The Dinosaur Chronicles

by Erhardt, Joseph

  Think, man. You used to be an engineer, remember?

  He reached for the handle on the access port in the middle of the dash and tugged. Locked. Of course.

  He flew south. The red giant filled the viewport. Stray clouds marked its disk with a sardonic, mocking smile. After all, he’d come to Evensong to die.

  He lost another 300 meters just thinking about the situation. The altimeter told him he had 2500 left before encountering a very hard landing.

  Ferguson brought his right leg up and kicked at the handle of the access port.

  Pain shot from his foot and buried itself in his right hip.

  He kicked again. Harder.

  He didn’t feel the pain this time, but the cuff of his trouser went dark.

  The plane droned on, oblivious to the drama in its cockpit.

  Ferguson’s vision hazed. At its periphery, pinpoint flashes winked on and off like Christmas lights. He clenched his fists and kicked one more time. The autocrutch, a marvel of modern engineering but still only a machine of limited intelligence, responded as designed to his adrenalin-laced motor nerves. Ferguson heard both cracks as the leg broke.

  Ferguson sucked air and blinked. The red giant loomed before him once more. He’d blacked out, and the altimeter now read a scant 600 meters.

  But the handle to the access port dangled from the dash by a thin strip of plastic, exposing a coin-sized hole.

  He poked a finger into the two-centimeter gap, toggled the latch and opened the cover.

  He looked at the wiring and the single circuit board that rested in the center of an outgoing web of lines. Then he laughed—a short, sick gallows laugh that heralded the hopelessness of his situation—for he had no idea what to look for. How could he think to do anything without diagrams? Or equipment? Or computer support?

  The altimeter flashed 200 meters in a desperate red blink, and he knew he wouldn’t clear the cliff that was bearing up ahead.

  His eyes fell on the newest-looking, most dust-free component on the circuit board. He locked his fingers around the device and threw his arm into a vicious twist.

  The flivver righted itself briefly, then dropped into a steep left bank. The turbines screamed, and red warning lights lit up the console.

  G-forces pinned Ferguson to the backrest. Through half-closed eyes he saw the cliff grow large, and then the right wing-tip sparked against the rockface.

  The flyer shuddered, and Ferguson thought it was over. But seconds later the craft began a gentle climb to a safer altitude, and the computer’s audio interface returned. Was it his imagination, or did the voice seem just a bit less cordial than before?

  “System override,” the computer announced tersely. “Manual control aborted. This incident is being referred to the Licensing Board, Mr. Ferguson.”

  “Fine, fine,” he sighed. “And while you’re at it, please change destination to nearest city, nearest hospital.”

  “Are you ill?”

  “I’m dripping blood all over your nice clean carpeting.”

  “Interior damage will result in extra charges to your account.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  —

  Ferguson looked down at his leg. So he’d had the thing reconstructed after all, though his stay in the hospital had been wholly unanticipated. He’d rested there a week, recovering from the surgery, and afterward the plasticast had stayed on his leg for three months.

  —

  When the flivver arrived at Cower Glen’s small airport, ambulance techs had to lift him out, as he’d gotten so weak by then that breathing had become his only fascination.

  But the attendants had slapped a glucose transdermal against one bare arm and had begun an infusion of synthoglobin into the other. By the time the five-minute ride to the hospital was over, he’d made his wishes clear to the chief attendant.

  Which was why, once he awakened in the post-surgery room, his eyes opened to find the local Constable as well as the resident Association Federal at his bedside.

  The Constable, gray and wrinkled as himself, was obviously a retiree working for extra income. He sat on the edge of a chair and directed deferential glances to the man at his right. Ferguson figured the Constable hoped the Feds would take the matter over, leaving him the manageable everyday duties of a small-town law-enforcement official—shuffling papers and bagging the occasional drunk. The Federal man, in contrast, could not have been out of his forties and, with his pressed suit and carefully-groomed features, presented a virile, competent image.

  Obviously a pro pulling a tour of duty, Ferguson thought, and looked him in the eyes. “Who are you?”

