The Forerunners

by Norman Arkawy and Stanley Henig

When a stellar navigator as gifted as Norman Arkawy finds a test pilot of Stanley Henig’s brilliance seated beside him on a journey to a star the cosmic mists are certain to roll back resplendently. True, the forerunners does not take us on a stellar journey in a strictly literal sense. But it would be carping indeed to insist on that when the cybernetic regions explored therein are so galactic in scope, and so challengingly mysterious.

The telepaths were a danger and a threat—to a world grown monstrous. But the human mind can unlock a multitude of doors.

He felt it when he awoke—the dull, persistent throbbing deep within his head—and he knew that no human mind would be closed to him today.

For thirty-two of his thirty-four years Neville Brandt had been a normal person. He had risen rapidly in the Cybernetics Division of Central Metals, Inc., and was now one of the youngest experts in the country. But he was no longer normal.

The throbbing continued while he dressed and while he ate his breakfast. It lingered with him during the drive to the jet port. It hung over him like a mantle of fire while he waited for the express, and it accompanied him aboard.

The jet train screamed along the monorail toward East City. Brandt watched the landscape rush by in a blurred fantasia of color. He stared through the window at the fascinating smear until he became dizzy. And the painful throbbing pounded on in his skull.

The express roared over the Appalachians, soaring up and through the man-made cuts and passes, and then sweeping down the eastern slope with its speed unabated. Still, the pain persisted.

Suddenly it was gone.

Brandt closed his eyes and relaxed into the cushions of his seat, the absence of the nagging pain soothing him like a balm. With his eyes shut, and smiling to himself, he sent telepathic feelers into the minds of his neighbors on the train. Gently, experimentally, his mental fingers touched one mind, then another. Reception was good.

Brandt arrived at Centrals at his usual time. He entered his office and greeted the same busy assemblage of secretaries, clerks and assistants he encountered every morning. Then he promptly settled into his customary work routine.

But there was nothing usual about the way Brandt spent the first few minutes on this particular morning. He was testing his telepathic capacity. He reached out carefully, extending himself until his mind shrieked in agony. Then, with as precise a mental movement as he could manage, he began to slowly extend fringes of his power until he scooped up impressions from the restaurant at the far end of the street.

He held a waiter’s thoughts for a moment, then let them go. He probed further, to the bank on the next block. But all he could pick up was a monotonous hum of unintelligible noise. He sagged against the back of his chair until the pounding in his head eased.

Brandt pulled a notebook from his coat pocket and checked his present range limits against the figures which he had entered on his past “spell days.” It was still about two hundred yards! His range had apparently stabilized itself at that distance. Only the duration of his effective control was increasing. The entries on the page read: March 14—-3 min. March 31—12 min. April 19—39 min. June 3—1 hr., 17 min. August 14—2 hr., 58 min. September 24—4 hr., 19 min.

He closed the notebook and carefully tucked it into his breast pocket. Would today, November 4, follow the general pattern? If it did, he knew that he would maintain control for almost eight hours!

He shrugged, turning his attentions to the people around him. Slowly he probed their minds. He crept into dark corners and trod tortuous, narrow paths, never really knowing what marvelous or horrible thing would pop up at the next turning. It was a thrilling game—and sometimes a shocking one. Incredibly primitive and candid at times were the thoughts of the innocent-looking girls, especially the slim brunette at the—

“Mr. Brandt!”

He looked up, startled. His private secretary was standing in front of his desk, and from the annoyed tone of her voice he knew that she must have spoken to him several times in an unsuccessful attempt to gain his attention.

“Yes, Miss Cartwright?” He spoke guilelessly, pretending to be deeply preoccupied with the papers in his hand.

The girl’s eyes seemed to be laughing at him. Brandt wished that he knew what she was thinking. Why, he asked himself for the hundredth time, did Ellen have to be one of the very few people whose minds remained always closed to him? Dear Ellen, aloof Ellen—Miss Cartwright! How he ached to touch her!

Her smile did not change. “Mr. Blanding would like to see you, Mr. Brandt,” she said, in a matter-of-fact tone.

He watched her move back to her desk, concentrating a question at her and getting no response. Shrugging, he arose quickly and left the office.

Blanding greeted him at the door. “Come in, Neville,” he said. “I’ve been expecting you.”

