United States or South Africa ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Into this Otto Harkaman vanished, with half a dozen men and a contragravity scow. Its historical section would be much poorer in the future. President Pedrosan Pedro was on the radio from Stolgonopolis that night. "Is this how you Space Vikings keep faith?" he demanded indignantly. "You've abandoned me and my army here in Stolgoland, and you're sacking Eglonsby.
It will be nothing but plain self-defense," he added righteously. "The oligarchic capitalists of Stolgoland have been plotting to attack us for years." "Yes. If you had carried out your original intention of looting Eglonsby, they would have invaded us the moment your ships lifted out. It's exactly what I'd do in their place." "But you maintain nominally friendly relations with them?" "Of course.
"I know, the maps we're using for this planet are a few centuries old; Stolgoland doesn't seem to appear on them." "I wish it didn't appear on ours, either." That was General Dagró Ector, Syndic for State Protection. "It would have been a good thing for this whole planet if you'd decided to raid them instead of us," somebody else said.
Pedrosan Pedro had been overthrown and put to death by General Dagró Ector during the disorders following the looting of Eglonsby; the troops left behind in Stolgoland had mutinied and made common cause with their late enemies.
They met more intimately, in a smaller and more luxurious room in the same building. "If you're going to declare war on Stolgoland, you'd better get along with it," Morland advised. "What?" Pedrosan seemed to have only the vaguest idea of what he was talking about. "You mean, warn them? Certainly not. We will attack them by surprise.
The two nations were in an uneasy alliance, with several other nations combining against them, when the Nemesis and the Space Scourge returned and declared peace against the whole planet. There was no fighting; everybody knew what had happened to Stolgoland and Eglonsby.
A couple of times around and somebody'll stick a knife in him, and then we'll be rid of him for good." They loaded the Space Scourge with gold from Stolgoland, and paintings and statues from the art museums and fabrics and furs and jewels and porcelains and plate from the markets of Eglonsby. They loaded sacks and kegs of specie from Khepera.
Stolgoland lay across a narrow and shallow sea from the State of Eglonsby; it was dotted with islands, and every one of them was, in turn, dotted with oil wells. Petroleum was what kept the aircraft and ground-vehicles of Amaterasu in operation; oil, rather than ideology, was at the root of the enmity between the two nations.
He'll probably bring half his army back, leave the other half in Stolgoland, and lose both. Suppose we drop in, in about three or four years, just out of curiosity. If we make twenty per cent of what we did this time, the trip would pay for itself." After they went into hyperspace and had the ship secured, the parties lasted three Galactic standard days, and nobody was at all sober.
We could charge our own prices for it, and we wouldn't need to tell them what gadolinium sells for on the Sword-Worlds." "We could, if we could do business with anybody there, after what we did to Eglonsby and Stolgoland. Where would we get plutonium?" "Why do you think the Beowulfers don't have hyperships, when they have everything else?" Harkaman snapped his fingers. "By Satan, that's it!"
Word Of The Day