‘Right away, sir.’
‘But just before I resign my own commission I think I’ll put a bullet in the head of this little one—’
Maggie approached him again. ‘Cutler. Are you a parent?’
‘What? No, not yet.’
‘Well, Captain Cutler, Ensign Carl won’t hurt you whatever you do. But if you don’t lower that weapon I will kick you so hard that your chances of ever fathering a child will be pathetically slim . . .’
It was a relief to get the Admiral into the relative sanity of her sea cabin. An ensign – not Carl – served coffee, and closed the door, leaving them alone.
Davidson leaned forward. ‘So, Captain Kauffman.’
‘Sir.’
‘I’ve never been one to waste my time. You know that.’
‘No, sir.’
‘Let’s get to it, then. In the short time you have commanded the Benjamin Franklin you have treated the ship as if it were your personal property, going well beyond the already loose parameters of your orders – to put it bluntly, making up the rules of engagement as you went along. Not only that, you have allowed possibly dangerous creatures to run free in the ship.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Resulting in such incidents as the humiliation of poor Ed Cutler, out there, over a troll.’
‘Yes, sir.’
He grinned. ‘Well done, Maggie.’
‘Thank you, sir.’
‘Personally, I particularly liked the way you handled the situation at New Purity. Having the dead of the trolls placed in the same cemetery as those poor pioneers. That went down well most every place that saw the record. You’ve done a great deal, and very visibly, to promote the kind of ideals that I, and others in the military – hell, even some in President Cowley’s administration – believe should be guiding our behaviour in the Long Earth. I wanted you, all of you captains, to reach out your hand to these scattered new cultures. Not to wield an iron fist. Ours is not to police our people, or to moralize; our duty is to protect our own from external threat. But for us to do that we have to know who and what we are protecting, in this strange new landscape we face today. And for you to achieve those goals you had to be open; you had to listen, to learn. Which is what you’ve done. I could never have ordered you to do all this, Captain; you had to learn your way, which you have done, and I’m glad you did.’
‘Thank you again, sir,’ she said, uncertain.
‘As to the future – well, somebody with your experience and particular skills should not be utilized simply to babysit every colonial group that hasn’t read the manual. Captain, once this business at Valhalla is concluded, I’d like you to consider a new command: the USS Neil Armstrong II.’
Maggie caught her breath. The second Armstrong was a new dirigible marque, semi-secret, designed to explore the Long Earth far beyond the limits reached so far, even by the Valienté expedition, even by the rumoured Chinese venture.
‘Your primary mission, as you’ll understand, will be to seek out whatever became of the Armstrong I and her crew. We haven’t even been able to send a ship out to search. Well, now we can. After that—’ He gestured. ‘Out there. Of course you can select your own crew.’
She thought of Mac, and Nathan, and Harry – even Toby Fox. ‘That won’t be a problem, sir.’
‘I thought not.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Well, we have a heavy duty to fulfil when we get to Valhalla. I think we’re done here.’ He stood. ‘But while I’m aboard, I think I would enjoy meeting your Ensign Carl, in a less confrontational situation . . .’
That night, Maggie lay half asleep in her bunk, lulled by the micro-sounds of the ship: every little click and creak and groan, so familiar after the voyage. Every sailor knew that a ship had a life of its own, an identity, idiosyncrasies – even moods.
She felt paws on the bed. She turned over. The cat’s face loomed in the dark, green eyes glowing bright.
‘You aren’t asleep,’ said Shi-mi.
‘You really are a genius of perception, aren’t you?’
‘What are you thinking, Captain?’
‘That I’ll miss this battered old tub.’
‘Yes. I hear congratulations are in order.’
‘You would hear that, wouldn’t you? And through you the whole of the Black Corporation, probably. In any event I haven’t decided. You hear that, Abrahams, whoever you are?’
‘You’ll need a cat.’
‘Oh, will I?’
‘Personally I like the Benjamin Franklin. But I wouldn’t mind roughing it with you. Think it over.’
‘I will. I promise. Now get some sleep.’
‘Yes, Captain.’
63
THREE DAYS AFTER his discovery that the ring was gone, when they got to the world they had informally called the Rectangles, there was only one obvious location for Joshua to make for.