With a sudden, sharp apprehensiveness Brandt probed at Blanding’s mind. Nothing. It had happened before, and the completeness of the mental shields which were always drawn closely around Blanding and Ellen excited fantastic possibilities. Yet, were they fantastic? If Brandt himself was a neophytic telepath, the probability of there being others more advanced, and with complete control and direction of the power, must surely exist. And why stop at two or three? Why not a well-developed society of telepaths still hidden from the government and successfully avoiding detection?

Brandt stared uneasily at the smiling Blanding and a sudden, overmastering fear pulsed through him.

“Of course, there might be two societies,” Blanding said, his expression utterly impassive. “One hidden from the government, and one within the government itself.”

All the blood drained from Brandt’s face. Blanding knew then. But how—how—

“How? Very simple.” Blanding motioned Brandt into a chair and handed him a cigarette. “It’s all here,” the big man said, tapping his forehead.

Brandt made no attempt to light the cigarette. He simply stared, his pallor almost frightening.

“You’ve done a remarkable job of logging and extrapolation, Neville,” Blanding went on. “But you made one serious mistake—a normal one under the circumstances. You should have used your unique talent as an aid in a search for other telepaths who might have helped you to develop.” Blanding pushed his bulky frame out of the chair and walked to the window. “But children are always selfish with a new toy.”

He turned to Brandt. “Do you realize that because of your selfish attitude, it took Cartwright and myself six months of quite needless speculative analysis to arrive at the truth about you. I mean, with absolute certainty—”

“So that’s it!” Brandt leapt to his feet. “Ellen’s one of us!”

Blanding smiled tolerantly. “Yes, that’s it. But don’t look so startled. We’re both master telepaths. Our ability goes far beyond your present stage of development. But once you are caught up, once your attacks disappear—”

“How long have you known?” Brandt asked, cutting him short with an urgent gesture.

“Almost from the first. But I was not absolutely sure, as I’ve just told you.”

“And Ellen?”

“We’re a team, Neville. It’s our job to find new telepaths and determine their potentials.”

Brandt crushed his unlighted cigarette between his thumb and forefinger. “You mentioned two societies of telepaths. Which one do you belong to?”

Blanding turned back to the window and spoke slowly. “There’s a small but powerful group of master telepaths within the government, whose task is to smoke out men and women who are determined to develop a new and totally different form of society. The government knows the capabilities of free-thinking telepaths, and what a threat they are to the status quo. The people in control of the government don’t want our present institutions changed. They don’t want to lose their power over the people.

“You see, the average citizen today has been conditioned to accept the almost divine power of the State. His thinking is done for him by those in office. He gets what he needs and never needs what the government doesn’t allot him. Only the telepaths question the government’s authority, and only the telepaths have the ability to do anything about it.”

Blanding paused an instant, then went on: “But the government isn’t concerned with what may happen a hundred years from now. Oh, they know telepathy is undoubtedly the next step in human evolution. They know that you and I and all the rest are just the advance guard of the future. But their immediate concern is with the present.”

Brandt sat down slowly. “How many known telepaths are there?”

“About seven thousand scattered throughout the country,” Blanding replied. “There may be an even larger number of untutored ones like yourself who haven’t been discovered yet.”

“And now you think I’m ready to join the others?”

“We do—yes.”

Brandt leaned eagerly forward in his chair.

“This evening,” Blanding answered his unspoken question. “Cartwright and I will take you to meet them.”

Brandt returned to his own office, and nervously, impatiently, waited for the day to end. He watched Ellen Cartwright, who remained busily absorbed in her work, and did not once glance his way. He sent feelers out to her again and again. But she gave no sign that she was aware of them, and when he probed, her mind was still impenetrable.

Toward evening, fatigue set in. He could no longer control his telepathy. But he was accustomed to that—his untutored talent always ran wild after several hours. Kaleidoscopic waves of thought assailed his mind, jabbing at his senses until his head rang with a thousand pulses.

Pain throbbed in his temples and at the base of his skull. Over and over, agonizing shafts of pain shot up to the top of his head until the very hairs on his scalp ached. He clenched his fists and steeled himself to endure the affliction in silence.

Abruptly, the torment ended. He felt empty. His tensed body sagged for an instant and when he opened his eyes everyone had gone. The rooms were still and dark except for the thin, barely visible filament of light that seeped under the closed door of Blanding’s private office.

