Part 2

"Yes. This is the door, over here. I must have crashed in the swamp and for some reason staggered out."

"But how--how does it work?"

"Like this."

He raised his hand to the plate, and suddenly the sense of danger swept over him again. And now he knew where it came from. Not from the ship itself. No, not from the ship. But from the Professor, the gentle little man who had been protecting him.

* * * * *

He swung around and saw that the little man's forehead was beady with sweat. The man had been tense, hoping that he would open the door without remembering too much. The hope had failed. His memory had been coming back gradually in the past few days. Now the sight of the ship had brought back everything. Everything.

He caught sight of the glint of metal in the Professor's hand. "I thought so," he said. "I thought so."

Angel's lower jaw had dropped. He stammered, "What is this? Professor, that ain't a gun, is it?"

"Much more than a gun," said Crusoe softly. "That's the magic. When I pointed with my hand, without thinking, it was because I was accustomed to having a weapon like that. But it was the Professor who actually had it. It was he who made those rifles explode. And because he didn't want any one to suspect that he had such a thing on him, he let me have the credit."

"It will do you no good to remember," said the Professor. "In the long run it will do you no good."

"I wonder. You can cover a great surface with a sheet of flame by using that thing, you can kill with it, but you can't make me do what you want. Not now, not after I've remembered who you are."

"Look," said Angel, "I don't get this. I know the Professor for five, six years."

"Not this one," replied Crusoe. "Perhaps the original Professor did find me wandering around alone. But then my friend here came searching for me, and after studying his characteristics for a time, killed him and took his place. He's a great mimic, is my friend. That, in fact, is why I was sent to get him, and was bringing him, a prisoner, back to his home planet. He's mimicked all sorts of people, even those who have only the slightest resemblance to humanoids. It was nothing at all for him to become a Professor. Physically, of course, he probably doesn't fit the part too well. Do you mean to say that you haven't noticed?"

The Professor laughed gently. "Angel wouldn't notice. Haven't you realized yet that he's half blind? He stumbles, blunders into things. He can't see well. He didn't notice the difference. Not when I acted so well."

* * * * *

Angel sought escape from confusion in a fact he could understand. He said pathetically, "You killed the real Professor? He was a guy who wouldn't have hurt anybody. You killed him?"

"Of course. I've killed much better and more important people than he would ever be."

"He's right, Angel, he's an experienced killer. But all his killing won't help him now. He needs me to open and operate the ship. And I'm not cooperating."

Angel held fast to what he could understand. He muttered to himself, "The dirty killer. The rat."

The little man ignored him. He said, "You were very wise, Tlaxon--you remember your name now?--you were very wise, when you saw that a crash threatened, to lock the ship's machinery so that only your own personal characteristic motions would open it again. That was too much for even me to mimic. Your cleverness left me helpless to escape from the planet without you. After we finally crashed, and I recovered from the shock, I examined the ship's machinery. There seemed to be no serious damage. But I couldn't operate it. I needed your help. And you were unconscious. Sitting at the controls, you had received a much more severe shock than I had. You didn't recover for many hours. And after you did, you remembered nothing. You were still unable to be of use to me.

"I was enraged, but there was nothing I could do. I tried to keep you in the ship, but once, while I was asleep, you awoke and stumbled out. I had no choice then but to follow you in order to protect you. The ship locked automatically behind me, leaving me worse off than ever. But I had to follow because my escape depended on your own. It was then that Professor discovered you and I discovered him. I had to kill him. I think you can see why."

"Yes, I see now."

"Once our return to the ship was blocked off, we had to hide. I had to discard our old clothes and steal clothes that would be less conspicuous. As it was, we ourselves were conspicuous enough. In the world of ordinary men, we would have been subject to immediate investigation. It was only among such outcasts as Angel and his friends that we could to some extent pass ourselves off as natives. When they met us, the others thought that Angel had at last found friends of his own kind. Angel, of course, thought he had found the Professor. He was overjoyed to see me, and his enthusiasm was our passport. Moreover, in their world, it was not customary to ask questions that a man was not inclined to answer. There were too many embarrassing secrets on all sides.

