Death Dance

by Jack McKinney

  Janice had thought to take hold of the old man's arm and utter a short panicked sound as the ground began to tremble. It was a performance worthy of Minmei's best, although Janice could hardly appreciate it as such-any more than she could fully understand just what had compelled her to seek out Rem and Cabell's company in the first place. That this should somehow please Dr. Lang was a thought as baffling to her as it was discomforting.

  "There, there, child," Cabell was saying, patting her hand. "It will be over in a moment."

  They recommenced their climb when the tremor passed. Janice disengaged herself and urged Cabell to go on with what they had been discussing.

  "Ah, yes," he said, running a hand over his bald pate, "the trees."

  Janice listened like a student eager for A's.

  "As you can see, they're nothing like the scrub growth we found on Karbarra-far healthier, much closer to the unmutated form." He motioned with his hand and went up on tiptoes to touch the spherical "canopy" of a healthy-looking specimen. The tendrils that encased the solid-looking sphere and rigid near-translucent trunk seemed to pulse with life. Gingerly, Cabell plucked one of the verdigris-colored applelike fruits, burnished it against his robe, and began to turn it about in his wrinkled hand.

  "Even the fruit they bear is different in color and texture-although still a far cry from the true Opteran species. Nevertheless, it may tell us something." He took off his rucksack and placed the sample inside. "Look for the ripest ones," the instructed Janice, as she added a second fruit to the pack.

  Cabell was straightening up when a sudden movement further up the slope caught his eye. Janice heard him start, and turned to follow his narrowed gaze.

  "What was it?"

  Cabell stroked his beard. "I thought I saw someone up ahead."

  "A Praxian?" Janice asked, craning her neck and sharpening her vision.

  "No," he said, shaking his head. "I would swear it was Burak!"

  Later, a stone's throw from the grounded GMU, inside the wooden structure that had been designated both quarters and cell, Tesla wolfed down the fruits Burak had picked from the sinister orchard Zor's Flower of Life seedings had spawned on Praxis.

  "Yes, yes, different, ummm," the Invid was saying in a voice tinged-with rapture.

  The young Perytonian tried to avert his eyes, but in the end couldn't help himself from watching Tesla as he ingested fruit after fruit. Moist sucking noises filled the cell.

  "And you think they may have seen you?" Tesla asked him.

  "It is possible-Cabell, in any case."

  Tesla scoffed, still munching and handling the fruits as if they were wealth itself. "Cabell is too old to recognize the nose on his own face. Besides, they know I can't subsist on what you call food."

  Burak said nothing. It was true enough: the Invid's food stock had been destroyed with the Farrago, and the Sentinels had agreed to place Burak in charge of securing alternative nutrient plants. But Cabell, who was anything but a doddering old man, and perhaps fearing the very transformations Tesla was beginning to undergo, had suggested that the Invid's fruit and Flower intake be regulated-this in spite of the fact that Tesla had to some extent ingratiated himself with the group since their victory on Karbarra. Each evening, Cabell and Jean Grant would look in on Tesla. Burak had been asked to furnish them with a daily log of the amounts gathered and ingested; and the devilish-looking Perytonian was complying-inasmuch as he would file a report. But the report was hardly a reflection of the actual amounts Tesla consumed. Fortunately, though, the Invid's transformations had been limited to brief periods following his meals, when neither Cabell nor Jean were present.

  "More," Tesla said now, holding out his hands.

  Burak regarded the Invid's newly-acquired fifth digit and pulled the basket out of reach. "I think you've had enough for today." Burak had heard it said that extraordinary powers could be gained from ingesting the fruits of Haydon's Worlds, but he had never understood that to mean physical transfiguration, and the Invid's recent changes were beginning to fill him with fear.

  Tesla's eyes glowed red as he came to his feet, taller by inches than he had stood on Karbarra. "You dare to say this to me after all we've been through? You, who sought me out before fate landed us in this despicable situation? And what of your homeworld and the curse you were so feverish to see ended-have you given up hope? Would you renounce your destiny?"

  Burak took a hesitant step toward the door, the basket clasped to him. "You're changing!" he said, pointing to Tesla's hands. "They're going to notice it, and what then? They'll cut back on the amounts, put someone else in charge of you. Then what becomes of your promises-what becomes of Peryton?"

  Tesla continued to glare at him a moment more, transmogrifying even as Burak watched. The Invid's skull rippled and expanded, as though being forced to conform to some novel interior design. Gradually, however, Tesla reassumed his natural state and collapsed back into his seat, spent, subdued, and apologetic.

  "You're right, Burak. We must take care to keep our partnership a carefully-guarded secret." His black, ophidian eyes fixed on Burak. "And have no fear for your tortured world. When the time comes for me to assume my rightful place in these events, I shall reward you for these efforts."

  "That's all that I ask," Burak told him.

  The two XTs fell silent as a gentle tremor shook the building.

