Reunion

by Alan Dean Foster

  Reaching the base of the bluff, they turned back toward the slumbering community and the shaman’s house. “You can sleep in my home tonight, sonny. Late tomorrow I will try to take thee wherever it is thou wishest to go.”

  Flinx eyed him curiously. “Why? I’m a stranger to you, and to this place. Why should you want to help me?”

  Cayacu chuckled. “It pleases me to confound the authorities. Officially, what I do they classify as simplistic entertainment. Though I am no unrepentant regressive preaching the virtues of a vanished age, I take these ancient ways more seriously than they do. Too many of them wear their air of technological superiority like a too-tight pair of pants. Every now and then, when circumstances permit, it suits me to shower in the waters of their discomfort.”

  The moon laid a silver road on the surface of the sea: the waters from which all life on this world, and subsequently the human intelligence that was now spreading throughout this arm of the galaxy, had sprung. Flinx felt a peace that had heretofore been denied him. But it remained a troubled peace, and would remain so until he at last secured the information he sought. His questions were basic enough. It was only the answers that seemed complex beyond reason.

  “I have to leave Earth in a hurry. In order to do that, I must get to Nazca. My shuttlecraft is berthed there.”

  Old Cayacu nodded. “Dost thou think the authorities can trace it to thee? If so, then thy chances of departing without confrontation are much diminished.”

  “I don’t know.” Flinx considered. “They may still think they have me bottled up in Tacrica. So far I think they have just the visual description you alluded to a moment ago, and that only from witnesses’ remembrances.”

  “Are they likely to be good remembrances?” The shaman stepped lightly, avoiding a scavenging crab.

  “In one instance, I’m afraid so.” Flinx’s deliberate deception of the innocent, unaware Elena Carolles continued to weigh heavily on him. But it had been necessary. How well had she described him to the authorities, and how accurate was the resultant rendition churned out by the police compositor? “But I’m pretty good at disguising my identity where official channels are concerned, and my ship’s AI is used to misleading any inquiries.”

  Wise eyes regarded him as they hiked together along the beach in the moonlight. “You’re an interesting young man, sonny. How come thou to have thy own shuttlecraft?”

  Flinx tried to make light of the query. “I’ve found that interesting people generally have interesting friends. For some reason, others have taken an interest in me. Some of it’s benign, some inimical, and the rest just inquisitive. I don’t know why. I’m just one citizen among billions.”

  “Are thou, now? I wonder. Why, exactly, are the authorities so anxious to question thee?” As Flinx prepared to deliver a carefully deceptive reply, the old man suddenly waved both hands at him. “No, no—don’t tell me! I don’t want to know.” In the darkness, his teeth were resplendently white. “If I’m brought in for questioning later, I want to be able to take nullity along as my companion. Ignorance makes the best lawyer. It’s enough that thou are a thorn in the side of those who govern.” He gestured. “Almost home, sonny. I hope thou be not a city lad, used to its noise and roar. In this little village, we sleep in silence.”

  Flinx thought of the vast empty spaces between the stars that had been his refuge for much of the past several years. “I’ll sleep just fine, shaman. Believe me, I know what quiet is.”

  As they rattled up the coast the following evening, Flinx found himself wondering more than once if his host’s ancient rattletrap of a skimmer would make it all the way to the Nazca parallel, much less inland to the high plateau where the shuttleport was situated. Cayacu did nothing to improve their chances by keeping to the lesser-known, more bumptious routes, away from the main commercial and tourist thoroughfares.

  Flinx regarded their safe arrival at the port’s outskirts as something of a minor triumph. The sun had long since set, the only illumination coming from the powerful landing lights of the port and the streak of cold flame from a cargo shuttle straining to lift itself beyond the heavens. They had arrived after dark by design: The less help provided to anyone searching for someone of Flinx’s description, the better his chances of departing unchallenged.

