"You are a yellowbellied fink," he commented.
"Okay," I admitted, "but it's her I'm thinking of, too."
"I've heard the stories about you both," he said. "So you're a heel and a goofoff and she's a bitch. That's called compatibility these days. I dare you, baitman, try keeping something you catch."
I turned.
"If you ever want that job, look me up."
I closed the door quietly behind me and left him sitting there waiting for it to slam.
The day of the beast dawned like any other. Two days after my gutless flight from empty waters I went down to rebait. Nothing on the scope. I was just making things ready for the routine attempt.
I hollered a "good morning" from outside the Slider and received an answer from inside before I pushed off. I had reappraised Mike's words, sans sound, sans fury, and while I did not approve of their sentiment or significance, I had opted for civility anyhow.
So down, under, and away. I followed a decent cast about two hundred-ninety meters out. The snaking cables burned black to my left and I paced their undulations from the yellowgreen down into the darkness. Soundless lay the wet night, and I bent my way through it like a cock-eyed comet, bright tail before.
I caught the line, slick and smooth, and began baiting. An icy world swept by me then, ankles to head. It was a draft, as if someone had opened a big door beneath me. I wasn't drifting forwards that fast either.
Which meant that something might be moving up, something big enough to displace a lot of water. I still didn't think it was Ikky. A freak current of some sort, but not Ikky. Ha!
I had finished attaching the leads and pulled the first plug when a big, rugged, black island grew beneath me....
I flicked the beam downward. His mouth was opened.
I was rabbit.
Waves of the death-fear passed downward. My stomach imploded. I grew dizzy.
Only one thing, and one thing only. Left to do. I managed it, finally. I pulled the rest of the plugs.
I could count the scaly articulations ridging his eyes by then.
The squiggler grew, pinked into phosphorescence...squiggled.
Then my lamp. I had to kill it, leaving just the bait before him.
One glance back as I jammed the jatoes to life.
He was so near that the squiggler reflected on his teeth, in his eyes. Four meters, and I kissed his lambent jowls with two jets of backwash as I soared. Then I didn't know whether he was following or had halted. I began to black out as I waited to be eaten.
The jatoes died and I kicked weakly.
Too fast, I felt a cramp coming on. One flick of the beam, cried rabbit. One second, to know...
Or end things up, I answered. No, rabbit, we don't dart before hunters. Stay dark.
Green waters, finally, to yellowgreen, then top.
Doubling, I beat off toward Tensquare. The waves from the explosion behind pushed me on ahead. The world closed in, and a screamed "He's alive!" in the distance.
A giant shadow and a shock wave. The line was alive, too. Happy Fishing Grounds. Maybe I did something wrong....
Somewhere Hand was clenched. What's bait?
A few million years. I remember starting out as a one-celled organism and painfully becoming an amphibian, then an air-breather. From somewhere high in the treetops I heard a voice.
"He's coming around."
I evolved back into homosapience, then a step further into a hangover.
"Don't try to get up yet."
"Have we got him?" I slurred.
"Still fighting, but he's hooked. We thought he took you for an appetizer."
"So did I."
"Breath some of this and shut up."
A funnel over my face. Good. Lift your cups and drink....
"He was awfully deep. Below scope range. We didn't catch him till he started up. Too late, then."
I began to yawn.
"We'll get you inside now."
I managed to uncase my ankle knife.
"Try it and you'll be minus a thumb."
"You need rest."
"Then bring me a couple more blankets. I'm staying."
I fell back and closed my eyes.
Someone was shaking me. Gloom and cold. Spotlights bled yellow on the deck. I was in a jury-rigged bunk, bulked against the center blister. Swaddled in wool, I still shivered.
"It's been eleven hours. You're not going to see anything now."
I tasted blood.
"Drink this."
Water. I had a remark but I couldn't mouth it.
"Don't ask me how I feel," I croaked. "I know that comes next, but don't ask me. Okay?"
"Okay. Want to go below now?"
"No. Just get me my jacket."
"Right here."
"What's he doing?"
"Nothing. He's deep, he's doped but he's staying down."
"How long since last time he showed?"
"Two hours, about."
"Jean?"
"She won't let anyone in the Slider. Listen, Mike says to come on in. He's right behind you in the blister."
I sat up and turned around. Mike was watching. He gestured; I gestured back.
I swung my feet over the edge and took a couple of deep breaths. Pains in my stomach. I got to my feet and made it into the blister.
"Howza gut?" queried Mike.
I checked the scope. No Ikky. Too deep.
"You buying?"
"Yeah, coffee."
"Not coffee."
"You're ill. Also, coffee is all that's allowed in here."
"Coffee is a brownish liquid that burns your stomach. You have some in the bottom drawer."
"No cups. You'll have to use a glass."
"Tough."
He poured.
"You do that well. Been practicing for that job?"
"What job?"
"The one I offered you--"
A blot on the scope!
"Rising, ma'am! Rising!" he yelled into the box.
"Thanks, Mike. I've got it in here," she crackled.
"Jean!"
"Shut up! She's busy!"
"Was that Carl?"
