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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30288 ***
+
+                         Transcriber's Note:
+
+  This etext was produced from Analog Science Fact & Fiction May 1962.
+  Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S.
+  copyright on this publication was renewed.
+
+
+
+                              SIGHT GAG
+
+
+                          BY LARRY M. HARRIS
+
+
+     Intelligence is a great help in the evolution-by-survival--but
+     intelligence without muscle is even less useful than muscle
+     without brains. But it's so easy to forget that muscle--plain
+     physical force--is important, too!
+
+
+
+                      ILLUSTRATED BY SCHOENHERR
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+Downstairs, the hotel register told Fredericks that Mr. John P. Jones
+was occupying Room 1014. But Fredericks didn't believe the register.
+He knew better than that. Wherever his man was, he wasn't in Room
+1014. And whoever he was, his real name certainly wasn't John P.
+Jones. "P for Paul," Fredericks muttered to himself. "Oh, the helpful
+superman, the man who knows better, the man who does better."
+
+Fredericks had first known of him as FBI Operative 71-054P, under the
+name of William K. Brady. "And what does the K stand for?" Fredericks
+muttered, remembering. "Killer?" Brady wouldn't be the man's real
+name, either. FBI Operatives had as many names as they had jobs, that
+much was elementary. Particularly operatives like Jones-Brady-X.
+"Special talents," Fredericks muttered. "Psi powers," he said, making
+it sound like a curse. "Superman."
+
+Upstairs, in Room 1212, the superman sat in a comfortable chair and
+tried to relax. He wasn't a trained telepath but he could read surface
+thoughts if there were enough force behind them, and he could read the
+red thoughts of the man downstairs. They worried him more than he
+wanted to admit, and for a second he considered sending out a call for
+help. But that idea died before it had been truly born.
+
+Donegan had told him he could handle the situation. Without weapons,
+forbidden to run, faced by a man who wanted only his death, he could
+handle the situation.
+
+Sure he could, he thought bitterly.
+
+Of course, if he asked for reinforcements he would undoubtedly get
+them. The FBI didn't want one of its Psi Operatives killed; there
+weren't enough to go round as it was. But calling for help, when
+Donegan had specifically told him he wouldn't need it, would mean
+being sent back a grade automatically. A man of his rank and
+experience, Donegan had implied, could handle the job solo. If he
+couldn't--why, then, he didn't deserve the rank. It was all very
+simple.
+
+Unfortunately, he was still fresh out of good ideas.
+
+The notion of killing Fredericks--using his telekinetic powers to
+collapse the hotel room on the man, or some such, even if he wasn't
+allowed to bear arms--had occurred to him in a desperate second, and
+Donegan had turned it down very flatly. "Look," the Psi Section chief
+had told him, "you got the guy's brother and sent him up for trial.
+The jury found him guilty of murder, first degree, no recommendation
+for mercy. The judge turned him over to the chair, and he fries next
+week."
+
+"So let Fredericks take it out on the judge and jury," he'd said. "Why
+do I have to be the sitting duck?"
+
+"Because ... well, from Fredericks' point of view, without you his
+brother might never have been caught. It's logic--of a sort."
+
+"Logic, hell," he said. "The guy was guilty. I had to send him up.
+That's my job."
+
+"And so is this," Donegan said. "That's our side of it. Fredericks
+has friends--his brother's friends. Petty criminals, would-be
+criminals, unbalanced types. You know that. You've read the record."
+
+"Read it?" he said. "I dug up half of it."
+
+Donegan nodded. "Sure," he said. "And we're going to have six more
+cases like Fredericks' brother--murder, robbery, God knows what
+else--unless we can choke them off somehow."
+
+"Crime prevention," he said. "And I'm in the middle."
+
+"That's the way the job is," Donegan said. "We're not superman. We've
+got limits, just like everybody else. Our talents have limits."
+
+He nodded. "So?"
+
+"So," Donegan said, "we've got to convince Fredericks' friends--the
+unbalanced fringe--that we are supermen, that we have no limits, that
+no matter what they try against us they're bound to fail."
+
+"Nice trick," he said sourly.
+
+"Very nice," Donegan said. "And what's more, it works. Nobody except
+an out-and-out psychotic commits a crime when he hasn't got a hope of
+success. And these people aren't psychotics; most criminals aren't.
+Show them they can't get away with a thing--show them we're
+infallible, all-knowing, all-powerful supermen--and they'll be scared
+off trying anything."
