by Brian Daley
Now he tapped out two shimmering granules of nirvanitol, rolling them in his palm.
"Look, m'friend, we'll get a certified abstract from the log, proving you've put in time in crewmember capacity. After all, you do know your way around; in a monitor, anyway. We still might have to deadhead or work for passage before we're through; this would count in your favor."
"But what do I really know? Which dial to oggle, is what."
Alacrity shook his head. "Will you please get a good attitude? You proved you can get along in confined space, cooperate, take orders, leave the bridge before you break wind—"
"I see; a passing grade in deportment."
"If you like, yes. Listen, nobody's saying you're a certified crewman yet, but you already know more about starships than most people in the galaxy are ever going to learn in their life. Here."
He gave Floyt one of the granules and popped the other. Floyt let his dissolve slowly on the end of his tongue. It tasted sweet and sharp. "How soon will I feel something?"
"A minute or two. Look, Ho: if you don't want to play breakabout, you sure don't have to. I know it could make things tougher when we get back to Terra. But it might come in handy for a variety of reasons. It sure as Shiva looks like we're not going to be able to hire a crew."
"In fact, we haven't really talked about this at all. Even if Astraea Imprimatur is spaceworthy, mightn't it cost a great deal to get her home?" Floyt asked.
"Home" suddenly summoned up a recollection of the unique blue-and-white ball of Earth as he'd last seen her; it set off an unlooked-for longing and homesickness in him, an attack such as he hadn't had since his trip out, in the Bruja. It wasn't so much distress as a poignant and almost infinite yearning, ill-defined, all-consuming. Then he realized he could feel the steady, dependable beat of the blood in his veins and a connectedness between who he was, the things that had happened to him, and what he must do—and the greater universe around him.
Alacrity was chuckling. "Cost? We don't know if there's money owed for docking fees or defaults, or if she's been impounded—and there's no point worrying about that now. We'll just have to deal with what we find when we get to Blackguard, but … "
"But?"
"But two breakabouts would improve our chances over a breakabout and a groundling—no offense."
"None taken. All right; what's next?"
"Well, I was thinking we could check out the airlock and at least teach you how to get into a suit. Then maybe run through escape capsule procedures."
Alacrity was sprawled in the hammock belly down, like a large, sedated cat.
"Very well." Floyt looked around the cuddy, feeling a calm, quiet sense of energy and inner reserve, and of tranquility. "Alacrity, did they move the bulkheads back, or, um … "
"Classic nirvanitol reaction. All that elbowroom is a nice feeling, isn't it?"
"It is indeed; it is indeed." And the harsh cuddy lighting seemed more benign too. The gnawing of the Earthservice conditioning that was usually at the back of Floyt's awareness like a trickle-current was now distant and dim. He could recall all the details of his problems; he'd simply relaxed before the fact that there was nothing more he could do about them right then and there.
Alacrity reached under his hammock and came up with a square, blue glass bottle. The cap unscrewed and popped off when he set his thumb against it. He took a very small sip and passed it to Floyt.
Floyt had just reminded himself that even if by some miracle everything was to work out and they got Astraea Imprimatur back to Earth, were deprogrammed, and Floyt avoided radical reorientation, some new set of troubles would arise and run its course in one fashion or another. He knew that wasn't particularly sage, but made a mental note not to worry so much.
"Sufficient to the parsec the evil thereof." He sighed, accepting the bottle. It felt cold.
"Inshallah!" Alacrity seconded, hands behind his head now, staring up at the overhead.
"Inshallah!" echoed Floyt, good old Earther word. He took a sip and found that the stuff was heavy, almost sludge, but warming and fragrant. He took a second sip, barely a wetting of the lips, and passed it back.
"Alacrity, all this Precursor business—it's just a variation on everything from Delphi to Jung—trying to get in touch with something that'll answer all questions."
"I guess that's fair enough. So what?"
"So what happened to you up there on the gantry at the causality harp?"
Alacrity gazed at him. "You still have to go through reorientation. If I tell you, it'd be like telling Earthservice, wouldn't it?"