"Yeah," I called. "Talk later," and I cut it.
Why did I do that?
"Why did you do that?"
I didn't know.
"I don't know."
Damned echoes! I got up and walked outside.
Nothing. Nothing.
Something?
Tensquare actually rocked! He must have turned when he saw the hull and started downward again. White water to my left, and boiling. An endless spaghetti of cable roared hotly into the belly of the deep.
I stood awhile, then turned and went back inside.
Two hours sick. Four, and better.
"The dope's getting to him."
"Yeah."
"What about Miss Luharich?"
"What about her?"
"She must be half dead."
"Probably."
"What are you going to do about it?"
"She signed the contract for this. She knew what might happen. It did."
"I think you could land him."
"So do I."
"So does she."
"Then let her ask me."
Ikky was drifting lethargically, at thirty fathoms.
I took another walk and happened to pass behind the Slider. She wasn't looking my way.
"Carl, come in here!"
Eyes of Picasso, that's what, and a conspiracy to make me Slide...
"Is that an order?"
"Yes--No! Please."
I dashed inside and monitored. He was rising.
"Push or pull?"
I slammed the "wind" and he came like a kitten.
"Make up your own mind now."
He balked at ten fathoms.
"Play him?"
"No!"
She wound him upwards--five fathoms, four...
She hit the extensors at two, and the caught him. Then the graffles.
Cries without and a heat of lightning of flashbulbs.
The crew saw Ikky.
He began to struggle. She kept the cables tight, raised the graffles.
Up.
Another two feet and the graffles began pulsing.
Screams and fast footfalls.
Giant beanstalk in the wind, his neck, waving. The green hills of his shoulders grew.
"He's big, Carl!" she cried.
And he grew, and grew, and grew uneasy...
"_Now!_"
He looked down.
He looked down, as the god of our most ancient ancestors might have looked down. Fear, shame, and mocking laughter rang in my head. Her head, too?
"Now!"
She looked up at the nascent earthquake.
"I can't!"
It was going to be so damnably simple this time, now the rabbit had died. I reached out.
I stopped.
"Push it yourself."
"I can't. You do it. Land him, Carl!"
"No. If I do, you'll wonder for the rest of your life whether you could have. You'll throw away your soul finding out. I know you will, because we're alike, and I did it that way. Find out now!"
She stared.
I gripped her shoulders.
"Could be that's me out there," I offered. "I am a green sea serpent, a hateful, monstrous beast, and out to destroy you. I am answerable to no one. Push the Inject."
Her hand moved to the button, jerked back.
"Now!"
She pushed it.
I lowered her still form to the floor and finished things up with Ikky.
It was a good seven hours before I awakened to the steady, sea-chewing grind of Tensquare's blades.
"You're sick," commented Mike.
"How's Jean?"
"The same."
"Where's the beast?"
"Here."
"Good." I rolled over. "...Didn't get away this time."
So that's the way it was. No one is born a baitman, I don't think, but the rings of Saturn sing epithalamium the sea-beast's dower.
The Keys to December
BORN OF MAN and woman, in accordance with Catform Y7 requirements, Coldworld Class (modified per Alyonal), 3.2-E, G.M.I. option, Jarry Dark was not suited for existence anywhere in the universe which had guaranteed him a niche. This was either a blessing or a curse, depending on how you looked at it.
So look at it however you would, here is the story:
It is likely that his parents could have afforded the temperature control unit, but not much more than that. (Jarry required a temperature of at least -50 C. to be comfortable.)
It is unlikely that his parents could have provided for the air pressure control and gas mixture equipment required to maintain his life.
Nothing could be done in the way of 3.2-E grav-simulation, so daily medication and physiotherapy were required. It is unlikely that his parents could have provided for this.
The much-maligned option took care of him, however. It safe-guarded his health. It provided for his education. It assured his economic welfare and physical well-being.
It might be argued that Jarry Dark would not have been a homeless Coldworld Catform (modified per Alyonal) had it not been for General Mining, Incorporated, which had held the option. But then it must be borne in mind that no one could have foreseen the nova which destroyed Alyonal.
When his parents had presented themselves at the Public Health Planned Parenthood Center and requested advice and medication pending offspring, they had been informed as to the available worlds and the bodyform requirements for them. They had selected Alyonal, which had recently been purchased by General Mining for purposes of mineral exploitation. Wisely, they had elected the option; that is to say, they had signed a contract on behalf of their anticipated offspring, who would be eminently qualified to inhabit that world, agreeing that he would work as an employee of General Mining until he achieved his majority, at which time he would be free to depart and seek employment wherever he might choose (though his choices would admittedly be limited). In return for this guarantee, General Mining agreed to assure his health, education and continuing welfare for so long as he remained in their employ.
When Alyonal caught fire and went away, those Coldworld Catforms covered by the option who were scattered about the crowded galaxy were, by virtue of the agreement, wards of General Mining.
This is why Jarry grew up in a hermetically sealed room containing temperature and atmosphere controls, and why he received a first-class closed circuit education, along with his physiotherapy and medicine. This is also why Jarry bore some resemblance to a large gray ocelot without a tail, had webbing between his fingers and could not go outside to watch the traffic unless he wore a pressurized refrigeration suit and took extra medication.