He sat silently as Bill guided the airship over an arid, crumpled landscape to a dry valley, its walls honeycombed with caves, its floor marked with those familiar rectangular formations, like field boundaries or the foundations of vanished buildings – and that one monumental stone structure, like a sawn-off pyramid.
Even from the air the place oppressed Joshua. Here, ten years ago, with Lobsang and Sally, he had found sapient life, some reptilian form. How did they know it was sapient? Only because, in a jumble of dried skeletons in a cave, a relic of some last spasm of dying, Joshua had found a finger-bone wearing that ring he’d taken away: clean gold with sapphires. So these creatures had evidently been sapients, and were just as evidently long dead, and Joshua still felt the odd, existential ache of that near miss, as if he were stranded on some island watching a ship pass, oblivious.
And, oddly, he felt an echo of that strange experience in this new time, the Long Earth without the trolls. More worlds with something missing.
‘Well, this is the site,’ he called up to Bill. ‘I kind of expected it to be swarming with trolls.’
He could almost hear Bill’s shrug. ‘And I never expected it to be that easy.’
‘I guess not.’
‘The world’s a classic arid Joker,’ Bill said. ‘According to my instruments. Drier than my gob in Lent.’
‘Take us down well away from that pile. It’s hot.’
‘Actually I thought I might make for the person on the ground down there waving to us.’
When Joshua looked away from the monument, it was obvious. Silvery emergency blankets had been spread over a rock bluff, positioned to be visible from the sky but not from the ground. And somebody was standing there in olive-green coveralls, waving both arms.
‘Good plan,’ Joshua said.
The Shillelagh descended smoothly. They both disembarked this time, with their boots on and packs on their backs – Bill was laden with a Stepper box, and Lobsang’s troll translation kit – ready to explore.
Joshua wasn’t particularly surprised at the identity of the person who had summoned them from the sky. ‘Lieutenant Jansson.’
‘Joshua.’ Jansson was thin, pale, sweating, evidently a lot more unwell than when he’d last seen her. As they walked up she sat down on an outcrop of rock, clearly exhausted from all the waving.
‘We came to the right world, then. We guessed correctly.’
‘About Ms. Linsay taking the ring? What it signified, where you were to come? Oh, yes. She complained about it being hard for her to find – the ring. “Trust that idiot to take it with him on his holidays,” was her phrase, I’m afraid. Then she hoped you wouldn’t notice its absence. And even if you did, you wouldn’t follow her here. She hoped that, she said, but she did plan for you showing up . . . You took your time to work it out, Joshua.’
Joshua shook his head. ‘You’re still a cop, retired or not. Only a cop would call Sally “Ms. Linsay”. We need to be here, Monica. We have our own mission, from Lobsang. About the trolls.’
Jansson smiled. ‘I think Sally anticipated that too. “That meddler Lobsang’s bound to get involved in
this”—’
‘I know, I know.’
‘I said she planned for you to come, Joshua. Whether she wanted it or not. That’s why I’m here. She brought me over to wait for you. Call me a stalking horse. She did a complicated deal with the beagles over that.’
Joshua stared. ‘Beagles?’
‘I know. Long story. Truth be told I think they were glad to have me stashed out of their sight, I smell bad to them . . . You know, it’s been a month since we’ve been here, most of it playing for time, hoping something would turn up. Sally’s patient. The instincts of a hunter, I suppose. It’s been harder for me.
He inspected her. ‘I’m guessing you’re self-medicating.’
‘Yes, and I’m doing fine, so don’t fuss. Now, just listen, Joshua . . .’
Jansson quickly told them that Sally was twenty-six worlds further over, and what the situation was: about the kobold, about the sapient canines.
‘Finn McCool,’ Bill growled. ‘Playing both ends against the middle, I’ll be bound. The little gobshite.’
For now, Joshua took in very little of this. ‘Kind of complicated.’
‘So it is,’ said Jansson.
‘That’s what happens when Sally Linsay gets into your life . . . But, as I said, we have our own mission here. OK. Well, we’re going to leave the airship here and walk over.’