+
+"But killing Fredericks would do that just as well--" he began.
+
+Donegan shook his head. "Now, hold on," he said. "You're getting all
+worked up about this. It's your first time with this stakeout
+business, that's all. But you can't kill him. You can't kill except
+when really necessary. You know that."
+
+"All right. But if he's going to kill me--"
+
+"That doesn't make it necessary, not this time," Donegan said. "This
+vengeance syndrome doesn't last forever, you know. Block it, and
+you're through with it. And think how much more effective it is,
+letting Fredericks go back alive to tell the tale."
+
+"Think how much more effective it would be," he said, "if Fredericks
+managed to get me."
+
+"He won't," Donegan said.
+
+"But without weapons--"
+
+"No Psi Operative carries weapons," Donegan said. "We don't need them.
+We're supermen ... remember?"
+
+He twisted his face with a smile. "Easy for you to talk about it," he
+said. "But I'm going to have to go out and face it--"
+
+"We've all faced it," Donegan said. "When I was an Operative I went
+through it, too. It's part of the job."
+
+"But--"
+
+"And I'm not going to tell you how to do the job," Donegan went on
+firmly. "Either you know that by now, or you don't belong here."
+
+He got up to leave, slowly. "It's a fine way to find out," he said
+mournfully.
+
+Donegan rose, too. "Good luck," he said. And meant it, too.
+
+That was the chief for you, he thought. Send you out into God knows
+what with no weapons, no instructions, lots of help planted for the
+man who wanted to kill you--and then wish you good luck at the end of
+it.
+
+Sometimes he wondered why he didn't go in for some nice, peaceful job
+of work--like rocket testing, for instance.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Fredericks, downstairs, was deciding to do things the subtle way. The
+man upstairs--Jones, Brady or whatever his name was--deserved what he
+was going to get. Psi powers were all very well, but there were
+defenses against them. Briefly he thought of the man who'd sold him
+the special equipment, and wondered why more criminals didn't know the
+equipment existed. It worked; he was sure of that. Fredericks knew
+enough of general psi theory to know when somebody was handing him a
+snow job. And the equipment was no snow job.
+
+A force shield, that was the basic thing. A shield with no points of
+entrance for anything larger than air molecules. Sight and sound could
+get through, because the shield was constructed to allow selected
+vibrations and frequencies. But no psi force could crack the shield.
+
+Fredericks has sat through a long explanation. Psi wasn't a physical
+force; it was more like the application of a mental "set," in the
+mathematical sense, to the existing order. But it could be detected by
+specially built instruments--and a shield could be set up behind which
+no detection was possible. It wasn't accurate to say that a psi force
+was blocked by the shield; no construct can block that which has no
+real physical existence. It was, more simply, that the shield created
+a framework inside of which the universe existed in the absence of
+psi.
+
+That wasn't very clear, either, Fredericks thought; but mathematics
+was the only adequate language for talking about psi, anyhow. It had
+been the theory of sets that had led to the first ideas of structure
+and rationality within the field, and the math had gotten
+progressively more complex ever since.
+
+Psi couldn't get through the shield, at any rate; that was quite
+certain. And very little else could get in, or out. There was only one
+point of exit. Unholstering his gun and aiming it automatically keyed
+the shield to allow passage of a bullet, and the point of exit was
+controlled by the gun's aiming. It was efficient and simple to handle.
+
+But Fredericks wasn't depending on the shield alone. There was a
+binder field, too--a field which linked him to the surrounding area,
+quite tightly. That took care of the chance that the Psi Operative
+would try to pick him up, force shield and all, and throw him out a
+window or through the roof. With the binder field in operation, no psi
+force could move him an inch.
+
+A plug gas mask, too, inserted into the nostrils. The shield plus the
+mask's pack held two hours' worth of air--just in case the Psi
+Operative tried to throw poisonous molecules through the force
+shield, or deprive him of oxygen.
+
+And then there was the blindfold. Such a simple thing, and so
+effective.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Upstairs, the Psi Operative caught the sequence of thoughts. Did the
+FBI have to do such a thorough job, he wondered bitterly. The
+equipment, he knew, would do everything Fredericks thought it would
+do. It was important that Fredericks go up against the Operative
+thinking he was completely protected--in that way his final defeat
+would be most effective. He'd have guarded against every possible
+failure--so, when he failed, there would be nothing to explain it.
+
+Except the "fact" that the Psi Operatives were supermen.
