by neetha Napew
Zainal shook his head. ‘You must smell like Catteni, too, and you don’t.” Yuri made a grimace and sighed. ‘Wear what you have on voyage, then change at Barevi,’ Zainal added with a grin. ‘Now,’ and he took out the sheets of the Barevi Spaceport and its environs which he had worked on, to show Chuck. ‘We must know where to go, and you must learn what to answer to questions. If you walk fast as if you know where you’re going, that you are taking a message, no-one will question. So you must knower!” They readily agreed to that but, along with the language lessons, came questions, especially from those who had not been enslaved on Barevi and were unfamiliar with it. That was where Kris came in, because she had flitted all over the city with her owner.
“Can’t we just steal flitters and not walk everywhere?” Dowdall asked.
“You may rent flitters,’ Zainal corrected him. ‘We must fit in or be noticed. If we fit in right, we can come back again.” ‘Hey, I like that,’ Ninety Doyle said, grinning. ‘There’re a couple of Tudos .
. .” Zainal pointed his pencil at Ninety. ‘You will be good Tudo and follow your Drassi’s orders.” ‘Yeah, sure, boss, gotcha, boss Drassi,’ Ninety said goodnaturedly, tugging at an imaginary cap and nodding agreement.
“Chuck, can you remember the exact layout of where slaves were held?” ‘Can do, have done,’ and Chuck took out a sheet on which he had earlier drawn an outline. ‘We better learn some Catteni symbols, too, you know . . . to follow hall markings . . .” Preparations took ten days, with long learning sessions for those who were chosen to take part. The selection was restricted to those whose physical appearance was closest to Catteni, who had already had some knowledge of the language and some experience with Barevi. Scott, Marrucci and Yuri did not, but they could be paired with those who did like Chuck, Ninety Doyle, Dowdall and Matt Su. Coo, Slav and Pess were a bit nervous about going, but they would be required to contact their own ethnic groups for what news they had. Kris was an essential addition for her knowledge of the city and familiarity with the flitters. The legs of one Catteni uniform had to be lengthened to fit her but, with her hair skinned back with the grey mud that would disguise Terran locks and the grey powder make-up, she passed well enough. She also knew enough Catten and the Barevian lingua to hire flitters and bargain properly.
Someone not bargaining with Barevian shopkeepers would immediately be suspect. On both the KDL and the scout, enough Catteni script and coin were found. Zainal then told them that the habit was for ships to charge to their number, and the charges would be sent back to a central bank to make payments.
“And we’ll be long gone before the reckoning,’ Doyle chuckled, rubbing his hands together in anticipation.
“What happens, Zainal,’ John Beverly asked one morning during the planning sessions, ‘if someone recognizes you?” All at the table - and Sandy Areson was sitting in that morning to explain about the grey ‘make-up’- turned towards him.
“I am dead,’ Zainal said, shrugging off that consideration.
“No-one will expect to see me, especially in Drassi uniform,’ he added.
Sandy tilted her head and then, rising and reaching across the table, turned him by the chin from one profile to the other.
“No problem,’ she said. ‘We add cheek pads so he looks fatter, another in front and some lines down his face to make him look older and his own mother wouldn’t recognize him.”
“What is this? Pads?” Zainal asked, somewhat dismayed.
“I used to do make-up for our theatre group, Zainal. Trust me.
You won’t recognize yourself. I’ll bring some over to the cabin and show you,’ and when she saw other sceptical expressions Sandy added, “You won’t know him either. Trust me.” When she demonstrated to Kris and Zainal later that evening, it was remarkable the change those few alterations made.
“I’d slump were I you,’ Sandy remarked. ‘Drassi are small men and don’t walk proud like an Emassi, you know.” Zainal grinned as he thanked her, a grin that was substantially altered from his normal one with the pads in place.
“Take them out,’ Kris said when Sandy had left. ‘I’m not sharing this cabin with a total stranger. A very unattractive total stranger, I might add.” And she gave a shudder of dismay until he had removed the pads and looked himself again.
The arrival of the Ix Mentat and its two juniors at the Catteni
.
ù:
main Earth spaceport in Texas, near what had been Houston, caused major security problems. Its reason for coming caused consternation, since the military governor was somehow sure that he would be forced to honourably end his life because he had not been able to reduce the rebellion of the indigenous population, despite the severe measures he employed. He had scrupulously followed orders sent to him by the Mentats on Catten, but seemed no further towards solving the tides of revolt and producing the wealth available from the planet than he had been in the first months of occupation.
When High Emassi Bulent learned the sort of equipment the Mentats had brought with them, he turned ashen, until he also heard that the mind-probes were to be used on humans, not ineffective Emassis.
Therefore he listened intently to the Ix Mentat’s wishes, organized the search and rounded up as many of the required subjects as could be found. Some could be proven dead; others might well have been already transported, since they had resided in the fifty cities originally depopulated in the first wave of Catteni suppressions.
Bulent could almost feel sorry for the men and women rounded up and crammed into the open slave-pens, for the summer heat was intense, though he himself revelled in such temperatures. There were casualties from the heat and the crowding. He had the unenviable task of explaining to the Ix Mentat that humans could not endure the solar rays that Catteni hides could, particularly humans in this upper age group as were most of the new prisoners. So they were moved to a huge shed that had been cleared of its exhibits.