  Tesla stared at the floor. "I sense something about this planet," he announced, his sensor organs twitching as his snout came up. "And I think I am beginning to see just what the Regis was doing here."

  CHAPTER TWO

  Unfortunately, there are no detailed descriptions of the Genesis Pits, other than Rand's colorful but highly personalized and impressionistic accounts (specious, as some would add), and the notes Colonel Adams hastily scribbled to himself while on Optera. And despite a plethora of theories and explanations, the sad truth is that the mechanism of the Pits remains a complete mystery-except to say that they were devices utilized by the

  Regis for purposes of creative evolution. Praxis apparently played host to the largest of these, and Lang, to name one, has speculated that the Pits not only gave rise to extinct creatures, but succeeded in regressing the entire planet to a formative stage of destructive vulcanism.

  Zeus Bellow, The Road to Reflex Point

  If Burak and Tesla had become the Sentinels' silent partnership, then Jack Baker and Karen Penn were certainly the group's inseparable pair. But that, each liked to believe, was merely a result of duty assignments. And even four months on Praxis hadn't provided them with enough time to work through the competitive trifles that fueled their relationship. They were not only marooned, but marooned together; and Praxis had become the proverbial town that just wasn't big enough for the two of them. Bela, Praxis's wasp-waisted local sheriff, was only one of the contributing factors; but Karen nevertheless took every opportunity to keep Jack as far from Bela as she could, often encouraging the Hovercycle recons that had become something of Jack's stock-in-trade.

  A joyride disguised as a scouting mission had brought Jack and Karen to a series of caves two hours out from the GMU. Lron and Kami had ridden with them. Four months had given the Sentinels plenty of time to grieve for those who had gone down with the Farrago; but Karen often wondered just how long it was going to take for her to grow accustomed to her XT comrades. She wasn't a bit xenophobic-a fact that had won her a place with the Sentinels to begin with-and in actuality it wasn't so much the strangeness of Lron or Kami that overwhelmed her, but the similarities. If only Karbarrans didn't so resemble Kodiak bears, she would tell herself. And if only Kami didn't look like upright versions of the foxes she used to see near the cabin her father had once owned...She had much less trouble with Baldan and Teal, with their bodies of living crystal. Or Tesla, for that matter-now there was an alien you could believe in!

  But wolves and bears and snail-headed things...Karen was in the midst of wishing that Bela had had a more ali
en form-even a more rotund form-when without warning, Jack hissed: "Cut it out!"

  The four Sentinels were well into the central cave now, inside a huge vaulted corridor that was as hot as blazes and reeking of sulphur. Curiosity had drawn them in; but Jack, never one to do things halfway, had insisted they go "just a little further," and here they were a good half a click along. There were primitive sketches on the walls of the caverns they had passed through-depictions of hideous spiderlike creatures Jack claimed were "symbols"-and Karen was in no mood for fun house games or laugh-in-the-dark surprises.

  "Huh?" she said, gulping and finding her voice.

  "I said cut it out."

  "I know what you said, Jack..."

  She threw him an angry look in the darkness, wondering suddenly if she had actually voiced some of her private musings about Bela. Then all at once something hit her on the top of the head. XTs or not, she decided, someone was trying to be funny. Karen whirled around, hoping to catch Kami in the act, but he was way off to her left inspecting a chunk of rock near the cave wall. Lron, too, seemed to be preoccupied with other things. So, wiping sweat from her face, she turned back to Jack, and said, "Not funny."

  "What?"

  She put a hand up to shield her eyes from his miner's light. "Throwing things. I'm not real thrilled about being in here to start with."

  "I didn't throw anything," he started to say, when Lron's gurgling snarl interrupted him.

  "Who hit me?" the Karbarran growled.

  Jack felt a tap on his shoulder, swung to it, then instinctively looked up. His light illuminated what looked like an assemblage of globular-shaped deposits on the cave's ceiling. Suddenly he saw one of the things move, and realized that it was some sort of free-floating, translucent sphere. Kami switched on the light strapped above his muzzlemask and shined it on another portion of the ceiling; here were more spheres, ranging from baseball size to almost four feet in diameter, all bobbing against the rock like helium balloons.

  "What the...?" Jack said, moving his head around, the beam finding more and more globes. "Jeez, the place is crawling with them."

  "Jack!" Kami shouted, training his light on something further along the corridor. Everyone turned in time to see a medium-sized globe emerge like a bubble from a conelike projection in the cave floor. Jack rushed ahead, watching the milky thing ascend, and soon found himself perched on the rim of a large shaft, roughly circular and belching up a lot of heat and noxious fumes. Kami, Lron, and Karen joined him a moment later, just as another globe was beginning to make its way up and out.

  "What a stink," Karen commented.

  Warily, Jack reached out to touch the basketball-sized orb. It was hot, but not dangerously so; what surprised him was the thing's misleading solidity.

  "Jack, don't," Karen warned him when he tried to capture it.