"I hadn't thought about that. You'd better forget I asked." A little time passed. "This is very pleasant, but it isn't Nirvana the way I heard it described."
"Increasing the dosage increases the effect. Believe me, if you want to see the White Light, you can do it right here."
"Not necessary; this is fine. Besides, duty might call. Can we function on this stuff?"
"Well, I wouldn't want to do any neurosurgery right now."
"What happens if we get hit by a meteorite right now and the space pirates attack?"
"We give them a few granules and a drink and they help us patch the leak."
"Seriously."
"Crisis management isn't too hard; a load of adrenaline makes this stuff go away pretty fast. If you really needed it, I suppose you could take a quarter dose of Engine or something.
Floyt lay fiddling with his proteus. "Just asking. So, it's spacesuits next, eh? D'you want to know the unifying element of everything that's happened to us since we lifted out of Nazca spaceport? The flights and murder attempts and ceremonies and airbikes and all the rest?"
Alacrity brought out a little sound unit Redlock had given them. He picked something roomy, Bledsoe's Forever Endeavor, Amen, a piece inspired by Precursor artifacts.
"Yeah, tell me," Alacrity said, securing the unit to a wall clip.
Easing himself out full length, Floyt had found, brought the soles of his feet flat against the end of the bunk. He did so now. "It's that I haven't learned one damn thing that will help me make Earthservice Functionary Second Class."
"Which in turn tells you what?"
"Adventures and career goals seldom mix."
Chapter 6
Hirelings
Alacrity and Floyt established a busy, absorbing rhythm of shipboard life so quickly and thoroughly that it came as a surprise when, early one watch, Amarok showed up to say that they would soon make planetfall.
They both blinked as if awakening, having immersed themselves in details of life-support systems, basic combat procedures, the monitor's astrogational apparatus, waste disposal drill for the model V-B Clarion EVA suit, and who could do more matador crosses without lassoing his own ankles.
They'd also spent a lot of time resting up and mending. Alacrity's side felt fine, Floyt's nose had only a slight ridge to show where it had been broken, and the Earther's teeth were coming in with amazing speed. They'd also further researched the various substances they'd brought along with them—synaptiflake, neurobomb, metajolt, hypnozap—but found that sleep and work often seemed preferable. Alacrity said it was possible to spend most or all of a voyage in an altered state, but unwise. The unexpected had a lethal way of cropping up.
"Besides," he'd said, "prolonged anything takes its toll."
Then too, there was Carbon Dioxide College, a breakabout euphemism for marathon bull sessions. Of course, the bigger the crew, the broader the curriculum, and there were only two of them sharing the cuddy—though Amarok sometimes joined in. A certain amount of mutual aversion had kept the two from talking much on the voyage from Luna to the Halidome system, and they were still catching up.
Alacrity talked about his first encounter with the Foragers and about the time he'd shipped in a freighter where everyone inboard came down with a form of superjardia. Floyt reminisced about growing up in the Terran urbanplexes and recounted chapters from the planet's history.
Then, almos
t before they knew it, Amarok was standing before them in a loose-fitting groundsuit, announcing that they were about to make planetfall on Way 'Long, a dry, temperate place as comfortable to Homo sapiens as it was to its inhabitants. The natives' name for the place was immune to pronunciation. The locals called themselves the Croi.
It was an old, complacent planet ellipsing an aged main-sequence star. Way 'Long—or at least that part of it near the spacefield—smelled a little like the inside of an old sock, but aside from that it was actually quite pleasant. Even airlessness and volcanic upheavals would've been welcome after the confinement of the cuddy.
The Croi were reasonably peaceful, complacent and pre-technological. Blessed with a benign ecosystem, they'd taken a slow, unhurried climb toward sentience.
Their spacefield wasn't very impressive: a few bunkers containing sealed automatics—guidance and commo systems, mostly—fronting about two hectares of glue-fused soil. Their nearby village put Floyt in mind of a jumble of terra-cotta acorns. The Croi were gregarious creatures but not prolific; their small communities were scattered widely across Way 'Long.
