Chapter I: Front Matter

THE BERSERKER

By CHARLES V. DE VET

_'Twas said of The Berserker ... "when
an opening comes he'll play for it, and
he'll do it with a single-minded violence._"

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Planet Stories March 1953.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

All of Big Jim Ostby's attention seemed on the cigar as he lit it, but it was not. He observed the faces of the men who passed him by, and the figures of those across the street, and up and down the sidewalk. Satisfied, he moved on.

Ostby's six feet four, and two hundred thirty-five pounds, were not conspicuous on this other-dimensional world, where his size was but little above average. And only the sharpest observer would have noted the leashed aliveness of the instrument of sinew and muscle which was his body.

Deliberately Ostby avoided the shadows. That way lay danger. Reason, abetted by an instinctive capacity for adaptation, told him blending in with his background offered the best concealment.

By now the whole district would know that the police were after him. He wondered what the latest reports were. Casually he slowed his pace until two men behind him drew near enough to be overheard.

"They say the police have the Berserker cornered in our half of the Flats," one of the men said.

"If they trap 'im there's gonna be some dead police before the night's over," the second answered. "He ain't called the Berserker for nothing."

"I'd hate to be in his shoes. They've got a net around the district that a fly couldn't get through."

"I'd hate to be one of the police that corners him."

"He'll never get away this time."

"I wouldn't bet against him if I was you. The gamblers in the street are giving odds of two to one that he makes it."

"How do you figure he's got a chance?"

"I don't know. We're not cut out of the right stuff for that kind of thing. He is. When an opening comes he'll play for it, and he'll do it with a single-minded violence."

Suddenly Ostby's attention was drawn to a group of men collected at the corner ahead. Two thin lines of police were blocking the way and examining identity cards. He drew in a long, deep breath. Life for him on this world was one of a series of crises, unforeseen, but stationed along his way as regularly as mileposts.

Swiftly, but with studied unconcern, he looked about him. To turn back here would arouse attention. His cigar had gone out now, and he flicked it into the gutter.

To his right was an amusement place. He turned and entered.

The place was filled with the usual crowd of drinkers and merrymakers. Ostby found a seat at the bar and ordered a drink.

A minute later he left his stool and went to the rest room. He had to plan a way out in case of necessity. There was no back entrance to the rest room, he saw, and the only window was high above his head. Too small for a man's body to squeeze through. He'd be trapped if he let them corner him here.

Back at the bar he found his drink still waiting.

"I held your place for you," a woman's soft voice said.

* * * * *

Ostby glanced into the full length mirror above the bar. The girl next to him was young and pretty. He shifted his glance to his own reflection. The mustache and the little patch of beard between his chin and lower lip had grown well. His whiskers always came in heavy and black, and they were the style now. They altered his appearance considerably.

Evidently it had not lessened his attraction for the opposite sex. That attractiveness had been with him so long that he had ceased being surprised by it. But it still puzzled him. There was strength in the features of the reflection that looked back at him, he admitted, but no beauty. Rather the outline was almost harsh, as though etched by a rough masculine hand. He wondered, without caring, why women were drawn to it.

All this retrospection occurred in the split second after he glanced into the mirror. "I am in your debt," he said, turning to his companion. His manner and expression was disinterested, even a bit disdainful. Yet his voice was gentle and courteous.

Perhaps that contrast was the thing that held women's attention. The manner seemed to imply a knowledge of their wiles, and an ability to read through their vanities. Yet his voice told them that he recognized their womanly need to be appreciated, and coddled, and that he would be invariably gentle with them.

"May I buy you a drink?" he asked.

"My glass is still full," the girl answered, and smiled at him. She did not look so young now that he saw her face to face. The features were young, but the eyes were old, and too wise for one of her chronological age. With his flameless lighter Ostby lit the white oval which the girl drew from its package and placed between her full red lips.

All the while Ostby's eyes made their swift survey of the room and stamped its every feature in his eidetic memory. Only one exit, other than the front door, he saw. The windows were all about seven feet above the floor, and banded with burglar-bars. A man would have difficulty gaining entrance or exit.

At the opposite end of the room he observed a small dance floor and a mechanical music box. His attention was held for a moment by a party seated in a booth at the edge of the dance floor. The men and women in the booth were too well dressed, too well bred, to be down here in the Flats.

The apex of the party was a woman whose beauty attracted Ostby clear across the room.

"Who are the people in the back booth?" he asked his companion.

"The Duchess of North Hudson," the girl answered, wrinkling her nose in affected hauteur. "She's slumming. Seeing how the other half lives."

"Does she come often?"

"Only when she gets tired of being a lady. Right now she's celebrating her separation from her second husband."

Abruptly Ostby sensed something was wrong.

He glanced into the mirror. At the door stood a half dozen of the police. His gaze shifted to the rear entrance. He saw another party of police there.

"If you'll excuse me," he said to the girl, as he stepped down from his stool, "I believe I'll have a word with the Duchess."

