Darsen didn’t hide his dislike for this idea, but he had no real alternative but to co-operate. “Very well,” he agreed. “You can use one of our robot-piloted Spiders. We use them for hull maintenance, and emergency transport between spacecraft. You’ll go alone—no sense in risking more than one person. I’ll take the Pegasus in as close to the alien as I judge safe. From there, you’re on your own.”
“Thank you, sir,” said Div. “I’m sure that will do quite well. Now, I’d like to rest awhile.”
Darsen grunted. “You have eight hours in which to do so. With Tin Woodman behaving unpredictably, we can’t afford to wait any longer.” Darsen turned to Mora, not looking directly at her. “See that Mr. Harlthor is made comfortable. Check with Accommodations. They should have a spare bed someplace for him to rest on.” With that, Darsen spun on his heel and retreated from the room as quickly as dignity would allow. The exec smiled awkwardly at Mora and Div, then followed Darsen.
Div and Mora were alone.
Some of the tension drained from her mind with Darsen’s departure.
Some. Not all.
She led him to the lift shaft and programmed it for one of the crew quarters decks. Div stepped onto the platform with her and the lift started with a slight lurch. The air smelled faintly of electricity.
“They’ve probably got you a cot by the bilge pump,” Mora joked awkwardly, grimly. “Our captain doesn’t care much for our sort.” She stared at him hesitantly. His face remained set in the impassive lines it had worn during his entire meeting with Darsen, “You are not what I was told you were,” said Mora. She realized she was fingering the left cuff of her jacket nervously.
“You were told,” Div said casually, “that I’m unbalanced. That they plucked me out of a sanitarium on Earth. That they picked me because no sane human being would volunteer to endure two weeks of non-relative space, alone.”
Mora nodded.
“It’s true,” Div said simply.
Here’s an enigma, she thought. She had scanned the boy earlier. She knew that he had fear and panic and anger packed into a tight light ball inside himself. He was trying to win a game, with the Normals and with himself. The same game that Mora had been losing for a long time.
“You should understand,” said Div. “I know how you feel here.”
Mora, on sudden impulse, dropped the shield from her thoughts. You couldn’t possibly. I’m a failure. A miserable shiplady. If I weren’t, Darsen wouldn’t have sent for you.
Just what are you failing at? Div demanded. He was thought-casting, an unusual experience for Mora, who was accustomed merely to receiving emotional readings. I’m not sheltered, nor naive, Mora. They couldn’t build walls thick enough on Earth to allow me that luxury. Four years in the service academy couldn’t persuade you of the nobility of your sort of prostitution. Who failed?
Very perceptive. Mora was at once sorry for the bitterness behind the thought. Div was like her. That his impressions of her, based on ten minutes’ acquaintance, were somewhat superficial hardly merited her scorn.
Div reached out and took her arm. His eyes met hers, and he opened his mind to her, totally. Mora recoiled under the bombardment of images, feelings, and thoughts which flooded her consciousness. Even as she did so, she realized that Div was forcing nothing on her, She had merely to will it, and the flood ceased at once. Shutting him out, Mora was safe in the silence of her mind.
But she opened her mind again. Trusting Div now, she let him see into her own soul. She let him see the fear, the vulnerability which Normals always seemed to sense. Since childhood they’d abused her, stabbing into her mind to relieve their own pain. As she had grown into womanhood, men became the worst, deadliest of vultures with their sadism-passing-as-virility pounding pounding pounding on her soul until she thought she—
So, Space Service was my last refuge, Mora thought, suddenly compressing and organizing her thoughts and assigning them words. I had tried . . . I’d moved around. I’d tried to live in the little farms and villages—Schuylkill Haven, Willowood—where Talents live apart, building their own worlds. But I felt as though I were running. The world that mattered, that I knew, was outside, allowing us to do this.