  Certainly the automatic scanner at the Chungillo gate was not impressed by the pair of dirty, cowled figures who occupied the front of the antique skimmer. It passed them through with an almost audible synthesized whisper of disgust. Huddling beneath his cotton hood, old Cayacu tried not to grin too hard.

  “They pride themselves on the sophistication of their contrivances, but it is amazing how easily some of them can be fooled by such simple baggage as dirt and grease. Especially when applied in thick but not overly conspicuous layers.”

  Reaching up, Flinx ran the tips of his fingers down his bare cheek, slick with the aromatic lubricant that had been thoughtfully supplied by his host. The disposable colored lenses that distorted his eyes itched, and during the past several hours of driving he had received every indication that there was something besides himself living in the filthy cotton hooded shawl Cayacu had insisted he wear. His discomfort was mitigated more than a little by the fact that they had been passed through the main gate without comment.

  The success was cheering, but hardly a wondrous accomplishment. It was entirely possible that the gate had not yet been programmed with a copy of his likeness, which in any event was not taken from life but from an artist’s rendition provided by the police. That was no reason to relax, he knew. On more than one occasion he owed his life not to precautions taken but to paranoia presumed.

  The skimmer trundled past the imposing reproduction of the Chimu-era Huaca of the Moon that served as the passenger reception area, past the cargo receiving terminal, and finally slowed as it approached the more heavily safeguarded barrier that prevented casual sightseers from wandering out among the parked shuttles and aircraft. Here Flinx would have to identify himself in order for them to gain entrance. It was the most likely checkpoint for a confrontation.

  Instead of attempting to pass scrutiny by the automatic sentry, they parked the skimmer and headed straight for the security office. It was a bold move, designed to catch any forewarned personnel off guard. Whether it was a foolhardy one remained to be seen. The decision would be judged by its outcome.

  If the automatics recognized him, Flinx knew, anxious dialog and emotional manipulation was unlikely to sway them. Though it was in some ways riskier, he preferred to take his chances with sentinels of flesh and blood.

  There were three of them, seated at their positions behind a shieldscreen. It buzzed slightly as Cayacu made contact, a warning to stay back. Anyone trying to force the screen would receive a strong enough shock to lay them out flat—outside the portal. Bored, one of the guards looked up from his battery of security monitors and eyed the two men reluctantly.

  “Yar? What is it?”

  The old man spoke while Flinx hovered in the background, trying to conceal his face without appearing to do so. “I be Cayacu of Pacyatambu, a shaman of much experience and great knowledge.” He indicated Flinx. “This is Gallito, my assistant.”

  The sentry was somewhat less than impressed. “So?”

  “I have been asked by friends of the owner to bless a vessel stored here.” Reaching into the sack secured at his waist, he pulled out a feathered rattle from which issued an especially noxious smell and shook it lightly in the guard’s direction. “I have everything with me that I need.”

  Another sentry glanced up from his bank of monitors. “Process ’em, Avro, and let ’em in.” Ignoring the silent Flinx, the senior sentry focused on the weathered shaman. “Better make it a short ceremony. You’ve got ten minutes.”

  “Thank thee, sir.” Cayacu bowed gracefully and shuffled to his left, to stand within the confines of the security scanner. Flinx edged into the circular space alongside the old man.

  There was a brief hum as
the security device was activated. Other than a slight tingling of the scalp, there was nothing to indicate that anything had happened. The hum ceased, the warning lights went out, and the two visitors stepped clear.

  “Just a minute.” Frowning at one of his monitors, the second guard gestured to the third. “What’s this here?”

  “Hold it, you two.” The first sentry remained seated, but his right hand had slipped downward to shade the butt of the weapon holstered at his waist. He waited for further details from his companions.

  The middle sentinel spoke up. “You, ‘assistant.’ Come over here.” Flinx sensed wariness, uncertainty, challenge within the woman. Not a promising combination.

