By Mind Alone
Larry Niven, first published in If: Worlds of Science Fiction, June, 1966.
part 5
I got my drink replenished and reached for a cigarette to occupy my other hand. I was out, and Pat wasn’t back yet. Nuts. I joined Larsen again. Shouldering my way into the group that surrounded him.
His eyes lit. “Art, have you thought of an experiment for us?”
I hadn’t, but I said, “Yah. Get someone to teleport to two different places at the same time. If it works, there’ll be town of him, and that’ll violate the Laws of Conversation of Matter.”
That got a laugh. Larsen said, “All rights, you’re elected to go first.”
“Let’s let Carol go first. Two of Carol would be a fun thing.”
She was standing right me, of course, and she cocked her head at me and asked, “What are you buttering me up for?”
“Got a cigarette?”
She had t wo, and she grimaced when she had to give me one. It was mentholated, and it was dried from the altitude, but I’ll smoke anything in an emergency. Carol said, “Pat should have been back by now.”
I nodded. It had been a good fifteen minutes.
“We’d better call her home.” Larsen sounded a bit uneasy.
Lon Dugan was the guy she’d come with, and he had her beach house number. We crowded around while Larsen made the call. When he hing up he looked very sober. “She’s been taken sick,” he said.
In this Sunday series of posts I will be “re-publishing” pulp science fiction short stories that have long since gone out of print. When possible I will seek out author’s and estates for permission.