They call us Talents and laugh. They mock us. They call us Talents and then can’t decide to cure us or kill us. Because they know all we really are is disturbed. Unbalanced and dangerous. But when I was a child, I didn’t understand the laughing. They called me a Talent and I believed it. I felt I should use my “gift” to help others.
So I came to the service. What human beings were doing in space was noble—surely such people were too disciplined, too respectful of one another to waste energy on the luxuries of torture. I went to the academy. I spent four years trying to learn the mental discipline, the little tricks a shiplady has to know. I learned the soothing ways of “physical therapy” and a lot of other nonsense—all their excuse for sticking me here to whore in a little metal can falling through space, where people are only people after all . . .
Mora let the train of thought fade as she tottered there on the brink of night. She looked at Div. There was no pity in his eyes. Instead, there was understanding. And the beginnings of something deeper. Their clasped hands tightened together.
“Would you like some coffee? We can take it to my cabin,” she said aloud as the lift platform came to a halt on Mora’s deck.
Div said, “Something else besides coffee, maybe.”
She gave him a trembling smile and led him to a drink station.
RAC COMMUNICATIONS, INC.
MAGNEPAPER® #TX8794a
Leana Coffer
Exec. Commander
Triunion Starship PEGASUS
Dear Me,
Vocoder time again.
Met the Talent from Earth. Div Harlthor. He worries me. Reminds me of Mora Elbrun—without Elbrun’s strength. Odd. Never thought of Mora as a woman with a strong character. Compared to this boy-freak she seems sturdy as a soldier in combat armor. Harlthor was confined to a sanitarium on Earth, and seeing what the Talent can do to a human being I rather wonder at the inner reserves Mora must have to exist in the hostile world of this ship.
This ship. Darsen’s little world. Another reason Harlthor worries me. I know what Darsen wants—and why—though I don’t think he knows himself. He’s not analytical but emotionally driven and on the Pegasus his needs become commands and are translated into obedience so quickly that he need never define, measure, or control them. I can see what the man’s ideals are: entirely egocentric, a puffing up of self. Darsen’s damned selfish, and I’m sure this fact has not escaped Harlthor. I just can’t see their intentions or modes of approach toward the alien as compatible at all. Darsen’s reasons are entirely personal—but I can’t fathom Div Harlthor’s yet. If this perception is correct, why is Darsen giving the Talent such power?
Of course, the captain hasn’t thought this through. He’s incapable of that. He needs a personal triumph so badly that he can’t conceive of his need being frustrated—certainly not by a boy whom he holds in such obvious contempt. To Darsen, Harlthor must be a piece of equipment, a robot to be powered by his will, to be ordered about and used and possibly sacrificed for an objective—just as that minor megalomaniac must have viewed his soldiers in that battle on Goridan.
I think I’m making sense. But I’m not an uninvolved observer, and may be projecting my feelings on to the situation more than I like to admit. I can’t forget my horror—no, anger—when I learned that Darsen was to be the new commander of Pegasus. It’s useless to pretend to myself that experience and time have changed my belief that I should have been given command. I still wonder what kind of system gives a man like Darsen a second chance after a disaster like the Goridan massacre. Someone in the high councils of the service, far beyond the levels of Darsen’s personal influence, saved his career for him. Well, maybe it fits in with my
theory . . .
Mora lounged in her chair, watching Div, who lay on her bunk in a semi-somnambulent condition, his breathing slow and quiet. There had been much to discuss, and they had done so exhaustively, with minds and mouths. Realizing that not much time was left, Mora had insisted that Div rest on her bunk. No time to see about your quarters, she claimed. And Div had not objected.
She sat now, content to watch him rest, to feel his presence. Delicately, she let her mind attempt to lull his into deeper sleep.