Alacrity and Floyt were looking around, blinking at the local star, enjoying the opportunity to stretch and do little loosening-up moves. Floyt had originally chafed at the news that there would be a brief detour en route to the Grapple, but right then the idea seemed brilliant.
Amarok had set down to trade data, technical instruments and tools, and an array of seeds, cuttings, and plants. In return, he was to receive some novaseeds, extraordinary gemstones that accumulated in the gut of a creature native to Way 'Long's wastelands.
The trading had taken place so straightforwardly, been so devoid of red tape and formality, that Floyt, who'd grown up under Earthservice, was scandalized. The Croi expected Amarok's arrival and had his payment waiting. Offloading the appropriate cargo took only a few minutes, no bureaucracy involved.
("No quarantine either," Alacrity had pointed out in an aside to Floyt. "The Croi are safe for now; Rok's the careful type. But that'll have to change. I hope somebody tells 'em.")
"Where is everybody else, Rok?" Alacrity said, looking around. "What is this, election day?" Spaceship landings were very rare occurrences there; he couldn't believe the natives were so blase'.
The Pihoquiaq's skipper had been talking to the little gaggle of locals who'd come out to treat with him. "It seems we've been upstaged by a funeral, Alacrity. A very important status-being has gone on to glory, so to say."
"What's it about us, Ho, that we're so good at coming across big-time funerals?"
Floyt shrugged, scrutinizing the Croi, loose-limbed creatures who stood three and four meters or more, all reedy limbs and angular sensory appendages, meeting in leathery hassock torsos. Their fantastic coloring ran the spectrum, combined in swirls and zebra patterns, dots and mottling. Their hides gleamed as if powerbuffed.
The Croi had no central organ display that could rightly be called a face, and their various extremities were in almost constant, if leisurely, movement. It made talking to them a bit like a conversation with a very large floral arrangement.
"So the ceremony is that important to them, Rok?" Floyt asked. He was fascinated despite the fact that he'd kept a cautious distance from the creatures, a very few of whom spoke a measured, surprisingly good Terranglish, though they were given to redundancy.
That probably makes sense, he thought. Certainly their limbs and other appendages seem to provide for redundancy-in-depth.
Amarok nodded. "That's the way Someone understands it. Death is the culmination of life; an individual is judged by his or her or its funeral, and the Croi spend a good deal of thought and time arranging for their own. They even hire mourners, as a matter of prestige."
"Professional mourners, like the old-time Chinese," Floyt said.
"One supposes. The final rite, locally, consists of taking the remains of the departed to that cliff up there and casting them into the sea." He pointed to a summit above the spacefield.
"Right now they're getting ready to heave some august old chappy after eight solid days of memorial drinking, testimonial orgies, inheritance soirees, and commemorative gluttony."
"Not too different from Frostpile." Alacrity pondered. "Can we go look? Just for a few minutes? I know we're short of time and all, but—"
"This One isn't sure that would be such a good idea. These are very amiable beings, but still, we haven't been invited."
Alacrity tched. Floyt, to his own surprise, found himself disappointed as well. Way 'Long was only the second XT world he'd ever been on, not counting the sealed environment of Luna. Even his terran aversion to nonhumans didn't make it any easier to pass up on a chance to get some exercise. And he was, though he tried to minimize it to himself, curious.
Alacrity and Floyt had done what looking around they could from the immediate vicinity of the ship, using Amarok's electroimager. It only whetted their curiosity and reminded them that the confinement of the cuddy was right behind them.
"Best we were going," Amarok decided.
"Hey, hang on a minute; what's that?" Alacrity asked, squinting.
A local was approaching across the field, having just come up from town. The Croi moved with a speed they hadn't seen from the creatures before.
"Trouble?" Floyt wondered at once, missing the feel of the Webley against his midsection. There'd been an unfortunate incident earlier on in human-Croi contact, entirely the fault of Homo sapiens. As a result, these peaceful giants forbade their visitors any weapons.