+
+He gritted his teeth. It would be nice, he reflected, to be a real
+superman. But any talent has its limits. And, even allowing for that,
+only Donegan and a very few others could handle the full theoretical
+potentials of their talents. In theory, a telekineticist could move
+any object with his mind that he could move with his hands. That was a
+rough rule of thumb, but it worked. The larger objects were barred by
+sheer mass; no matter what kind of force you're using, there's a limit
+to how much of it you can apply.
+
+The smaller objects--molecules, electrons, photons--simply took
+practice and training. First the object had to be visualized, and the
+general structure memorized. Then the power had to be controlled
+carefully enough so that you moved just what you wanted to move and
+not, for instance, shift the Empire State Building while trying to
+lift a molecule out of its topmast.
+
+It was possible, in theory, to create full sensory hallucinations by
+juggling electron streams and molecules within the brain. But
+memorizing the entire structure of the brain was a lifelong task,
+since you also had to allow for individual variation, and that meant
+working with "tracking" molecules inside each brain before any work
+began. Most Operatives stuck to one area--usually, as most effective,
+sight or sound.
+
+He was a sight man. He could create any visual hallucination, as long
+as the subject was within a twenty-five-foot range. Beyond that,
+control of the fantastically small electrons and photons simply became
+too diffused.
+
+But Fredericks had a shield. And in case the shield didn't work, he
+was coming with a blindfold.
+
+The Psi Operative had no weapons, no reinforcements, no chance to
+run--nothing except his psi talent, which Fredericks had defenses
+against, and his brains.
+
+But there had to be a way out.
+
+Didn't there?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The desk clerk looked young and comparatively innocent. Fredericks
+ambled over, taking his time about it. The clerk looked up and smiled
+distantly. "Yes, sir?"
+
+"You've got a man registered here," Fredericks said, in crisp,
+official tones. "He gave the name of John P. Jones--"
+
+The clerk was consulting a card file. "Yes, sir," he said brightly.
+"Room 1014."
+
+"He's at work on an FBI matter," Fredericks said. "Naturally, this is
+private and confidential--"
+
+"Naturally," the clerk said in a subdued tone. "But I--"
+
+"I'm assigned to work with him," Fredericks said. "You understand."
+
+"Of course, sir," the clerk said, trying to look as if he did.
+
+Fredericks took a deep breath. "I know he's here, but I don't know his
+room number," he said. "Some red-tape mixup."
+
+"He's in 1014," the clerk said hopefully.
+
+Fredericks shook his head. "Not that," he said. "The real room number.
+Look, I've got to get to him immediately--"
+
+"Of course, sir," the clerk said. "Identification, sir?"
+
+Fredericks grinned and fished in pockets. Naturally, he didn't come up
+with a thing, FBI identification was infra-red tested, totally
+unmistakable and unavailable to non-Operatives under any circumstances
+whatever. "Got it here some place," he muttered.
+
+The clerk nodded. "Of course, sir," he said. "No need to waste time. I
+understand."
+
+Fredericks stopped and stared. "You what?"
+
+"The room, sir, is 1212," the clerk said. "Would you like me to
+accompany you--"
+
+"No thanks," Fredericks breathed. "I'll find it myself." The man was
+too easy to find, he thought savagely. It ought to be tough to find
+him--but it's easy.
+
+Remotely, that idea bothered him. But what difference did it make,
+after all? He had all the protection in the world. He had all the
+protection he was going to need. And all the time to fire one shot.
+Doing it blindfolded was going to be tough, but not insuperably tough.
+Fredericks had spent a week practicing, and he could locate a fly by
+sound within two inches, nineteen times out of twenty. That, he
+thought, was going to be good enough.
+
+Upstairs, the Psi Operative thought so, too.
+
+There had to be a way out, he told himself desperately.
+
+But he couldn't find it.
+
+He couldn't even come close.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On the way to Room 1212, he flipped on the shield, the mask, the
+binder field. Now let the superman try something, he thought wildly.
+Now let him try his tricks! He attached the blindfold as he got off
+the elevator. He could see Room 1212, three doors down the corridor,
+twenty steps--and then the blindfold was on. From now on he worked in
+the dark.
+
+He felt the skeleton key in his palm and flipped the shield off for a
+second; then the key was in the lock, the shield back on, protecting
+him. The door opened slowly.
+
+He heard it shut behind him. Then there was silence. He drew his gun.
+
+"Go ahead," a muffled voice said from his right. "Go ahead and try
+something, Fredericks."
