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he'd return to being that stagnant milquetoast.
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Lilith: A Snake in the Grass
Me, on the other hand . . . Me, I would still be here, still live on, the real
me.
I would become more complete than he would.
I was under no illusions, though. Kill me they would, if they could, if I
didn't do their bidding. They'd do it automatically, from robot satellite, and
without a qualm. would. But my vulnerability would last only until I
I
mastered my new situation and my new and permanent home. I felt that with a
deep sense of certainty, for I knew their methods and how they thought. I'd
have to do their dirty work for them, and they knew it-but only until I could
find a way around it. They could be beaten, even on their own turf. That was
why they had people like me in the first place: to uncover those who expertly
covered over their whole lives and activities, who managed to vanish totally
from their best monitors-to uncover them and get them.
But there'd be no new expert agent sent to get me if beat them. They'd just
I
be putting somebody else in the same position.
I realized then, as they had undoubtedly figured, that I had no choice but to
carry out the mission. Only as long as I was doing what they wanted would I
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be safe from them while still in that vulnerable stage. After that-well, we'd
see.
The thrill of the challenge took over, as it always did. The puzzle to be
solved, the objectives to be accomplished. I like to win, which is even easier
when you feel nothing about the cause, just the challenge of the problem and
the opponent and the physical and intellectual effort necessary to meet that
challenge. Find out about the alien menace. It no longer concerned me either
way-I was trapped on a Warden world from now on anyway. If the aliens won the
coming confrontation, the Wardens would survive as allies.
If they lost, well, it wouldn't make a damned bit of difference, only continue
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Lilith: A Snake in the Grass the current situation.
That meant the alien problem was purely an intellectual challenge, which made
it perfect.
The other objective created a similar situation. Seek out the Lord of that
particular Diamond world and kill him if I could. In a sense accomplishing
that would be more difficult, for I'd be operating on totally unfamiliar
ground and would therefore require time and perhaps some allies. Another
challenge. And if I got him, it could only increase my own power and position
in the long term. If he got me instead, of course, that would solve
everybody's problem-but the thought of losing is abhorrent to me. That set the
contest in the best terms, from my point of view. Track down assassination was
the ultimate game, since either you won or you died and did not have to live
with the thought that you lost
It suddenly occurred to me that the only real difference between me and a
Lord of the Diamond was that I was working for the law and he-or she-
against it. But no, that wasn't right, either. On his world he was the law and
I
would be working against that. Fine. Dead heat on moral grounds.
The only thing wrong at this point, I reflected, was that they were starting
me at a tremendous disadvantage. The normal procedure was to program all
pertinent information into my brain before setting me off on a mission-but
they hadn't done that this time. Probably, I thought, because they had me once
on the table for four separate missions, and the transfer process, to a new
body, was hard enough without trying to add anything afterward. Still, this
method put me in a deep pit. I thought sourly that somebody should have
thought of that.
Somebody did, but it was a while before I discovered how. About an hour after
I had awakened a little bell clanged near the food port and I went over
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Lilith: A Snake in the Grass to it. Almost instantly a hot tray appeared,
along with a thin plastic fork and knife I recognized as the dissolving type.
They'd melt into a sticky puddle in an hour or less, then dry up into a powder
shortly after that. Standard for prisoners.
The food was lousy, but I hadn't expected better.
The vitamin-enriched fruit drink with it, though, was pretty good; I made the
most of it, keeping the thin, clear container (not the dissolving type) in
case I wanted water later. Everything else I put back in the port, and it
vaporized neatly. All nice and sealed.
About the only thing they couldn't control was bodily functions, and a half-
hour or so after eating my first meal as a new man, you might say, nature
called. On the far wall was a panel marked "toilet" and a small pull ring.
Simple, standard stuff. I pulled the ring, the thing came down-and damned if
there wasn't a small, paper-thin probe in the recess behind it. And so I sat
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on the John, leaned back against the panel, and got brief and relief at the
same time.
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