonist’s secret thought came to Kelly: “Seize the jewel at the back of the neck.”
    Kellyscanned the slowly advancing figure. It was exactly his height and heft, naked, but radiating an inhuman confidence. The face was blurred, fuzzy, and Kelly could never afterward describe the countenance. He tore his gaze away.
    “How do we fight?” he demanded, beads of sweat dripping from his body. “Do we set any rules—or no holds barred?”
    “Tooth and nail,” came the calm thoughts of the Leader. “Han now has organic sensibilities like yours. If you kill this body, or render it unconscious, you win. If you lose this trial, then we shall decide.”
    “Suppose he kills me?” objected Kelly, but no one seemed to heed his protest.
    Han came glaring-eyed at him. Kelly took a step backward, jabbed tentatively with his left fist. Han rushed forward. Kelly punched furiously, kneed the onrushing body, heard it grunt and fall, to leap erect instantly. A tingle of joy ran down Kelly’s spine, and more confidently he stepped forward, lashing out with rights and lefts. Han leapt close and clinched his arms around Kelly’s body. Now he began to squeeze, and Kelly felt a power greater than any man’s in those green-glowing arms.
    “The jewel,” came a sly thought. Sparks were exploding in Kelly’s eyes; his ribs creaked. He swung a frenzied hand, clawing at Han’s neck. He felt a hard protuberance, he dug his nails under, tore the jewel free.
    A shrill cry of utmost pain and horror—and the god-man puffed away into black smoke which babbled in a frenzy back and forth through the darkness. It surged around Kelly, and little tendrils of the smoke seemed to pluck at the jewel clenched in his hand. But they had no great force, and Kelly found he could repel the wisps with the power of his own brain.
    He suddenly understood the function of the jewel. It was the focus for the god. It centralized the myriad forces. The jewel gone, the god was a welter of conflicting volitions, vagrant impulses, insubstantial.
    Kelly felt the Antagonist’s triumphant thoughts. And he himself felt an elation he had never known before.The Leader’s cool comment brought him back to himself:
    “You seem to have won the contest.” There was a pause. “In the absence of opposition we will render any requests you may make.” There was no concern in his thoughts for the decentralized Han. The black smoke was dissipating, Han was no more than a memory. “Already you have delayed us long. We have the problem of”—the now familiar confusion of ideas, but this time Kelly understood vaguely. It seemed that there was a vortex of universes which possessed consciousness, as mighty or mightier than these gods, which was driving on a course that would be incommoding. There were qualifications, a host of contributory factors.
    “Well,” said Kelly, “I’d like you to move the planet I just came from back to its old orbit around Magra Taratempos. If you know what planet and what star I’m talking about.”
    “Yes.” TheLeader made a small exertion. “The world you mention moves in its previous