Bulent’s staff then had to assign numbers to the types of specialists the Ix wished to interrogate in order of rank within the science the humans had practiced.
The Ix, Co and Se made trial examinations on lesser-known individuals
with varying results. After four deaths with little information
retrieved from the bursting brains, the instrument had to be
re-calibrated. It had originally been used to upgrade Catteni mentality
by expanding cerebral and cortical areas and stimulating certain centres in both lobes. The result had been the intelligent Emassi subset of Catteni who had originally been primitive and little more than upright animals. But what could be enhanced could also be withdrawn; that was the purpose of using the equipment on the humans.
The actual examination could take up to half a day, if the initial information plucked from the more accessible areas of the mind looked interesting. That is, if the subject was worth treating carefully. Otherwise an hour’s viewing would suffice, but the subject rarely recovered much personality and memory.
Incontinence was a frequent problem, and some retained insufficient intelligence to feed themselves. These were quietly disposed of.
In more judicious use of the mind probe, the Ix and its juniors gained the codes to private files in research laboratories, but much of the material dealt only with human concerns. The Mentats found top security codes but they weren’t interested in the politics, finding them very commonplace and predictable in the extreme; though there were one or two ploys that the Ix might use if the need arose.
Among its victims were the remaining heads of state who had not met with either transportation or execution, revealing the names of more important officials whose brains were full of sometimes amusing if petty details. Some investigations were more fruitful, leading the Mentats to find out what particular scientific studies were in progress and where. This was what the Ix had been searching for and it gave the High Emassi a inst.
The High Emassi Bulent sent his minions scurrying to find
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these people. Often they returned empty-handed, with stories that the named persons had died or had possibly been transported, but certainly could not be found. Several of these, the Ix decided, must be found unless proof of death could be established beyond doubt. So Bulent despatched his best people, including several of the renegade humans, with instructions and promises of titillating rewards for success, to make a thorough sweep of known hiding-places and refuges.
The Ix exhausted all avenues to discover what little the humans had learned about the galaxy, the universe, and their incredibly primitive methods of star travel, as well as theories that, over its millenium of existence, it had already investigated, implemented or discarded.
The resultant human chaff that remained alive after these sessions was loaded on transports and sent to Batevi, to be sold as slaves for whatever use could be found for the near-mindless.
Then the Ix closed itself in its vessel and began to sift carefully through all it had learned, in the hope that perhaps there might be even one theory that would spark its high mentality towards a viable line of research.
On the off-chance that they could hijack another ship, Bert Put and Balenquah would come along as auxiliary pilots. It fell to Raisha, then, to pilot the scout to the Balloon and see if the coast was clear.
Beverly and Marrucci had plotted the next five windows available that would avoid the orbital satellite, so it only remained to check on the absence of any Catteni ships in the general area.
Kris found it both hard and easy to leave Zane in Sandy’s charge.
She had been able to partially wean him, and he was already eating pureed foods. But Sandy promised that she would not stint him, and Kris could trust her. Pete Easley put in an appearance when she brought Zane to the creche, feeling treacherous and unnatural because part of her was dying to go on this adventure and the other part would miss her darling son terribly.
“He’s a good size, isn’t he?” Pete remarked to no-one in
_ b
particular as Kris started to hand him over to Sandy. He was awake and in one of his giggling moods, the kind that are hard to ignore. ‘Here, give him to me,’ he said and gave Kris no chance to refuse.
Being the adaptable personality he was, Zane had no problems with being passed around and gurgled up at Pete Easley as happily as he would have done at Zainal.
Kris, watching the transfer, suddenly realized that Pete was telling her he intended to watch out for his natural son during her absence. His proprietorialness was both welcome and disturbing. But should the unthinkable happen, Kris knew that Pete Easley would assume responsibility for Zane - and, she had to admit, he had a right.
With a cheery wave at him and a farewell hug and kiss for Sandy, Kris left the creche, her conflicting emotions gradually easing as she focused all her attention on the Mission.
Raisha took off in the scout to test the space beyond the Balloon just as Zainal aimed the KDL at the ‘back door’. She poked the prow through the obstacle long enough to get a reading that there was nothing immediately visible in space. Zainal eased the KDL through the Balloon just above the southern polar region.
He wasn’t the only one to expel a gust of relief that the manoeuvre was unrestricted and the KDL allowed to exit. Then he aimed the ship towards the nearest of the five moons and, using that to hide his trajectory surveillance, made all speed to that point. Once there, he plotted the course out of the system and to Barevi’s.
Even at the speed the KDL was capable of making, the Journey would take three weeks. So there was more time in which to perfect their Catteni roles, and automatically respond to orders and queries.
The meagre library of the KDL did contain spaceport plans for those
planets under Catteni domination, and these were enlarged for study,
especially by Bert and Balenquah if the chance of a second hijack
l
was feasible. Scott was not yet committed to that objective.
“He wants a warship,’ Mitford confided to Zainal and Kris.
