Palace City was the safest place to be. Not only was it thirteen minutes in the future but, like Spiteos, it was protected from mobs by the simple fact that they could not cross the vast Great Desert on foot or with ground cars. Palace City also had heavy exterior defense bunkers that could shoot anything out of the sky. Under the yellow mist of warped space, in the great round antechamber of the Emperor, Lombar Hisst sat with his back to the locked and bolted bedroom door and faced his general staff. A red-uniformed old criminal, whose battle-scarred face also bore traces of debauchery and no sleep, was speaking. "The Army finally took it into their heads to cooperate," he said. "A thousand transports have landed a million men on Calabar. This freed up the remainder of our forces there and they should be arriving at Apparatus Staging Area Seven by this evening. So, factually, sir, we don't have any more troops on Calabar, only a few observers. That puts me out of a job as Calabar staff overseer here. And I was wondering if I might not take a little run up into the Blike Mountains. I've an estate there…" "You'll stay on duty!" thundered Hisst, slapping his stinger down on his desk. "Set up a bureau for future population suppression. This would never have happened if we'd planned for it." He pointed the stinger at another general. "If Tur there had had his wits about him, if he'd done some advance planning, he wouldn't be in trouble now. Gas. Set up some ps extermination chambers for troublemakers: I'll get you the plans from one of the Blito-P3 surveys." "Sir," said the general indicated, "I don't think there's any time for construction of anything. Over two hundred Apparatus town headquarters have been wiped out to a man. If I could just have a few troops from the staging areas____________________

"

"Empty a few prisons and put the inmates in uniform," snapped Hisst. "Do I have to think of everything?" Tur was already doing that as fast as he could but he held his peace. "Now you, General Muk," said Hisst, "how are you coming along with the Earth-invasion staging?" "As a matter of fact," said Muk, squirming, "I've put the invasion of Blito-P3 on hold. It seemed to me that the two and a half million troops might be needed right here on Voltar." "Bah!" said Hisst, glaring at the other generals. "We have a million and a half Apparatus troops to handle Voltar and some of the others. This is no full-scale civil war. It's just mobs. Sooner or later they'll get tired of being shot down and that will be the end of it." "We are having trouble with suppliers," said Muk. "The troops that came in from Calabar are short of everything. We can't seem to get deliveries into the staging areas." He added hastily, "We are, of course, sending out armored convoys and simply raiding civilian warehouses and we can, of course, accomplish our outfitting. We have had some trouble with mobs burning plants and we have lost eighteen convoys in street fights as of this morning, but we can be invasion-ready in a couple of days, even so. It just seemed to me that with all this trouble, you might need the Blito-P3 force here." "No, no, no," said Lombar. "We're just fighting riffraff. You others simply need to take stronger measures, that's all. The invasion goes off as scheduled, regardless of local disturbance." He gave a short, barking laugh. "Unarmed rabble, riffraff." "They seem pretty mad," muttered a general in the rear. "We've already lost over fifty thousand men." "Who's that?" snarled Lombar. "Are you frightened or something? Well, speak up!" He didn't get an answer, for running feet sounded in the outside hall. A staff officer, followed by two men, raced into the room. The others looked up in alarm. The three were carrying huge stacks of papers. The staff officer dumped his on Lombar's desk and pointed with a shaking finger. Headlines, full first page:

HELLER KIDNAPS EMPEROR

Seventy papers said the same, A general came out of his shock and frantically switched on a Homeview set. The words blared out, "IN THE MOST DARING RAID IN VOLTAR HISTORY, THE OUTLAW JETTERO HELLER HAS KIDNAPPED CLING THE LOFTY, EMPEROR OF VOLTAR!" The generals stood like scarlet ice statues, eyes filled with the headlines, ears pounded by the din.

Into this stunned tableau rushed J. Walter Madison. He was wearing a General Services officer's gray uniform and sand goggles. Thundering hard on his heels came his director and camera crew. "Oh, heavens!" cried Madison. "I am so glad I found you, Chief!" It was no accident that he knew Hisst was there: he had been having him tailed. Madison came to a halt before the stunned Hisst. He pointed at the headlines on the desk. He pretended he was short of breath. "I tried to get them to hold the announcement until I consulted you but the traitors wouldn't wait!" What an awful lie that was! He had had his reporters, armed with copies of Heller's letter, leak the news to every paper. He had only been waiting outside the antechamber until he had seen the papers brought in. Lombar was staring at him. The generals were staring at him. Madison gave the director and crew a hand signal to go live, straight into the Homeview circuits for the whole Confederacy, as arranged by the manager at his orders. "Quick, quick!" cried Madison. "We've got to take fast action to disprove this rumor. Open that door fast so we can show the whole Confederacy that the Emperor is still there!" Lombar at the desk saw with horror, from the flickering camera lights, that they were on the air! He moved suddenly to mask himself with Madison's body. Then he saw Heller's baton lying there: convulsively he snatched it up and put it behind his back. He was trying to think of something, anything that would prevent this disclosure. His own generals, not in the know, unwittingly undid him. In various voices, they all said differently and urgently the same thing, "Yes, for Gods' sakes!" "Open up the door!" "This is catastrophe!" "Check that bedchamber!" Madison was grabbing keys and opening plates. Lombar was too paralyzed to stop him. Madison got the door open and slammed it wide. He and the generals rushed in. Lombar was knocked into their midst by the director.

THE ROOM WAS EMPTY!

The cameras played all around the Royal bedchamber. Madison saw very clearly that the room had not been occupied for months: food in the pans was decayed, excreta on the bed covers was dry. Swinging up the covers to pretend to look under the bed, he hid the evidence. Madison, leaping up, cried, "It must have been just last night! Oh, heavens, I'm afraid for the Emperor's life!" Then Madison saw Lombar was holding something behind his back. "What is that you've found?" he shouted. He grabbed the baton and the cameras zoomed in on it. Madison examined it, holding it to be shot, "The evidence! He left evidence! This is Jettero Heller's officer baton! Now we know for sure who did it! The outlaw Jettero Heller has kidnapped Cling! Oh, catastrophe! Oh, woe! We are undone!" Madison made a slight signal to the director and the cameras promptly began to cover the room minutely. It took them off of Lombar. Madison got behind Hisst's back and whispered urgently in his ear. Lombar came out of his shock. The cameras centered on him. "Yes, yes!" shouted Lombar. "Instantly! Generals! Order all Fleet and Army units to pursue him! The villain has escaped to Calabar!" The director had the cameras pan as all the generals rushed off to issue the orders. Madison gave the cameras and director a signal to stop. The moment Lombar saw the flickering lights go off, he sank down soddenly in a chair. "Oh, this is terrible," he groaned. "Oh, no, it isn't!" said Madison. "This is just great! It's the very thing you have been waiting for! Violent civil unrest, no Emperor. The Army and the Fleet now out of the way. The great opportunity has arrived!" "Opportunity?" said Lombar in new shock. "This is disaster!" "No, it's not," said Madison. "The throne is empty. Lombar, you are about to become Emperor!" "No, no," said Lombar. "I need the body of the last monarch to show a duly convened assembly of Lords! I need the regalia! It's gone!" "Details, details," said Madison. "Here, fortify your nerves. This is no time for palsied hands." He took out of his pocket a flat pint bottle of the very best counterfeit Scotch that Bolz had been importing. There was only one change Madison had made in it: it held a minute quantity of LSD. Lombar took a swig. It burned its way down. He felt his blood begin to flow again. He took another swig. "Now, that feels better, doesn't it?" said Madison. He turned. "Get set up, director."