The girl's mouth made a round O as he left her.

Ostby paused directly in front of the Duchess. Her attention swept up to him.

"My name is Captain Faas, formerly of the Imperator's private guards," he said, bowing deeply enough to show courtesy, but not so deeply as to seem subservient. "May I be so bold as to hope that the Duchess has not forgotten me?"

There was no recognition in the Duchess's look but there was interest.

"Should I remember you?" she asked.

"It was my privilege to meet her grace at the winter games a few years ago," Ostby answered. The look he gave her was appreciative of what he saw.

The Duchess returned the look without recognition, but with amused acknowledgment of a clever approach. "Of course," she said. "How could I have forgotten? Won't you join us?"

"You are very kind," Ostby said. From the corner of his eye he saw that the soldiers were drawing nearer. They were demanding identity cards from all the men. "If I may presume on that kindness," he said to the Duchess, "would you do me the honor of dancing with me?"

The Duchess hesitated for a barely perceptible instant. "I would be happy to," she said.

* * * * *

The Duchess danced well. Ostby followed the waltz piece with a fine sense of the music's rhythm that women love.

The Duchess' dress was worn off her rounded shoulders and each breath stirred the fullness of her breasts against the dress.

At the side of the dance floor he saw that a lieutenant of the police was waiting politely for them to finish their dance. The big test would come soon.

"You say we met at the winter games," the Duchess mused. She looked up at Ostby. "We danced at the ball after the games, did we not?"

"That's right," Ostby answered, while one part of his mind considered the problem of the lieutenant waiting for them. "That is why I asked you to dance. I'd hoped it would recall our acquaintance."

"Acquaintance is such a formal word," the Duchess said teasingly, and Ostby knew, without pride, that she was reacting to that intangible something about him that pleased women. He looked down into her eyes and noted just a suggestion of permanent crinkles at the corners. He judged her age as about thirty-three, seven years older than himself.

"I assure you that I feel anything but formal when I hold you in my arms," he answered, following her lead. He made her feel desirable by the things he expressed in his glance.

In the meantime the other portion of Ostby's mind had made its decision concerning the lieutenant.

"I see the police are making another of their nuisance spot-checks," he said. "I'm afraid I'm due to go through a bit of red tape. I've misplaced my identity card."

"I hear they're tracking down some notorious criminal," the Duchess answered. Abruptly her glance, full of sudden speculation, swept up and studied his face. After a short pause she said something that at first thought sounded irrelevant. "I've never danced at the winter games," she said.

Ostby drew in a quick breath. She knew!

The lieutenant was beside them now.

"You won't need to see his identity card, officer. He's with me," Ostby heard the Duchess say, and he let his breath out in a long silent sigh.

The lieutenant was not satisfied, but he was clearly afraid to press matters. He bowed to the Duchess as they walked past him.

* * * * *

Ostby lay on his back, with his knees drawn up and his hands beneath his head. His eyes shifted idly about the room, taking in its every feature automatically. It was this automatic attention to details that had always helped him land on his feet in the past whenever he had been in trouble. And he might be in trouble now. Too much of his trust rested with the Duchess--Rinda, she had asked him to call her. His entire safety rested in her fair hands--and he did not like it. He liked to trust no one except himself.

Ostby had accepted the invitation to visit her because he needed a place to hide; and because she knew too much for him to do anything except agree. But he would have chosen otherwise had he had a choice.

However, his reason told him that she had not taken him from the grip of the police to turn him in now.

And so he lay quietly, with the relaxed alertness of a resting cat. His thoughts were back on Earth.

When he had taken this assignment to come through the "door" between the worlds, he had known that there would be hardships, and that his life would be continually in danger, but it was moments like these that he hated the most--moments when he was not able to dictate the next step.

Approximately twenty years earlier--in 1950--the aliens had somehow made their "door" between the worlds; that "door" which never appeared twice in the same spot. At first they had been content to come in, circle their noiseless vessels through the air as they observed the Earth, then return through their shifting "door." They had refused all contact. Then gradually evidence began to come in that they were raiding undefended areas, abducting men and stealing property. Their depredations increased through the years until eventually they constituted a major menace.

There was no effective defense against them. Now and then one of their air ships was shot down but invariably it exploded before crashing. At last, in desperation, the United Governments had attempted to get operatives through with the captured persons. Ostby was one of the few instances of success.

For six months now, by dint of adroit maneuvering and luck, he had managed to stay alive, but he was no nearer to closing the "door."

Impatiently Ostby climbed to his feet and began pacing the room. He had never been able to get used to these rooms, with no corners, and all their furniture in the center. But they made for convenient pacing.

Had he been wrong in his estimate of the Duchess, he wondered. She had appeared too much woman to let matters of the state come ahead of her private affairs. Suddenly he stopped in mid-stride as there came a gentle tapping on his door. He had not been wrong!