  The Federal man said, “Hollis. Investigative agent. This is Constable Dorfmann.” He indicated the oldster to his left.

  Ferguson kept his eyes on the Federal. “Where are my things?”

  The man held up a plastic bag.

  “Rear trouser pocket, right side.”

  The agent dug his fingers in and removed the part Ferguson had ripped from the dash circuitry. “And this is?”

  “Sabotage,” Ferguson said. “I yanked it from the control circuit. The plane would’ve smeared itself across the rocks. I think you’ll find the circuit a foreign make.”

  The Constable blinked. “Foreign make?”

  “Tarapseti.”

  Hollis offered a question of his own. “Why?”

  “You know what happened in Granger Hollow?”

  “I heard about the hit-and-run; yes.”

  “Murder,” Ferguson said. “I know why Tar F’set was killed, and by whom. But you’ll have to move fast to recover the one key piece of evidence—if it’s still there to be had.”

  The Federal men moved. The evidence was found, and a Tarapset was arrested. Quietly, without fanfare. Evensong wanted no trouble with the Tarapseti government, nor did it want to draw unfavorable attention to itself. The murder of any retiree, even alien, was not admitted gladly.

  —

  Ferguson’s second cup was empty and the red giant nearly clear of the horizon.

  The final chapter to Tar’s story had been written but a week before, when Ferguson’s still-smoldering rage had taken him to the Immigration Holding Facility in Capital City. He thought about that trip now and wondered if it had done him any good at all.

  —

  Ferguson found himself in the offices of the Chief of Immigration. With her were two Association Federals, one of whom was the man who’d met him in the hospital.

  “Nice to see you again, Mr. Ferguson,” Hollis said, extending a hand. “This is Agent Figby and the lady is the Immigration Chief herself, Dame Warthen.”

  Ferguson nodded to both. Neither Figby nor Warthen seemed happy to see him, and even Hollis’s eyes showed doubt.

  The second Association man said, “This meeting’s a bit unusual, Mr. Ferguson. I don’t think it’s been done before—having a witness or victim kiss off a killer, as it were. How’d you get the Council to agree to this?”

  “Most cities have Plasjoint-Induced Dementia support groups, Mr. Figby. Through the Capital City group, I discovered that Councilfem Braddock’s granddaughter has PJID. I rather expect the Ruling Council acceded to her influence.”

  Figby’s eyes widened, but still he asked, “Are you certain you want to do this?”

  Ferguson said, “I owe it to my friend.”

  Hollis nodded at Warthen, a grim-faced woman who seemed the most unhappy about the tableau to be assembled in her office. Reluctantly, she spoke into her squawker. “Send in the prisoner. Now.”

  The big door on the far side of the office opened, and a Tarapset was led in by two guards holding recoilless machine pistols. Additionally, an electronic restraint collar rested between the bug’s head and thorax.

  “Hello, Gar Gisset,” the bug said quietly.

  “Hello, Rehar M’zek,” Ferguson responded, adding, “Are they treating you well?”

  “As well as can be expected. Naturally,
I wish my freedom.”

  “And I wish Tar P’teng were alive. So much for wishes.”

  The bug paused for a long minute. Then she said, “Why do you speak to me?”

  “The hypercruiser to the Algonquin sector, and Tarapseti, arrives in three days. Before you leave, I thought I’d give you something to think about during the six-week trip.”

  The Immigration Chief harrumphed, but Ferguson ignored her.

  Ferguson said, “The Evensong government doesn’t want an incident—it doesn’t want to try you and it certainly doesn’t want you as a prisoner. Political considerations prevent that. Deportation is all that will happen to you.”

  “This I have discerned. Again, why do you speak?”

  “Because deportation back to Tarapseti has its own consequences. Permit me to review the matter.

  “I don’t know how you managed to overpower old Tar—perhaps you slipped a soporific into his food, perhaps you managed to get hold of a neural whip—but after disabling him, you dragged him to the highway, got into the stolen convertible, overrode the governor and safeties and ran him down—as if he were nothing but an overgrown cockroach!”