"I was continually on tenter-hooks with regard to you. I was hoping that you would remember enough to help operate the ship and escape from the planet, but not enough to recall who I was. Meanwhile, I watched with interest how even in your amnesiac state you absorbed the English language. With our people, Tlaxon, language learning is much more of a reflex process than it is with these Earthlanders. You learned without knowing that you were doing so. All the same, your racial peculiarities prevented you from speaking exactly as the natives do."

* * * * *

"That's why I thought that _they_ were the ones who spoke strangely. All but Angel."

"Yes, he has the same difficulties with dentate sounds like _t_'s and _d_'s that we do. Strange how much he resembles us physically too. It helped people to think of us as three freaks of a kind. Mentally, of course, there's all the difference in the world."

"Is there? I wonder if he isn't basically sound. I wonder how well he'd do if he weren't made to feel like a freak, if he were given a chance in our own System."

The smaller man's lips curled in a sneer. "Perhaps an inferior creature like him would fit in. I'm afraid I never will. I'll tell you what I'll do, Tlaxon. Once we take off from this planet I'll let you put me down in one of three places where I have friends. I'll give you your choice and promise you that no harm will come to you."

"The rat," muttered Angel hoarsely. "Look, Crusoe, I don't understand everything you fellows said. But I remember the Professor, the real Professor. He had a big head, just like me. He used to say a wrestler could be a highbrow too."

"A high forehead, such as our own. Yes," agreed the little man. "He had."

"And he didn't make fun of me because my face was kinda blue. Other people used to look at me like I was a freak. They didn't realize that after I stopped wrestlin' I had to go to work in some factory where the silver chemicals turned my skin blue. They just thought I was born that way."

"We _were_ born that way," said Crusoe gently. "Can't you tell? Or are your eyes so very bad? That's one reason we would have been so conspicuous without you. That's why the people looked so strange to me. Not merely because most of them had low foreheads. But because none of them were blue. Pink and brown and white, and red and yellow and black, but no blue. I began to think of them all as freaks."

"You are as big a freak as any," interrupted the Professor. "I am giving you a chance for your life. And you prefer to discuss irrelevancies."

Crusoe shook his head. "Your offer is rejected. Whatever happens to me, I do not intend to help you escape."

"No? You have no choice, friend Tlaxon. I am tired of caring for you like a baby. Either you accept my offer now or I withdraw it for a worse one. And I think I know of ways to make you do as I wish."

It was Crusoe's turn to perspire. He was quite aware that the other man knew of many painful ways. But he knew too that if he accepted the original offer, the murderous little man would break his promise and murder him the moment the ship's controls were freed of their responsiveness to the characteristics of one man.

* * * * *

While Crusoe hesitated, the sharp crack of a rifle broke the silence. Angel winced and pressed his hand to his right shoulder. A red stain spread under his fingers.

Half a dozen men with rifles were advancing across the burned out area of the swamp. "Attracted by the flame," muttered the Professor. "The fools." He swung around to cover them with his weapon, keeping one eye on Crusoe.

He had written off Angel because of the latter's wound. He should have remembered the man's tremendous vitality. Just as the weapon went off, Angel's left hand swung out and caught him under the jaw. A sheet of flame appeared at treetop level and then died out. The weapon fell to the ground and Crusoe picked it up.

The rifles exploded. The next moment the door in the ship's surface had swung silently open. Crusoe leaped in.

"So long, pal," said Angel huskily. "This rat killed Professor. I'm goin' to make sure that he gets his."

Crusoe shook his head, remembering all the times the big man had befriended him before.

"Those men will punish him. You come in here."

"Huh?" said Angel foolishly.

"Your one real friend is dead. Do you want to be regarded by the others as a freak all the rest of your life? Come with me. I'm expected back with a prisoner. They'll be glad to get you instead. You'll be made over, given a new life. You'll still be blue, of course--but so will everyone else. As for _him_, he's past making over. He doesn't deserve to be treated as we treat most of our prisoners. I'll leave him to your race and he'll probably be punished for killing the real Professor. Even if the only thing that happens to him is to remain on Earth and have no way of getting back to his own planet, that will be punishment enough. You needn't worry about his getting his."

Angel moved slowly through the doorway. The metal clanged shut behind him. The motor purred and the ship began to vibrate so smoothly that Crusoe could hardly feel it. All was well, he realized; the motor was unharmed by the crash. For which they were thankful.

The ship roared into the air. As the forgotten little man, who had been the danger, screamed unheard, they headed for the nearest star and home--for both of them.