••• A GLIMPSE OF RAINBOW DAWN THROUGH THE MIST OF A METHANE WORLD •••
••• WHIRLING VORTEX DROPLETS OF AMMONIA ICE CLINGING TO HULL •••
••• THE BURNING RAIN WHICH KILLS •••
••• VUL ••• DEATH ••• ALONE •••
••• EMPTINESS •••
••• COME ••• YOU HAVE COME •••
••• WELCOME •••
“Div!” Mora cried out inadvertently, stiffening. The alien sensation passed. Div tried to sit upright abruptly, as if in terror. Mora stood, trying to ease him back. “What was that?” she asked, afraid of the answer she already knew.
“Tin Woodman,” Div replied. He lay back again, clutching onto Mora with something like frenzy. Struggling to understand the impressions she had accidentally glimpsed, Mora realized that they had been hidden in Div’s mind all the time.
“You’re already in contact with it, then?”
Div stared at the ceiling for a moment, then turned to her, holding her eyes with his.
“Yes, I caused it to wake.”
Later, Div asked, “How long? Before I have to go out there, I mean?”
“About two hours,” she said.
“I can’t sleep. I’m going to go back to the observation deck, to see it again, to be closer.” His sudden vehemence frightened her. He jerked up from the bed to his feet.
“Do you have to?” she asked.
“You can come with me, if you like. Please do.”
“No,” she whispered. “I can’t. There are bound to be other people up there. I don’t want to face them so soon. I need time to think. No, I won’t!” She looked at Div desperately as he opened the cabin door. He turned back to her, silhouetted in the blue light of the corridor beyond.
I know, he cast gently. I wish I didn’t love them, too.
FOUR
Leana Coffer sat at the bridge’s launch monitor, running through a last check of the hangar deck’s subsystem’s display. “Hangar depressurized,” she reported, turning away from her console to face Darsen at his command station. “Bay doors are powered up, and robot guidance on the spider checks out normal.”
Glumly drumming his fingers along the edge of his desk, Darsen acknowledged the report.
“We can proceed with launch on your command, Captain,” finished Coffer.
“Activate the spider’s inboard monitor now,” Darsen ordered, gesturing toward the globe of the bridge’s main vu-tank. “I want to keep an eye on the boy. Don’t trust him at all.”
“Why?” asked Coffer. “What could he do?”
“I’m not sure,” muttered Darsen. “But Harlthor hasn’t been playing straight with us. I know it.”
Coffer shrugged and activated the vu-tank. A holographic image of the hangar deck, transmitted through the Pegasus’ internal surveillance cameras, coalesced within the huge crystal globe which hung suspended in the center of the bridge. The vu-tank showed the dull gray bulkheads and sharp black shadows of the hangar deck. In the middle of the picture, centered over the bay doors, stood the spider. The craft rested on six of its eight articulated metal appendages. The remaining two thrust forward into the air, their grappling claws extended. The cabin of the craft was nothing more than an open metal cage with a seat bolted into it, mounted just below the point where the legs joined the body of the ship. Gilt metal shielding separated the cabin from the chemical engines which propelled the spider. Exposed cables ran up and down every surface.
Coffer switched over to the spider’s inboard monitor; the scene in the vu-tank dissolved into a close-up of Div’s head, his features hidden behind the dark visor of his reflective yellow pressure suit. Darsen stared at the image as though trying to pierce the black mirror of Div’s helmet and read the boy’s expression. After several moments, the captain returned his attention to Coffer. “Okay. Proceed with launch when ready—signal that to the local controller,” he ordered. “And keep that monitor on.” He looked around the bridge realizing that someone was missing. “Where the devil is the shiplady?”
“Do you care?” asked Coffer, coldly.
“Not really. Log her as absent from her post.”
Darsen watched the vu-tank sullenly.
Mora stood alone in one of the observation rooms which lined the walls of the hangar deck, separated from the depressurized launch area by less than an inch of transparent metal and plastics. She made no attempt to reach out to the mind of the boy who sat strapped into the heart of the spider. She knew that Div’s thoughts were fifty thousand kays distant, focused on Tin Woodman.
The door behind her slid open. A young man wearing an engineering uniform entered the observation room. She read him, found that he was surprised that the room was occupied. Nothing more. She had never noticed him before; he did not appear to recognize her.