  “The laws of your world do not require that I respond.”

  “Your schizophrenic application of the laws of my world conveniently forget those relating to murder!”

  “Your laws refer to homicide. Tar P’teng was not human.”

  “An omission shortly to be remedied, at least on this world! But as a political killing, your act also falls under our civil rights laws, which refer to ‘citizens of Evensong.’ Tar P’teng immigrated and lasted his two years, so he was a citizen.”

  The Federal from Cower Glen gasped audibly, and the Immigration Chief let out a long, low whistle. She asked, “Was the Ruling Council aware of this? Do we still just deport?”

  “Yes, we deport!” Figby insisted. “We’ve got an agreement with the Tarapseti government. There are no other options!”

  “Yes,” the bug agreed. “This meeting is pointless.” The Tarapset’s stridulation ended in a curt, clipped hiss.

  Ferguson said to M’zek, “Aren’t you even curious to know how you blundered?”

  Antennae waved. “No comment. I will, however, listen.”

  “It was the attempt on my life. That was truly pointless. Remember, I had no real evidence anymore—Tar P’teng’s message to me had evaporated, and I was going to Capital City more to vent my spleen—give voice to my rage—than to effect any serious action.”

  “An offworlder would have no way of knowing that,” Rehar said evenly.

  “Now, my communications to Capital City and to the flivver rental company could have been intercepted, as they were radio transmissions from my house. But Tar P’teng’s message to me was internal, and audio only.

  “And without Tar P’teng’s message, my other transmissions would have been meaningless to any eavesdropper.

  “So I knew I had a listening device in the house.

  “And I thought, would the Tarapseti government farm out its dirty little practices to non-Tarapseti agents? This was doubtful. And I thought, what had I carried into my house recently of Tarapseti origin?

  “For I was certain that any unauthorized access to my bungalow would have been detected by the HCU security sensors. So I knew that it had to be me who ‘bugged’ myself. You’ll pardon the expression.

  “And then I remembered the chess set you returned to me on the day of Tar’s death, as I was leaving after expressing my condolences to you. In retrospect, this return was rather sudden and you, yourself, said you hoped I would come by that day. Remember?”

  “I recall the day,” the bug said simply.

  “Tar and I had been friends a long time—two years on Evensong are more than four standard years. Because you couldn’t know what he might have said to me, tagging me with a listening chip was only prudent.

  “Unfortunately, after I left in the flivver, there was no undetected way you could recover the device, and when the Association agents inspected the set, they found the chip in a hollowed-out nook under the Black Queen, just behind the felt base.”

  “It could have been Fanz K’har or Rebek Tor who modified the set.”

  “It could have been. But what guarantee could they have had that the set would be returned to me? None—unless you were involved in the matter as director or conspirator.

  “But the listening units found in your bungalow after your arrest put any doubts aside. What was it you taught on Tarapseti? Molecular electronics? Cybernetic controls?”

  The bug shuffled uneasily on its six legs but said nothing.

  “And now,” Ferguson said, “I get to my own part in Tar’s death.”

  Murmurings broke out behind him, but Ferguson kept his eyes on M’zek.

  “Three weeks ago,” Ferguson said, “I traded hypergrams with Alex Shevski, editor of the Association Chess Quarterly. After I submitted the game in which Tar fought CyberKnight to a standstill, Shevski, on speculation, sent 500 copies of that issue of the Quarterly to Tarapseti, along with 500 inexpensive holosets and 500 bookchips on chess and its history. He sent them to various schools and universities.

  “One result of this was that Tar F’set’s identity was exposed—a fault of mine that I shall ever regret. Chess became wildly popular on Tarapseti—something in the game touches the Tarapsettean psyche, I guess—and many eyes fell over the game that Tar F’set had played. Someone eventually tried to trace F’set and found he didn’t really exist. Then you—” he pointed accusingly “—arrive on Evensong and play to the loneliness of an aged outcast!”