"This One doesn't think so," Amarok said slowly.
The Croi drew to a stop before them, fluttering and swaying. It was one of the largest they'd seen, with more appendages and a thicker growth of sense nodules and substructures than most.
"People-persons of the human race species!" the thing began eagerly in the register of a bass fiddle being bowed. "How pleasantly fun it is that you didn't exit into departure prior to the start of my arrival!"
"Interpreter!" Alacrity yelled playfully over his shoulder to a nonexistent diplomatic corps. Croi sensory apparatus tilted and swiveled toward him, and Floyt gave him a disapproving frown.
"I have the identity of being Caut'Karr," the thing resumed to Amarok. "I am very nice to meet your acquaintance."
"And what can This One do for you, Caut'Karr?"
"Well, we are about to funeralize the last rites of our bereaving leader, the High Meddler, with the solemnly dolesome flinging-forth of his extinct corpse," the Croi explained. "Such observances are about to begin on the dot of now."
"Yes, we'd heard. Our deepest sympathies are with you."
"Too bad you missed the sadly forlorn gorge-cramming of the epigastria-cavity stomachs. It was an admirably fed meal.
"At anyhow, the reason I have come is to ask you if you'll do us the overpowering thrill of walking the last final steps in the funeral cortege procession. Status rank is evaluated on the basis of mourners: their number, prestige, and hysterical unreservedness."
"See, now," Amarok began, not wishing to offend a customer, "it deeply grieves Someone to tell you this, but there are pressing demands on our time and—"
"Compensatory money payments would of course be of generous largesse, in keeping with our customs," Caut'Karr interjected anxiously.
"Money?" Alacrity jumped in.
"Affirmatively yes! Your presence would be so gratefully appreciated!" gushed the Croi. "To have the first offworld aliens in a funeral train—think of it!"
They did.
"Paid mourners, hmm?" Amarok said, rubbing the skin of his throat thoughtfully. "May Someone ask the amount of the, um, compensatory money payments?"
"As to that, for this great innovative modernism, our Botherers of the Privy have agreed that honor demands the sum of novaseeds be not less than one amber Perfect and four azure Primes per each apiece.
"Of course, common sense demands that it be no more," he added.
"Per each apiece what!" Floyt inquired.
"Per every inconsolably sad human mourner, per capita all," Caut'Karr clarified.
Alacrity worked it out in his head. An amber Perfect and four azure Primes was a tidy sum—several thousand ovals, or nearly a thousand ducats, depending on current prices.
Amarok turned to the two companions. "What about it? Would you two boys like to earn a little pocket money?"
"For a few minutes' work?" Alacrity said slyly, glancing to Floyt.
Floyt's conditioning was giving him only a mild tussle, in view of the need for money with which to carry out his mission.
"Do we caper, or roll in the gutter, or what're we supposed to do?" Floyt asked laconically.
"Isn't there a custom of lachrymose weeping and wailing?" Caut'Karr asked anxiously. "A completely bizarre bodily function like that should serve with altogether nicely admirability. Er, just what does it look like in any chance?"
The funeral procession was a long one, the three were told, even for the teeming megalopolis of the spacefield, which comprised some thousand or so Croi.
It came out of town a few minutes behind Caut'Karr. Musicians were playing, with a sound like kilometers of catgut being drawn through assorted holes. Croi lamentations reminded Alacrity of the noises he'd once heard in a warship's SIGINT section.
Hundreds of the creatures approached in a sloppily organized column. At the front was a large Croi borne along on a platform.
After a few moments the humans figured out that it wasn't some leader striking a noble pose, or a statue, but the late High Meddler himself, propped up by inobtrusive supports and gleaming with what looked like a generous application of shellac.
Gathered around him on his platform were flowers and food and drink, works of art, and memorabilia. Caut'Karr explained that the swag would all be recycled to heirs and mourners after the ceremony, making everything that much merrier.
Directly around the departed were his heirs and various Very Important Croi. After them came family, then close friends of same, then employees, associates, their friends and relations, and other amateurs.