  Estimating the height of the fence that enclosed the shuttle service area, Flinx gauged his chances of making it up and over before port security personnel could run him down. The Teacher’s shuttle was located about halfway across the crowded tarmac. He decided his chances were slight, even if the fence was not electrified or otherwise charged to keep out the unauthorized. He took a couple of hesitant steps forward.

  The woman who had called out to him was eyeing him intently. After a moment of silence, she addressed the younger man for a second time. “What’s that coiled up under your outfit? On the shoulder? It shows here as organic.” She indicated one of her monitors.

  Flinx replied deferentially. “It’s a minidrag—a flying snake.” Should he say something else, he wondered?

  Cayacu stepped in. “We use many serpents in our ceremonies. Some live, some dead, some pickled.”

  The woman made a face. “Spare me the details. Save it for those tourists with more money than sense.” Turning back to her monitor, she muttered to her companion. “That gibes with what I see here. Let ’em through.”

  Heart pounding, Flinx followed a buoyant Cayacu as they passed through the deactivated section of fence. With a slight cracking sound it sprang back to life behind them. Ten minutes, the sentry had told them. He tried not to look back. At any moment he expected to hear the whine of security sirens and the shouts of eager police closing on them. Catching up to the shaman, he urged the old man to walk faster.

  Flinx had been privy to many spectacular sights in his time, but none were as stirring as the silhouette of the Teacher’s shuttle, parked where he had left it many days ago. It did not appear to have been touched. Verbal contact activated its AI, which promptly assured him that its integrity had not been violated and that no unauthorized individuals had recently come snooping around. The shuttle could use force to prevent any such from boarding, Flinx knew, but denial of access could in itself be enough to set off alarms among the authorities. If anyone had linked him to this particular shuttle, they had not yet managed to pass the information along to those in a position to make use of it. He had no intention of giving them any more time to make the connection.

  A few coded commands delivered verbally, a concise security check performed by the ship’s AI, and the ventral loading elevator stood open awaiting his next move. Turning, he bade farewell to the old shaman, taking both deeply creased hands in his own.

  “I owe you a lot, Cayacu. How can I repay you?” A quick glance southward showed that all was still quiet in the vicinity of the security post. Its denizens needed to remain bored for another few minutes, and then he would be beyond their reach.

  The old man smiled encouragingly. “Continue to confound authority, sonny. Always do the unexpected.” Chuckling, he stepped back and began fumbling in his sack. “I have a feeling thou hast a talent for it.”

  Smiling gratefully, Flinx turned to go, then hesitated. “What are you doing?”

  A battered rattle heavy with colorful tropical feathers emerged from the sack. “Preparing to properly anoint thy craft, of course. Thou don’t think I’d let thee get off without receiving the blessings of the ancients, do thou?” Half closing his eyes, he launched into a chant not unlike the one Flinx had heard him sing in the buried city.

  “My thanks.” Flinx started toward the elevator, speaking back over his shoulder. “Just don’t linger too long, or you’ll find yourself anointed by shuttle backdraft.”

  Cayacu finished and walked away as the powerful engines of the shuttle sprang to hollow-voiced life. A word into a pickup, and he was passed out of the parking sector and back into the port proper. As he cajoled his superannuated skimmer out the main exit and back into the coastal night, a flurry of activity could be seen off to his left, where the main entrance to the port accessed the main north-south Lima conurbation track. An unusual amount of excitement for this time of night, he mused. What could possibly be the cause?

  Far overhead, a very small but efficient shuttlecraft was already streaking through the stratosphere. Turning south toward home, the shaman had no one to smile to but himself. It was enough. Not all magicians were old, he knew, and not every magic familiar. Some magicks were small, some great, and some inexplicable even to other shamans. It did not matter. He was neither resentful nor envious.

  It was good to have been able to help a brother in trouble.

  Chapter 5

  The clean, clear emptiness of space as the shuttle emerged from Terran atmosphere filled Flinx with relief. Not that he was safely on his way yet. In addition to the commercial stations that ringed the homeworld there were a number of orbiting military depots and other government facilities to which the public was not granted access. No one could simply approach as sensitive a place as Earth and set down in a shuttle. The identities of decelerating vessels and those individuals they carried had to be processed; quarantine procedures had to be acknowledged and followed; clearances had to be granted.