‘Fine. There’s a certain time of day when they wait for me, stepwise, to meet me when I’m ready to come back . . . Listen, do you have any coffee while we wait? I ran out days ago.’
The final step into Earth West 1,617,524 was a jolt. Though he was warned by Jansson, Joshua had expected another arid Joker, like Rectangles. But it wasn’t arid, not just here anyhow. Joshua had an immediate impression of green, of moisture, of freshness; he couldn’t help taking a deep breath.
Then he observed that the green wasn’t the usual riff on forest or prairie, but, evidently, fields, being grazed by creatures that might have been cattle but weren’t, and tended by upright figures that might have been human farmhands, but weren’t.
And then he took in the most important aspect of the landscape. The creatures standing before him, that might have been dogs, but weren’t.
There were perhaps a dozen of the upright dogs, standing in neat ranks. The central two seemed the most significant, judging by the quality of the belts they wore at their waists – belts, on dogs. From which tools of some kind hung. And weapons. A thing like a crossbow.
And a ray gun! A gaudy toy, like a prop from some old TV show. Just as Jansson had described.
Their gender was very obvious; of the central couple, one was female, the other male. The male was taller, towering, a magnificent – animal. Yet not an animal. Even as he computed the peril they were all in, part of Joshua rejoiced. Sapients – an entirely new kind – and one not extinct for millennia, like over in Rectangles.
Bill gaped. ‘I’m dreaming. I know you told us about this, Lieutenant Jansson.’ He shook his head. ‘But this is mad.’
The male turned to Bill, and pulled back his lips from a very wolf-like face, and Joshua was astonished anew when he spoke. ‘No. You a-hhre not in d-hrream.’ A dog-like growl, yet the English words were clear.
Jansson said, ‘Joshua, Bill. Let me present Li-Li. And Snowy.’
Despite Jansson’s briefing about all this, Joshua felt he was dreaming too. ‘Snowy?’
Jansson pointed to the humans. ‘Joshua Valienté. Bill Chambers, his companion. Joshua is the one Sally promised.’
‘ “Promised”?’
‘One of her schemes. Given you were bound to be coming anyhow, she spun it for her advantage. She bigged you up as an ambassador of a greater power . . .’
‘Nice of her.’
Snowy studied Joshua. ‘You are emissar-hrry of human Granddaughter-hrr.’
‘Granddaughter?’
‘He means ruler,’ Jansson said.
‘OK. Well, we don’t have a Granddaughter – umm, Snowy. Not the way you mean. But – an emissary. I guess that’s the right idea. I’m here to put things right with the trolls—’
Before he could say any more Snowy, without moving a muscle, emitted a soft growl, and two of the dogs behind him moved forward in a blur. They were on Joshua before he could react, and they pinned his arms to his sides.
Joshua fought an instinct to step away. ‘Hey. What are you doing?’
Snowy nodded.
And Joshua was thrown forward to the ground, his face pressed to the rutted dirt of the track.
His injured shoulder ached like hell. He made himself not step out of this, not yet.
He tried to lift his head. He found himself staring into the face of the female dog. Li-Li? She was unfolding a bundle of cloth that contained small wooden pots, blades of stone and iron, needles, thread. Like a crude field medicine kit. Her eyes were wolf-like, yet oddly tender.
He asked, ‘Why – what—’
‘Sorr-hrry.’ She reached behind him, and he felt his shirt being ripped open.
Even now he forced himself not to step.
He heard Jansson, evidently distressed. ‘Joshua? I’m sorry. Sally did talk about you as an emissary. They must have planned this. We never suspected they’d treat you like this—’
He heard no more, as what felt like a very heavy fist slammed into the back of his head, smashing his face into the dirt, and the option to step vanished anyhow.
And the pain began, slicing, piercing, and he fell into oblivion.
64
WHEN HE WOKE, he was sitting on some kind of hard chair, slumped forward. The pain in his back was exquisite, a tapestry.
A face floated before him. A dog, a wolf . . . It showed tenderness.
It was the one called Li-Li. She peered at him, lifted one eyelid with a leathery finger-like extension of one paw. Then she growled, ‘Sorr-hrry.’ She backed away.
Now Sally was here, standing before him.