Brandt relaxed in the soothing quiet. Faint murmurings came to him from the busy street below, but they were like gentle lullabies in contrast to the telepathic noise he had just endured.

Presently, Blanding emerged from his office. “Are you ready, Neville?” he asked.

Ellen stood quietly at his side. Her eyes were compassionate and Brandt suddenly realized that she understood what untutored telepathy was like. But was there more than pity in her feelings for him? Brandt earnestly hoped so.

He followed them out of the building. The streets were still alive with people, and the sounds of their thoughts began to creep into his mind. Direct and indirect, controlled and uncontrolled, meaningful and meaningless, the thought sounds clashed tumultuously within him.

He stepped onto the sidewalk strip beside Blanding, while Ellen moved quickly to his other side.

Don’t go with them! A powerful, directed thought plunged through the noise and echoed forcefully in his mind. Don’t go with them!

Brandt felt the pressure of Ellen’s hand on his arm increase, ever so slightly. For the first time he heard, her mental voice speaking to him directly. Neville. Trust me. You must trust me.

Don’t go! came the warning voice. They’re government people!

“Spotters!” Ellen’s voice was suddenly frightened, unsure. “We will have to hurry.”· She shuddered and urged him along the walk.

“But that man is a telepath,” Brandt objected.

“Of course,” Blanding said. “All government spotters are telepaths. How else could they find their quarry?”

Abruptly a searing, wide-open blast of hate, fear and anger washed over Brandt. So intense was it that he staggered from the shock. Instantly Ellen put her arm about his waist to steady him. As he leaned heavily against her he dimly heard from a far-off cavern of echoes, the sound of voices.

“The fool!” Blanding shouted. “Doesn’t he realize that Brandt can’t shield himself? Does he want to kill him?”

“You know how ruthless they are,” Ellen said. “They’d do anything to prevent us from adding to our strength. Come on,” she urged. “We’ve got to get him away from here!”

The hate impulses poured in upon Brandt again and again. Mechanically, unconsciously, he allowed Ellen to steer him along the walk to the North Terminal. Her warmth and sympathetic nearness gave him partial shelter from the raging storm of powerful emotion that was driving down upon him like a slashing torrent.

“Get in!” Blanding ordered, holding open the door of a cab. He obeyed mechanically. Ellen climbed in beside him, and Blanding followed. As soon as they were seated, Blanding worked the throttle and they took off.

As they sped away from the city, the turmoil in Brandt’s mind grew less acute. Full consciousness returned and he was aware of the tumultuous and conflicting impulses that still lingered, subdued under the blanketing balm of empathy he felt coming from Ellen.

He looked out through the window of the helojet. The night-black countryside was dotted with thousands of tiny lights—the suburban homes of the city workers. The lights wheeled and dipped and air-marker lamps traced out a huge figure nine and an arrow pointing northward toward the spaceport nine hundred miles away. Directly south of the marker patterns lay the immense blackness of the empty city.

Brandt turned to Blanding. “Where—where are we going?” he asked.

“I told you. We’re taking you to join the others.”

“But where?”

Blanding smiled. “There’s no harm telling you now,” he said. “We’re taking you to the Asylum. You’ll join the other thousands of telepaths we’ve taken into custody. You’ll be safe there. Safety for you and—safety for the government.”

Brandt shouted. “Then that man was right!” He twisted around, in sudden, unbelieving horror. “You are from the government.” His muscles tensed for an instant as he leaned toward Blanding. Then he hesitated, puzzlement spreading across his face.

Trust me, Neville!

Blanding laughed. “That’s all right, Ellen. He’s a big boy now. You can drop the act.” He sneered at Brandt. “That’s right, Neville. We’re spotters. There are two kinds of telepaths, you see—idealistic fools like you and government spotters like us. The idealists end up behind the bars of the Asylums.”

Brandt stared incredulously at the man he had worked with and trusted completely. He was like a different man now. He seemed to exude arrogance and contempt.

Brandt brought his fist up, hard. Blanding rolled back against the seat. The jet pitched convulsively. Again and again Brandt struck out blindly, his punches going wild.

Ellen struggled with the controls, bringing the cab level just as Blanding slashed out viciously with the edge of his hand. The blow caught Brandt in the back of the neck and he slumped forward.

“You fool,” Blanding taunted. “You could have become one of us! But you just didn’t have it in you! We probed you very thoroughly.”