  Leaving, however, was a far less complicated business. No one particularly cared if a contaminated crew or cargo set out to infect the void.

  Even so, and even though he was not challenged as his shuttle’s engines powered down from escape velocity to maneuvering mode, he paid close attention to every monitor within the cockpit. His presence was not necessary: The shuttle would warn him if they were challenged. But he was too nervous to stay stuck in transport harness while the craft worked its way through orbital traffic toward the drifting Teacher. He floated loosely in the command chair, held in place only by his grip on the arms.

  Within the cabin, Pip tumbled free, twisting and turning contentedly. She had adapted to weightlessness years ago and thoroughly enjoyed the occasional release from gravity. Freed from the constraints of Earthpull, she coiled and contorted in the air, pleated wings fluttering gaily, looking more like a free-swimming nudi-branch than an Alaspinian minidrag. Once back on board the Teacher, the overdrift from its posigravity drive would force her once again to beat air to stay airborne.

  Like all ships waiting to depart outsystem, the Teacher was parked well away from the overcrowded equatorial belt. The farther the shuttle traveled from that glittering planetary necklace of stations large and small, automated and inhabited, the more Flinx relaxed. When at last the Teacher loomed large enough in the port to see with the naked eye, he would have jumped for joy had not the danger of doing so in zero g restrained him.

  There was nothing for him to do now but loosen up, watch, and wait. Automatons handled nearly all modern navigation, with greater speed, efficiency, and accuracy than any human pilots could manage. In ancient times, he knew, machines had been built to serve as backups to people. Now the humans functioned as backups for their superbly crafted machines. Shuttle and mother ship communicated in high-speed bursts of compressed information while their master and his serpentine companion awaited their conjoined cybernetic permission to change ships.

  A telltale lit up on the console and a voice, clear and crisp, filled the cockpit. “Shuttle ident one-one-four-six, this is peaceforcer station Chagos. The favor of a reply is requested.”

  Cursing silently, Flinx hesitated for as long as he thought tolerable before responding. By that time the shuttle’s engines had shut down completely and the atmospheric transport was drifting with regulated p
recision into the open, expectant hold on the Teacher’s port side.

  “Chagos station, this is one-one-four-six. How’s the weather where you are?” Outside, the terminator line cut a black swath across the sapphire splendor of the Indian Ocean.

  “Depends what side of the station you’re sunbathing on, one-one-four-six. We are in receipt of a general query from western South America to hold all, repeat all, departures for half an orbital period. This is a general caution for all vessels that have applied to depart outsystem and is not specific to you. Can you comply?”

  Muted clanking sounds reverberated through the shuttle’s hull as it coupled with and was locked down in its holding bay. Pushing off gently, Flinx floated effortlessly out of the command chair. Gathering up Pip, he then kicked toward the main exit. Proper gravity would not return to his surroundings until the underpinnings of the Teacher’s KK-drive were reactivated.

  “No problem.” He responded promptly, knowing that the shuttle’s omnidirectional pick-up would find and amplify his voice. “Hey, drifter, tell me—what’s going on?”

  “We don’t know yet.” The voice from the station was devoid of duplicity. “We’re promised details within half an hour. But something has a lot of important bureaucratic types stirred up downstairs. Whatever it is, it’s significant enough to kick orbital as well as dirt-grubber backsides into action. Drift easy, and you’ll get the word as soon as we do.”

  “Must be serious.” With a soft hiss, air from the recently drowsing and now revived Teacher blended with that of the shuttle. By his presence, Flinx announced his return. In corresponding silence, the ship acknowledged his arrival, identified him, and began to rouse itself. It would take only a little while for all systems to be up and online, Flinx knew. That was a good thing, since he now had less than thirty minutes in which to leave the Solar System and still avoid a confrontation.