“I’m supposed to watch the launch,” he said, smiling. “Do you mind?” Mora shook her head. As he walked across the room toward the mirror next to her, she saw that he was no taller than herself, well under two meters tall. His hair was dark, his eyes were brown; she guessed from his features that he was a native of Earth, probably of European ancestry. He wore an ensign’s badges on his flame-colored uniform. And he was certainly young—perhaps twenty-three years old.
“My name’s Ston,” he offered. “Ston Maurtan.”
“I’m Mora . . . Elbrun,” she replied, trying to watch the hangar deck without being impolite. Ston did not seem to recognize the name.
“I’ve been aboard about three months,” said Ston. “Just commissioned. I’m really still in training—the Chief Engineer said I should observe this.” Maurtan smiled again. He seemed loquacious, but was so unaffectedly friendly that she didn’t find him annoying.
Suddenly the warning lights which lined the bay doors of the hangar deck flashed red. The doors began to part beneath Div’s vehicle. Mora’s attention was drawn back to the launch.
“That’s the telepath from Earth, right?” asked Ston.
Mora nodded absently, intent on the event unfolding beneath them. A tingling crawled up her spine. A sense of dread, and yet at the same time a sense of giddy elation. Then she realized that Ston was gazing at her as intensely as she had been staring at the ship. She looked him in the eyes, then self-consciously turned back to peer downward.
“What’s happening here?” asked Ston, slowly. “Something more than meets the eye, I think.” His tone was not stern; merely inquiring. The emotional waves Mora received from him were calm, concerned.
“No—just what you see,” said Mora in a strained voice. “Just what we’ve waited these weeks for. A Talent to make contact with Tin Woodman.” Even as she spoke, she chastised herself. There was nothing to fear from this young man. And yet she could not help but act defensively, the response was so ingrained in her in dealing with Normals.
“You’re a Talent too, aren’t you?” said Ston.
Mora, startled, pivoted toward him. How did he know? She had donned her civilian clothes for this—she felt more anonymous. And she’d slipped on blue contact lenses over her telltale eyes.
“How—how do you know?”
Ston Maurtan smiled slightly. “Oh, different things. The guarded way you stand, as though someone might strike you at any moment. The way you hold your head. The way your hands move. In fact you remind me of—�
�� A troubled look crossed his features; Mora felt a flutter of pain from his emotion-mix. “No. Let’s just say I know, and be done with it.” He placed a hand on her wrist. Now his face was full of understanding. “Yes. You needn’t tell me, but I think there’s much more happening here than I can see.” He glanced down at the departing spider. “Much more.”
Ston kept silent, hoping that Mora would offer some comment to his statement. But she did not.
Her thoughts seemed to turn inward. Her eyes turned back to the boy in the spider. The thoughtful, troubled expression on her face was startlingly familiar to Ston.
He was reminded of his sister Adria. His memories of her were painful ones, yet precious to him. She had been a Talent, like Mora, and Mora’s resemblance to her aroused some protective instinct in him. He tried to shrug the feeling off—he hardly knew this woman.
She seemed pleasant enough, but . . . it was no use. The more he sought out the differences between Mora and his sister, the deeper their similarities seemed to insinuate themselves into his mind. It was an eerie feeling—and a lonely one.
Whatever inner anguish caused the shiplady to watch Div Harlthor in such a troubled way, Ston wanted to help her.
The hangar doors slid away under the spider.
Its retro rockets thrust the ship away from the artificial gravity field of the Pegasus.
Then Div was weightless, He could see the Pegasus tumbling away above, then behind him. He knew that to an observer aboard the starship, it was the spider which appeared to be spinning aimlessly away, After a minute, the retro mobility rockets died, and the robot pilot fired the spider’s main engine. Div felt a sensation of weight again as the considerable thrust pushed him back in his seat.
Tin Woodman Page 3