He glared down at Brandt struggling to rise. “Frankly, I had hoped to be able to recruit you for the Service—it would have been a feather in my cap. But you’re an idealist!” He spoke the word with a grimace of contempt. “You’re one of those fools who subconsciously believe the drivel concocted for the masses. Equality! Liberty! You can understand why we can’t allow people like you to remain at liberty. We can’t afford to have too many ‘enlightened’ people in the unenlightened masses.”

“He knows now,” Ellen protested. “Leave him alone.”

“It’s never over with his kind.” Brandt shook his head to clear it, his eyes defiant. “I don’t give a damn about—”

“Save it, Neville!” Blanding warned. “It won’t do any good. We know you better than you know yourself.”

The helojet dipped and glided in to a landing at a brightly lighted field. The landing lamps made a circle of blazing blossoms in the night. The jet settled within the ring and rested like a huge butterfly amidst a bed of tiger lilies.

“This is it,” said Blanding.

He opened the door of the jet and hopped to the ground. Brandt followed him. Ellen came up to him and took his hand. He felt her fingers squeeze his.

“You seem confused, Neville,” Blanding observed with a laugh. “Is there something you still don’t understand?”

Brandt pulled his hand away. “Let’s get this over with!” he said angrily.

They walked down a long ramp toward a small circular stone building. There was no courtyard and no fences. High in the walls of the pill-box building were narrow windows in two rows—one at the third and one at the fourth level. The windows of each level alternated with those above and below in a checkerboard pattern that ringed the entire structure.

At the end of the ramp they were halted by a thick block-glass door. As they stood waiting a yellow light flashed on above them, and the door suddenly became transparent. They faced a battery of deadly iota-ray sprayers.

“Speak one, and identify yourself!” a metallic voice demanded.

“Spotters seventeen and two-sixty-three,” Blanding said. “And prisoner.”

The light blinked, changing from yellow to blue, and the door slowly swung open. Blanding prodded Brandt and the latter moved forward into a small rotunda. He had a fleeting impression that Ellen’s hand touched his once, and then....

It was a cold, unfriendly room, and Brandt lay on his back on a hard metal cot. His temples were pounding as he stared up at a three-quarter moon that peered in through a high-silled window. Moonlight glowed eerily in the small cubicle, painting the close gray walls with its soft light.

For a chilling moment, Brandt did not know where he was. It was like waking from a bad dream. His pulses throbbed, and he was covered with the cold dampness of fright. Even his limbs seemed pinioned by an intolerable weight.

Then he remembered—up to a point—and an even colder dread of reality settled over him. He was a criminal! When every pretense had been set aside—he was a criminal locked up in a prison. There was no escaping the fact.

He was a telepath, and Blanding and Ellen were telepaths, too. But a dark, cruel gulf yawned between them. The door to his cell slid open noisily and a self-propelled wheel chair rolled in.

“Prisoner will report to R and C at once!” The metallic voice seemed to come from everywhere.

Brandt got off the cot and moved quickly toward the door. The chair rolled in front of him. He stopped and stared at this strange guard on wheels. Then he calmly seated himself. The chair promptly turned about, and moved out into the corridor. The corridor seemed endless. Around and around it stretched on either side of him. The chair turned to the right.

  REGISTRATION & CLASSIFICATION

The sign hung above a door before which the chair had stopped. Brandt got off and opened the door. He tripped on the smooth metal bar which was stretched across the doorway, and fell against a tilted examining table. Instantly the table swung to horizontal and slid forward, carrying Brandt into a domed chamber equipped with weird instruments. Bands of nylon swiftly bound him motionless to the table.

An instrument, shining and ominous, lowered toward him. At its tip a needle slid out of its rubber shield. Brandt strained desperately against the bonds. The syringe lowered to his arm, and paused while a correction in angle was made. Then it plunged into his flesh. Brandt gasped. The room spun wildly and a blackness settled over him.

When he awoke, he was in another cubicle—bare except for a chrome table. The nylon bands hung limply across him. He pushed them away and sat up. A light splashed on the table. On it were two badges. One had the number TP-07403 stamped on it. The other read “Observation.”

“Pin them on,” the voice said. “Number on left breast, classification on right.”

Brandt picked up the badges and began to fasten them on his shirt, his hand shaking a little.

“You must wear identification tags at all times,” warned the voice. “Prisoner will report to orientation.”