+
+He whirled and almost fired--but voices could be thrown. He listened
+again. There was silence ... not quite silence ... a movement ... a
+rustle--
+
+Breathing was faint but unmistakable. It gave him a new direction.
+Breathing couldn't be faked.
+
+He pictured the Psi Operative, in one flash of imagination, trying to
+get through the shield, sweating as he strained helplessly against the
+force shield, the binder field, the mask, the blindfold--oh, there was
+no way out for the poor superman, no way at all.
+
+And Psi Operatives didn't carry weapons or anything else. They
+depended on their powers, and that was all.
+
+And he'd neutralized those powers.
+
+The breathing gave him the direction. He turned again, bringing the
+gun up, and fired six shots without a second's break between them.
+There was a sound like a gasp, and then nothing.
+
+Nothing at all.
+
+Grinning wildly, Fredericks whipped off the blindfold and switched off
+his shield in one triumphant motion. There, on the floor--
+
+There, on the floor, was a nice gray rug with nobody at all lying dead
+on top of it. In the half-second it took Fredericks to see that, the
+Psi Operative moved. Fredericks tossed the empty gun at him and
+missed; the man was coming too fast. He guarded his face but the Psi
+Operative didn't go for the face. Instead his hands went swinging up
+and out and _back_.
+
+The sides of the palms landed neatly on the twin junctions of
+Fredericks' arms and shoulders. Fredericks let out a shriek as his
+arms turned to acutely painful stone, and the Psi Operative stepped
+back and moved again in one blinding motion. This time the solar
+plexus was the target for one balled fist.
+
+And then, of course, it was all over.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Of course it was simple," Donegan said. "Anyone could have thought of
+it--and I knew you would."
+
+"All the same," the Psi Operative said, "I nearly didn't."
+
+Donegan nodded. "If you hadn't," he said, "we'd stationed a man
+downstairs who'd memorized your room. He could have done the job,
+too."
+
+The Operative blinked. "Who?" he said.
+
+"Desk clerk," Donegan said.
+
+"Why didn't you tell me--"
+
+"Now, use your head," Donegan said. "If you'd known you were all
+right, you'd never have thought of the answer. You had to prove you
+could do it--prove it to yourself as well as to me."
+
+"But--"
+
+"And you had to prove you could beat him on his grounds, too, as well
+as yours," Donegan went on. "You had to take him, not only with psi
+forces, but with the only weapons a Psi Operative is allowed to
+carry."
+
+"Fists," the Operative said. "Sure Judo and Karate are standard
+subjects--every Operative has to know them. What's so tough about
+that?"
+
+"Nothing," Donegan said. "Nothing at all--except for Fredericks. He's
+been beaten on your ground, and on his own. Now he _knows_ he's
+licked. Standard operating procedure."
+
+"I guess so," the Operative said.
+
+"And after all," Donegan said, "now that you're going up a grade--"
+
+"Now that I'm what?"
+
+"That," Donegan said, "was your promotion test, friend. And you
+passed."
+
+There was a second of absolute silence. Then the Operative said: "And
+it was all so simple."
+
+"Sure," Donegan said. "Simple enough so that you get a promotion out
+of it--and Fredericks gets sixty days for attempted assault."
+
+"Not ADW--assault with a deadly weapon--because we've got to keep up
+the myth," the Operative said. "Psi Operatives are untouchable. No
+such thing as a deadly weapon for a Psi Operative."
+
+"Which is nonsense," Donegan said, "but necessary nonsense. I wonder
+if Fredericks will ever figure out how you got him."
+
+"I wonder," the Operative said. "He'll know about karate, of course."
+
+"Karate's hand-to-hand fighting." Donegan said. "That was _his_ field.
+No, I mean _our_ field. Psi."
+
+"It makes a nice puzzle for him, doesn't it?" the Operative said, and
+grinned. "After all, I didn't touch him--couldn't, in any way. He'd
+shielded himself perfectly from any telekinetic force--and I had no
+weapons. I couldn't even get to him barehanded because of his shield
+and the binder field. He had me located--no tomfoolery about that. He
+fired six shots at me, point-blank at can't-miss range."
+
+"But you got him," Donegan said.
+
+"Sure," the Operative said. "Simplest thing in the world."
+
+"All you had to do--" Donegan began.
+
+"All I had to do," the Operative finished for him, "was use my mind to
+move the bullets--as he fired them."
+
+[Illustration]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Sight Gag, by Laurence Mark Janifer
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30288 ***