“Fire-power.” Zainal considered that. ‘It might be possible to steal weapons, but even Catteni keep guards on warships. We don’t have enough for crew. Maybe another time.” Chuck and Kris gawked at him in surprise and he grinned back.
“Who was it said “think big”?”
“Dick Aarens?” Kris suggested.
There were also maps of Barevi which augmented the memories of those who had spent time in it - and how much a flitter should cost to such and such a destination. How to argue with cheaters, how to act if accosted for a fight . . .
“Catteni always fight,’ Zainal said. ‘Work off anger that way.
Avoid at all costs.” ‘Hey, it’s easy enough to topple a Catteni,’ Yuri said, proceeding to demonstrate a jujitsu manoeuvre on the unsuspecting Zainal. One moment the Emassi was on his feet, the next flat on his back on the deck, looking both surprised and annoyed.
When Yuri offered him a hand up, he ignored it, but he was smiling when he got back on his feet.
“Teach us!’
So jujitsu, karate and other forms of martial arts were included in the daily training sessions.
“It is better we do no . . .” and Zainal grinned, ‘species’ injuries.”
“As if the Farmers would know or care,’ scoffed Balenquah.
“We will know and we will care that harm has been done,’ said Zainal, making his position plain to the surly pilot.
“You’re a fine one to talk,’ Sev Balenquah replied at his most contentious.
“I am finer than you know,’ was Zainal’s retort.
At this point Mitford, who was sitting next to the man, jabbed him so roughly in the ribs that he was winded.
“There’s a brig on this ship,’ Beverly said. ‘D’you want to spend the rest of the trip in it?”
“Have it your way,’ Balenquah said and, pushing away from the table, stalked off.
When Beverly would have called him back, Scott shook his head.
“We’d better watch that one,’ Marrucci murmured to Beverly.
Both the general and Scott nodded. ‘Can’t figure out what’s wrong with him. And he’s even got to fly again.” Everyone took turns in the galley, leaving the Catteni food stores alone since they were even worse in taste than the bars supplied to transported prisoners. The KDL had originally had three freezers: two medium-size and one large storage type that was now in the mess hall, while one of the mediums was in the hospital. But the remaining one was adequate for the journey since Zainal expected to restock perishable goods from the markets at Barevi. Surprisingly enough, the Catteni galley had the equivalent of a microwave heating device, so that the prepackaged soups, bread and meals that the mess hall had contributed to the Mission could be reheated.
By the time the first contact was made with Barevian planetary authority, they had each perfected their skills to the best of their abilities. Even Balenquah could spit out appropriate answers; despite his more glaring personality defects, he was a natural linguist and Zainal hoped to use him to accompany Kris on her buying missions.
“He glowers just like my old boss,’ Kris said, ‘typical nasty Tudo.
Whoops, not Tudo, Foto,’ she said, correcting herself.
She had known ‘Foto’ before she was aware of the distinction between Emassi and Drassi.
When hailed by the Barevian perimeter guards, Zainal, posing as Drassi Kubitai, barked the responses and Kris understood every word he said and every word the duty officer said. The KDL was officially the KDI, since the KDL would be listed as missing. There was no problem in the code.
“Sloppy,’ Zainal muttered under his breath, thankful though he probably was that this was the case.
He elected to overfly the town to give everyone the aerial aspect of it
and help orientate them, giving a description
of each area on his way to their appointed docking facility.
Matt Su was the putative
navigator and Yuri the engineer.
They both had immediate work to do, checking in with the port authorities: Matt to handle the ‘paper work’ and show the log which Zainal had created for them, while Yuri organized refuelling, watering and the usual docking procedures. Zainal paced about the dock area to be sure they encountered no immediate difficulties, while the various teams disembarked for their assignments.
Coo and Slav went off first, pretending pathetic eagerness to be away from the Drassi, while Pess stayed on board with Matt, Bert and Beverly - the latter two not to be seen. Pess and Matt had basic Barevi and some Catteni, so they were the best ones to stay behind and prevent unauthorized entry. Ninety and Dowdall would see if there were any humarts in the slave markets. Zainal, Mitford and Scott would go into the centre of Barevi to have a meal and some drinks, and hear what there was in the way of gossip. Then, when Matt and Yuri had finished their details, Yuri and Marrucci would combine with Kris and Balenquah to get supplies in the market. Some could even be charged to the ship, so they could use what Catteni money they had for other things like the ‘plursaw’ additive the Deski needed.
The original shipment was running low and there were new Deski babies in need of it. Zainal had made up a shopping list for them to display, as most Tudo couldn’t read or write more than their own names, and signed it ‘Drassi Kubitai’. He also made her practice the glyph for ‘Kubitai’ in case she had to sign chits for orders.
Kris was scared to the nails on her toes in the heavy Catteni boots. They were a bit large for her, although that only made her plod in a more authentic Catteni gait. She’d probably get heel blisters in spite of fluff-padding the toes, but she marched as smartly as the others did out of their berth and onto the main dock staging area.
There were a few Catteni lounging about, watching Rugarians and Deski
shift crates, load and unload material at other berths. The ship,