Brandt looked about for a door. There was none.

“Get back on the table!” the voice ordered. Brandt obeyed and the table carried him into yet another room.

“Identify yourself!” the metal voice commanded.

“Neville Brandt.”

“Identify yourself more explicitly—as a prisoner.”

He fumbled at the badge on his shirt, twisting it so that he could read the number.

“TP-07403,” the voice said, “you are now under the jurisdiction of the Telepathic Control Board. As a latent telepath, you will be kept under constant observation until such time as your sympathies and ultimate development can be determined. At that time you will be re-classified into one of two major groups—Serviceable or Unserviceable. If you are suitable, you will be inducted into the government service. If not, you will be dealt with accordingly.

“As a loyal citizen, you can readily understand that our policy is in the interest of national welfare, and we know that you will give us your full cooperation throughout your observation period. Failure to do so will, of course, lead to your immediate classification as Unserviceable. Prisoner will now—”

The voice was abruptly interrupted by a grating sound which reminded Neville of a scratchy recording.

Neville! The impulse swept over him suddenly, clearly, unexpectedly. Listen to me carefully! This is Ellen. Trust me, darling. You must trust me. Follow these directions and I’ll explain later. Brandt fell back against the cold wall as the thoughts pressed in on him. Go through the door and down the corridor to your left. Take the third door on the right-hand side of the corridor, then follow the stairs—hurry! Hurry, Neville!

Brandt hesitated.

Please, Neville!

He pushed through the door and ran down the corridor to the stairs. He could not understand Ellen’s dual behavior, but he put the thought out of his mind. He had nothing to lose by trusting her implicitly. He bounded down the stairs and fell against a door. It flew open under his weight.

The room was filled with banks of cybernetic controls—and was quite obviously the nerve center of the automatic building! Ellen was moving slowly around a long narrow table that contained the voice units of the huge robot prison. Blanding stood in tight-lipped silence at the far end of the table!

Brandt threw himself at Blanding. They fell to the floor, struggling furiously. Almost instantly, Blanding was in telepathic command. Paralyzing pain seized Brandt and rocked him back against the table. Blanding clambered to his feet, his face contorted with rage. He rushed at Brandt, catching him in the pit of the stomach with his fist.

The blow sucked the blood from Brandt’s head and his mind cleared a little. He struck back blindly and felt Blanding stagger backwards. He lunged after the falling man, sprawling on top of him, and pounded his head against the stone floor. Blanding’s body relaxed and he stopped struggling.

Brandt got shakily to his feet. Ellen rushed to him. He took her into his arms, and held her tightly.

“It’s all right,” he comforted her. “It’s all right.” He waited until she had stopped sobbing before he asked, “How do we get out of here?”

“We must release the others first,” Ellen said. “We’ve got a few minutes before the police can figure out what’s happened.”

“How many are there here?”

“About two hundred,” she told him. “And there are thousands more scattered throughout the country in other places like this.”

“What about them!” Brandt demanded.

Ellen pointed to the complex machinery in the room. “These controls can be activated to open every cell in the country.”

Brandt examined the machinery. It was similar to the cybernetic brain he had developed at Central Metals to control the quality regulators in all the factories at the same time.

Suddenly he was smiling. “Then you planned this whole thing!”

“Yes, Neville. Even the man who almost killed you with his concentrated thoughts this evening. He was planted there for Blanding’s benefit.”

“But why did you wait this long? Why not two years ago when my telepathy began?”

“That’s when our planning began,” Ellen said. “When I was certain that you were telepathic, I told our leaders about you. They decided that you were the only one who could set the dials on the ‘Brain’ properly, and we had to let them get you in here. It wasn’t easy to stand by and wait while Blanding watched you compile your notebook.

“This book,” Ellen continued, reaching into her purse, “could have been a valuable tool against us. It pinpoints every stage and system of telepathic development. Blanding wanted it as complete as possible before moving against you. Now we’ll use it to help train our people.”

“Then you knew how I felt about you all along,” Brandt whispered.

“I knew—and I feared for you each day. I wanted to tell you who I really was a thousand times—to tell you I loved you. But Blanding would have read you in an instant.”

“Ellen, I—”

She reached up and kissed him gently. “Now we must hurry.”

Brandt turned back to the dials of the cybernetic brain. He reached out and touched them. And an image flashed across his mind, an image of a thousand doors springing open.