It was like a sun had supernova'd in my skull!

The hypnohelmet was turned off. I was wide awake.

The Countess Krak!

(Bleep) her! (Bleep) (bleep) her!

She, and she alone, out of some stupid impulse to protect Heller, had consigned me to weeks and weeks of purest Hells! And all because I was just doing my simple, normal duty!

The strange illness that turned on each time I even casually thought of harming Heller! The Manco Devil in the nightmare! The fleeing from the scene to the mountains! The paralysis of my arm! My whole inability to carry out this mission! To even be my normal self!

All was explained!

The effects were gone!

The orders no longer held!

(Bleep) you. Countess Krak!

Aha, you wait and see now what happens to that (bleeped) Heller.

And to you!

Every Hells any planet ever heard of would be a lovely place compared to the Hells you two will be in now!

Chapter 5

For a seething half hour I just sat there.

Gradually I became aware of Doctor Cutswitz. He had let me be. He had removed the hypnohelmet long since and he was sitting over on a bench across the room just watching me. He saw now that I had fully come around.

I wanted to get out of there and get about my business. I reached into my pocket and got out a counterfeit five-credit note. He was no trained cashier. Might as well get him killed off by his friends the bluebottles.

I extended the note.

He smiled. "I am afraid that is not quite enough, Officer Gris." I froze. How could he know my name? I had no identification on me!

"Not five credits," he said pleasantly. "I think five thousand credits would be more accurate." I was thinking fast. "I don't have money like that."

"Oh, I think you could get it. You could give me all you have on you right now. And then give me the rest in installments – say, during the next week."

"You know nothing but my name!"

"Oh, and perhaps a few things more. Like twenty dead Fleet spacers in a dungeon. I think the Fleet would dearly love to know about them." I pretended to sag. Listlessly, I put the riding helmet on and dropped the visor. Then, as though hopeless, I took the rest of the counterfeit money out. I got up and walked over to him. He stood. He reached out his hand.

There was nothing wrong with my arm now and never would be again.

The hand that was extending the money to him did a small jerk.

A ten-inch tri-knife snapped out of my sleeve into my palm.

The (bleeped) fool was still smiling, thinking he had won.

I lunged. Ten inches of steel went through his heart.

Abrupt surprise shot into his eyes. And the knowledge he was dead.

I yanked the knife back, stepping aside. The blade inside him turned into three parts. Guts and a gush of blood rushed out of him, splatting on the floor.

He fell in it face down.

I prodded him. He was dead. Very messily dead.

The bills had flown sideways. I picked them up and wiped the blood stains off the shiny paper by rubbing them on the back of his coat. I put them in my pocket.

Then I ransacked the room and found the recording strips he had made on a hidden machine. I destroyed them.

He had uttered no sound. I had been silent. I went to the door and opened it a crack.

For an instant I thought I saw someone at the lower end of the hall, someone who had abruptly stepped out of sight. A witness?

Footsteps were coming down the hall from the other direction. It was a woman. She was middle-aged. She looked like she worked in this building.

I stepped out in front of her. I was holding the bloody knife. She stopped. I handed it to her hilt first.

"Quick," I said in a low urgent voice. "Take this and run down to the bluebottle station and show them that Doctor Cutswitz has been murdered." She would have screamed. But a low, secret sort of voice prevents that when used right. Her eyes went round and glazed.

She grabbed the hilt of the knife and rushed off, heading for the police station just below.

Another flick of movement in the shadows down the hall. Had I been observed?

Well, who cared? It would do them no good. I had the riding helmet on and the black visor down. I sped to the window. Nobody followed.

I went down the wall like an agile insect, I mounted the speedwheel.

A call for an arrest van blasted out at the police station. To Hells with them. I silently rolled the speed-wheel to the other end of the alley, into another street. I made no noises with the vehicle. It was two blocks away when I opened it up to a roar.

They would arrest the woman, of course. The police principle of "the least work consists of arresting the handiest person" would be in full play. It was a solved crime on their books. Be neat, I always say. Leave no loose ends.

I dropped the speedwheel at the den, putting it exactly where it had been before. I even locked it up again.

Shortly after, I slipped into the airbus. My changing clothes woke my driver up. We flew away on quiet wings. As we passed over the River Wiel, I dropped the suit and helmet into the raging water below.

That night I lay in my room. I planned and planned. What would happen to Heller and Krak now was all their own doing. I had never felt so deadly before in my whole life. I told myself, Hells have no Demon as full of hate as a man covertly hypnotized. And no Demon would have dared make up such ugly and varied plans as I made that night.

Heller was totally at my mercy now and I intended to make the very vengeful most of it!

Chapter 6

I was up with the dawn. I loftily did not comment on my driver's petty tribulations about the costume refund – Heller, it seems, had forgiven him but the driver, of all things, felt guilty!I swept into the office where the early arriving Bawtch was sucking his early morning jolt: I took it right out of his hand and finished it! I didn't even stand there to enjoy his surprise.

Climbing down the stairs into the hidden rooms in the basement, I made my way to the secret forgery unit.

Every Apparatus section has its own forgery unit – one couldn't run without one. Such actions are usually reserved for the framing of resistive or dissident citizens: few would be brave enough to make forgeries of the type I planned.

But, under the shadow of Lombar, forced to it by his orders – and even, I must admit in this case, enjoying the vindictive flavor of it – I swept aside assorted pens and stamps and sat down to compose my masterpieces.

It took me quite a while, what with scratch-outs and additions, but I was finished by the time the two forgers arrived.

They sat down at their tables and I put the rough drafts before them. It made me smile to see them flinch.

"I don't think we have the right paper," said the senior.

"Get it," I said. "Right now. Get it!" He fished around for a time, going through materials in the cases. He finally found two sheets of what he needed.

The other forger said, "I don't think we have the right seals."

"I think you have," I said.

He raked about in some old boxes and finally located some that could be converted.

They were both a bit white and terrified, as well they might be. Because I have enough on both of them, material not even in the master data files, and they elected to commit the present crime on the basis that it was less painful than the revelation of old crimes.

Forgers are very funny people. There is a streak of artist in them and, along with it, artistic pride, and soon they were both deeply immersed in concentration and ink. I did not have to tell them to do the best possible job. Their own tradecraft was a matter of self-respect. But, more than that, if these two forgeries had the tiniest detectable flaw in them, and if they were prematurely exposed, half the Domestic Police Division would be on their trail. Necessity breeds precision!