Beyond her he could make out a room, a big chamber, stone walls and floor, well-built, roomy, drab, undecorated. The air was full of the scent of dog. There were other people here. And dogs. His head was clearing, slowly; he felt like he’d been drugged.
‘Joshua. Don’t step.’
He focused on her with difficulty. ‘Sally?’
‘Don’t step. Whatever you do, don’t step. Well, you’re here at last. You took some tracking down, you and the professional Irishman here, in your travel-trailer in the sky. But I see the clue I had to leave finally percolated through your brain.’
‘The ring . . .’
‘Yes, the ring.’
‘Why’s it so important, suddenly?’
‘You’ll see. Sorry.’
‘Sorry? Why? And why the hell not step?’ He was mumbling, he discovered.
She took his cheeks in her hands, making him face her. He tried to remember the last time she had touched him, save by the scruff of the neck to rescue him from some calamity or other, such as from the wreck of the Pennsylvania. ‘Because if you do, you’ll die.’
He guessed, ‘My back?’
‘It’s a kind of staple, Joshua.’
That was Jansson. He looked around, blearily. He saw Jansson sitting on the ground by the wall, a beefy-looking dog standing over her.
He said, ‘A staple? Like the North Koreans. An iron staple through the hearts of prisoners. So if they step away—’
‘Yeah. In your case it’s a cruder variant, of a type used by some warlords in central Asia, we think. Joshua, don’t sit back. There’s a kind of crossbow fixed to your back. It’s just wood and stone and sinew, but it has an iron pin. You can walk around, you understand? But if you step away—’
‘The pin stays behind, and boing. The bow fires, and the bolt goes straight through the heart, right? I get it.’ He began to drum the message into his own head. Don’t step. Don’t step. He felt at his chest. Under the ruin of his shirt he found a stout leather band. ‘What’s to stop me just cutting this off?’
‘First, tha
t would set it off,’ Sally said. ‘And, second, they sewed the weapon to your skin. I mean it’s supported by the strap around your chest, but . . .’
‘They sewed it?’
‘Sorr-hrry, sorr-hrry,’ Li-Li said. ‘Order-hrrs . . . here.’ She brought Joshua a carved wooden mug, plain but smoothly shaped.
It contained a lukewarm, meaty broth. He drank gratefully. He found he was hungry, thirsty. He couldn’t be that badly hurt. ‘Orders, eh?’
‘It’s not her fault,’ Jansson said. ‘She’s a kind of doctor, I think. She tried to do the work cleanly, competently. Gave you some kind of painkillers. If it had been left to others – Joshua, I’m sorry. I didn’t know they were going to jump you like that.’
‘Nothing you could have done, I suspect, Lieutenant Jansson.’
‘We have a plan, of sorts. Or had one before you showed up. We’ve been trying to adapt . . .’
Sally said, ‘We’re second-guessing the motivation of non-human sapients. We weren’t expecting them to treat you like this. Maybe this is what passes for diplomacy, among beagles. Just attack the ambassador when he shows up. However the staple is our technology, after all. Humans invented this stuff to control other humans.’
Joshua grunted, ‘So I’m learning a moral lesson. But somebody brought it here, right? And somebody had to show these dogs—’
‘Beagles,’ Sally said.
‘How to manufacture the iron components.’
‘That would-ss be me. Hell-llo, pathless-ss one . . .’
Joshua looked around, more carefully, systematically. There was a row of dogs – beagles? – standing as if to attention over one of their number lying on a kind of scrap of lawn, green growing grass, like a carpet. Sally was standing before him, Jansson and Bill sitting on the floor, against one wall. And, in another corner, with a dog guard hovering over him—
‘Finn McCool. I’ve seen you looking better.’
The kobold had evidently been worked over. He could barely sit up straight. His sunglasses were gone. One eye was closed, bruises showed down one side of his bare torso, and one of his ears had been bitten off; Joshua could see the marks of teeth, a crude stitching. Still, McCool grinned. ‘It was all busines-ss. We told the beagles-ss of you, pathless-ss ones. Your ships flicker in the ss-ky of this world. You would notice beagles-ss soon. We told them, be ready. We taught them how to ss-taple the ss-teppers. We got good price-ss.’
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