All over the swarming galaxy, people took the advice of Public Health Planned Parenthood Centers, and many others had chosen as had Jarry's parents. Twenty-eight thousand, five hundred sixty-six of them, to be exact. In any group of over twenty-eight thousand five hundred sixty, there are bound to be a few talented individuals. Jarry was one of them. He had a knack for making money. Most of his General Mining pension check was invested in well-chosen stocks of a speculative nature. (In fact, after a time he came to own considerable stock in General Mining.)
When the man from the Galactic Civil Liberties Union had come around, expressing concern over the pre-birth contracts involved in the option and explaining that the Alyonal Catforms would make a good test case (especially since Jarry's parents lived within jurisdiction of the 877th Circuit, where they would be assured favorable courtroom atmosphere), Jarry's parents had demurred, for fear of jeopardizing the General Mining pension. Later on, Jarry himself dismissed the notion also. A favorable decision could not make him an E-world Normform, and what else mattered? He was not vindictive. Also, he owned considerable stock in G.M. by then.
He loafed in his methane tank and purred, which meant that he was thinking. He operated his cryo-computer as he purred and thought. He was computing the total net worth of all the Catforms in the recently organized December Club.
He stopped purring and considered a sub-total, stretched, shook his head slowly. Then he returned to his calculations.
When he had finished, he dictated a message into his speech-tube, to Sanza Barati, President of December and his betrothed:
"Dearest Sanza--the funds available, as I have suspected, leave much to be desired. All the more reason to begin immediately. Kindly submit the proposal to the business committee, outline my qualifications and seek immediate endorsement. I've finished drafting the general statement to the membership. (Copy attached.) From these figures, it will take me between five and ten years, if at least eighty percent of the membership backs me. So push hard, beloved. I'd like to meet you someday, in a place where the sky is purple. Yours, always, Jarry Dark, Treasurer. P.S. I'm pleased you were pleased with the ring."
Two years later, Jarry had doubled the net worth of December, Incorporated.
A year and a half after that, he had doubled it again.
When he received the following letter from Sanza, he leapt onto his trampoline, bounded into the air, landed upon his feet at the opposite end of his quarters, returned to his viewer and replayed it:
Dear Jarry,
Attached are specifications and prices for five more
worlds. The research staff likes the last one. So do I.
What do you think? Alyonal II? If so, how about the price?
When could we afford that much? The staff also says that an
hundred Worldchange units could alter it to what we want in
5-6 centuries. Will forward costs of this machinery shortly.
Come live with me and be my love, in a place where there
are no walls....
Sanza
"One year," he replied, "and I'll buy you a world! Hurry up with the costs of the machinery and transport...." When the figures arrived Jarry wept ic
y tears. One hundred machines, capable of altering the environment of a world, plus twenty-eight thousand coldsleep bunkers, plus transportation costs for the machinery and his people, plus...Too high! He did a rapid calculation.
He spoke into the speech-tube:
"...Fifteen additional years is too long to wait, Pussycat. Have them figure the time-span if we were to purchase only twenty Worldchange units. Love and kisses, Jarry."
During the days which followed, he stalked above his chamber, erect at first, then on all fours as his mood deepened.
"Approximately three thousand years," came the reply. "May your coat be ever shiny--Sanza."
"Let's put it to a vote, Greeneyes," he said.
Quick, a world in 300 words or less! Picture this...
One land mass, really, containing three black and brackish looking seas; gray plains and yellow plains and skies the color of dry sand; shallow forests with trees like mushrooms which have been swabbed with iodine; no mountains, just hills brown, yellow, white, lavender; green birds with wings like parachutes, bills like sickles, feathers like oak leaves, an inside-out umbrella behind; six very distant moons, like spots before the eyes in daytime; grass like mustard in the moister valleys; mists like white fire on windless mornings, albino serpents when the air's astir; radiating chasms, like fractures in frosted windowpanes; hidden caverns, like chains of dark bubbles; seventeen known dangerous predators, ranging from one to six meters in length, excessively furred and fanged; sudden hailstorms, like hurled hammerheads from a clear sky; an icecap like a blue beret at either flattened pole; nervous bipeds a meter and a half in height, short on cerebrum, which wander the shallow forests and prey upon the giant caterpillar's larva, as well as the giant caterpillar, the green bird, the blind burrower, and the offal-eating murkbeast; seventeen mighty rivers; clouds like pregnant purple cows, which quickly cross the land to lie-in beyond the visible east; stands of windblasted stones like frozen music; nights like soot, to obscure the lesser stars; valleys which flow like the torsos of women or instruments of music; perpetual frost in places of shadow; sounds in the morning like the cracking of ice, the trembling of tin, the snapping of steel strands...
They knew they would turn it to heaven.
The vanguard arrived, decked out in refrigeration suits, installed ten Worldchange units in either hemisphere, began setting up cold-sleep bunkers in several of the larger caverns.
The Doors of His Face, The Lamps of His Mouth and Other Stories Page 4