Tilting the Balance

He used Nipponese for as much of that as he could, and spoke the rest in his own language. Okamoto interpreted for Nishina. Then, much to Teerts’ delight, the two of them got into a shouting match. The physicist believed Teerts, the major thought he was lying. Finally, grudgingly, Okamoto yielded: “If you don’t think he can be trusted to be accurate, or if you think he truly is too ignorant to be reliable, I must accept your judgment. But I tell you that with proper persuasion he could give us what we need to know.”

“Superior sir, may I speak?” Teerts asked; he’d understood that well enough to respond to it. The surge of pleasure and nerve the ginger had brought was seeping away, leaving him more weary and glum than he would have been had he never set, tongue on the stuff.

Okamoto gave him another baleful stare. “Speak.” His voice held a clear warning that if Teerts’ words were not very much to the point, he would regret it.

“Superior sir, I just wish to ask you this: have I not cooperated with you since the day I was captured? I have told everything I know about aircraft to the males of your Army and Navy, and I have told everything I know-much more than I thought I knew-to these males here, whom your Professor Nishina leads”-he bowed to the physicist-“even though they are trying to build weapons to harm the Race.”

Okamoto bared his broad, flat teeth. To Teerts, they were unimpressive, being neither very sharp nor very numerous. He did, however, recognize the Big Ugly’s ugly grimace as a threat gesture. Mastering himself, Okamoto answered, “You have cooperated, yes, but you are a prisoner, so you had better cooperate. We have given you better treatment since you showed yourself useful, too: more comfort, more food-”

“Ginger,” Teerts added. He wasn’t sure whether he was agreeing with Okamoto or contradicting him. The herb made him feel wonderful while he tasted it, but the Big Uglies weren’t giving it to him for his benefit: they wanted to use it to warp him to their will. He didn’t think they had, so far-but how could he be sure?

“Ginger, hai,” Okamoto said. “Suppose I tell you that, after you go look at this uranium hexafluoride setup, we will give you not just ginger powder with your rice and fish, but pickled ginger root, as much as you can eat? You’d go then, neh?”

As much ginger as he could eat… did Tosev 3 hold that much ginger? The craving rose up and grabbed Teerts, like a hand around his throat. He needed all his will to say, “Superior sir, what good is ginger to me if I am not alive to taste it?”

Okamoto scowled again. He turned back to Nishina. “If he is not going to inspect the facility, do you have any more use for him today?” The physicist shook his head. To Teerts, Okamoto said, “Come along, then. I will take you back to your cell.”

Teerts followed Okamoto out of the laboratory. The guard followed them both. Even through the melancholy he felt after ginger’s exaltation left him, Teerts felt something akin to triumph.

That triumph faded as he went out onto the streets of Tokyo. Even more man than he had in Harbin, he felt himself a mote among the vast swarms of Big Uglies in those streets. He’d been alone in Harbin, yes, but the Race was advancing on the mainland city; had things gone well, he could have been reunited with his own kith at any time. But things had not gone well.

Here in Tokyo, even the illusion of rescue was denied him. Sea protected the islands at the heart of the Tosevite empire of Nippon from immediate invasion by the Race. He was irremediably and permanently at the mercy of the Big Uglies. They stared at him as he walked down the street; hatred seemed to rise from them in almost visible waves, like heat from red glowing iron. For once, he was glad to be between Major Okamoto and the guard.

Tokyo struck him as a curious mixture. Some of the buildings were of stone and glass, others-more and more outside the central city-of wood and what looked like thick paper. The two styles seemed incompatible, as if they’d hatched from different eggs. He wondered how and why they coexisted here.

Air-raid sirens began to wail. As if by magic, the streets emptied. Okamoto led Teerts into a packed shelter in the basement of one of the stone-and-glass buildings. Outside, antiaircraft guns started pounding. Teerts hoped all the Race’s pilots-males from his flight, perhaps-would return safely to their bases.

“Do you wonder why we hate you, when you do this to us?” Okamoto asked as the sharp, deep blasts of bombs contributed to the racket.

“No, superior sir,” Teerts answered. He understood it, well enough-and what it would do to him, sooner or later. His eye turrets swiveled this way and that. For the first time since he’d resigned himself to captivity, he began looking for ways to escape. He found none, but vowed to himself to keep looking.