  Ferguson paused and drew breath. The emotion behind his words had brought tremors to his hands and a rasp to his voice. More calmly he said, “The Quarterly now has half a million paying subscriptions on Tarapseti. Local clubs and newsletters are mushrooming, so its true circulation is perhaps five, six times that number.”

  “Mr. Shevski’s investment produced dividends,” Rehar responded without inflection.

  “Indeed. And I thought I might inform you about the contents of the current issue, which should be arriving on Tarapseti as we speak.”

  Hollis choked. “Ferguson! You didn’t!”

  “It’s actually worse than you think,” the engineer admitted. “While it’s true Tar P’teng’s message to me self-erased after running, I found a copy of it on a sector-level backup I’d made some five months earlier, when I upgraded the storage on my house unit. I sent a copy to Shevski, along with what public records there were of Rehar M’zek’s arrest and deportation order, and he tore apart his front page to banner the lurid and disgusting details of the First Tarapseti Master’s assassination.”

  The deathly silence which followed was broken first by the gentle applause of female hands cupping approval.

  Then Figby exploded, “This is a violation of the Foreign Affairs Interference Act! You’ve put your own neck in the noose!”

  Ferguson eyed Figby dispassionately. “How? All I gave Shevski were public records and a recording from an Evensong citizen to an Evensong citizen, one now dead, so the communication is releasable by the other. If you want to raise hell in court, be my guest.”

  “I think I will return to my cell now,” Rehar M’zek injected.

  Hollis spat coldly, “The bug stays!”

  “I’m almost finished, anyway,” Ferguson said and turned back to the object of his wrath. “So, Rehar, your people will know of your treachery, and your superiors will know of your embarrassing exposure. I think,” he said, dripping acid with each syllable, “that upon your return they will have little further use for you.”

  —

  Ferguson shook his head. Anger had finally left with Rehar M’zek’s shuttle. What he hadn’t counted on was the melancholy that remained. Empty and sour, it had been suppressed by the hatred. Once released, the sadness had come bobbing to the surface like a corpse.

  He got up to place his cup in the dishwasher when a familiar tapping played
on his front door. “Doesn’t anyone here use the bell?” he groused, and banged his cup back on the windowsill.

  Without bothering to check the HCU viewport, he crossed the living room in four quick steps and ripped open the front door.

  A Tarapset stood quietly on his stoop.

  Ferguson read the pattern on the bug’s carapace and said,

  “Rebek Tor. Why am I not surprised?”

  The Tarapset’s antennae waved momentarily in a gesture of puzzlement. Then it replied, “Perhaps you are prescient, Human, and that is why you are not surprised. Otherwise, I cannot answer your question.”

  “It was just an expression. What do you want?”

  The bug held up a recyclable hardcopy of the Association Chess Quarterly.

  “It is my understanding that you are behind this revelation, and sources tell me you are the reason for Rehar M’zek’s humiliation.”

  “Guilty as charged. Have you come to assassinate me also?”

  More antenna waving. A long pause. Finally the bug spoke.

  “You misunderstand, Human. On Tarapseti, I worked in the auditing department under the Old Emperor. My real name is Tau Martek, not Rebek Tor. Tar P’teng and I met, once, many years ago, but I could tell when I saw him here that he did not recall that meeting.

  “Shortly before the dynastic change, I discovered that Tar was transferring funds off-planet. I wondered if he were embezzling. I discovered only that he was converting his own assets, sometimes at great loss, into Association Mutuals. Considering his position and what was to come, the reason for his actions was quite clear.

  “After the Zenar family took power, I stayed on in my work. I felt that my connection to the previous dynasty was sufficiently tenuous to not pose any danger to myself.

  “This changed after I reported several malfeasances to the new Emperor—financial crimes traced to several of his appointees.

  “My presentation was greeted with the enthusiasm reserved for a carrier of Barakka plague, and I knew then that I had made a serious mistake.

  “During my investigation of old Tar, I became aware of his interest in Evensong, and after my audience with the Emperor I resolved to escape to this world myself. I was not as well equipped as Tar, however, to provide a background for myself. Nonetheless, I did what I could, including falsifying my name and age in my immigration application.”