  But as was so often the case with Jack, the warning came too late: no sooner had he taken hold of the sphere than it shot toward the ceiling, lifting Jack off the floor. Arms

  extended over his head, he rode it up for fifteen feet before letting go and landing on the other side of the cavern in a neat tuck-and-roll that blew out the miner's light.

  "Yeah!" he whooped, as Kami helped him to his feet. It wasn't unlike the spill he had taken six months ago in Tiresia, but this time he had landed among friends.

  Karen hauled off and whacked him in the arm. "Jack, can't you just-"

  "That thing took off like a rocket! Almost pulled my arms out of the sockets."

  "Yeah, we noticed, Jack," Karen said, miffed.

  They were all staring at the ceiling now.

  Jack watched the spheres bob against one another. "Almost seems like they're looking for a way out of here, doesn't it?"

  "Yeah, just like we are," Karen and Lron said at the same time.

  In the commo chamber of his hivelike domain on Optera, the Invid Regent received a transmission from the simulagent who was representing him on Tirol. It seemed that the so-called Humans now occupying the Robotech Masters' ravaged and forlorn moon had put on quite a show-with the kind of pomp and circumstance the Regent strived to imitate. He was almost sorry he hadn't gone there himself. What with most of his remaining fleet anchored in Fantomaspace, was there really anything to fear? he asked himself. Still, the fact remained that there were too many unanswered questions. What, after all, did the would-be commander of the Human forces-this Major General Edwards-want? He had been so quick to come to the Regent's aid in that matter of the Sentinels' ship...But it bothered the Regent that the Human had yet to ask for anything in return. Did he simply wish to capitalize on the Sentinels' defeat to move himself higher in the chain of command, or were these machinations part of some larger scheme?

  In a certain sense the answer was unimportant, the Regent decided at last-providing he could make use of that factionalism that divided the Human forces.

  He regarded the image in the communications sphere, catching a look in his double's eyes that troubled him. "Is there news of Tesla?"

  "There is," the simulagent said. "It appears the Tesla was aboard the Farrago when our forces destroyed it."

  Tesla, dead, the Regent thought. It touched him in a way he would never have believed possible. But perhaps it was not true, perhaps there were survivors of that battle? He had

  yet to hear from the follow-up forces who had been sent in to resecure the planet. "Who seems to be in charge?" he asked after a moment.

  "As you surmised," the simulagent continued, "there are signs of an ongoing power struggle, principally between Edwards and a certain Dr. Lang-a scientist who did his best to charm me during the introductory sessions."

  "Is Lang the weaker one, then?"

  "No...no, this is not my belief. The scientist in fact seems to have the backing of the Humans' council-an assembly that functions as a kind of governing body."

  The Regent found the idea odd-as he had the puzzling gerontocracy the Robotech Masters had favored. He couldn't understand how twelve minds could agree on anything, when he and his queen-merely two minds-had quarreled over every decision.

  "Then, you must work on Edwards," the Regent said. "Promise your continued support in his petty struggle if it comes down to that. Tell him we'll join forces. But just make certain you learn the whereabouts of their homeworld! and how they came to possess Protoculture. It may be that they know more than we do about Zor's matrix or the Masters' destination."

  "Am I to make no demands of Edwards in return for our support, Your Highness? It hardly seems a wise move."

  The Regent stared at the sphere's image in disbelief. Was this some evil mirror he was looking into now? "Just what would you have me demand?" he asked, seething under the restraint he kept in his voice.

  "The brain, to begin with. Along with their promise to keep out of the sectors we still control."

  The Regent made a dismissive motion toward the sphere. "These things are obvious, servant. What else is on your mind?"

  "Minmei," the simulagent said without explanation.

  The Regent made an irritated sound and scowled. "What's a Minmei?"

  "The Human female that sang for my benefit."

  The Regent caught himself from staggering back from the sphere. He had only the vaguest understanding of this thing called singing, but the implication was clear enough: the simulagent was flawed in the same way that the Regis was. She had allowed herself

  to be seduced by Zor, and now this pathetic creature the Regent had sent to Tirol was falling victim to the same perverse urge! Was there no end to these injustices!

  "Hear me, grub," the Regent growled, hood puffed up like a poisonous sac. "My reach is long enough to end your life where you stand. Do my bidding, or feel the power of my wrath."

  The simulagent genuflected for the remote eye of the sphere. "My lord."

  "Now and always," the Regent said, shutting down the device.

  Rick had spent the better part of the Praxian day
inside the GMU, brainstorming with Vince and Wolff about possible ways to contact the orbiting Spherisian drive module. Onboard computers had calculated the period of the module's eccentric course, and gone on to project just how much Sekiton fuel the thing contained, how far the module could be expected to fold, and just when its newly-attained orbit around Praxis might decay. But there were still no solutions to the big questions of how to reach the module or bring it down.

  Rick left the base just before sunset, as had become his habit this past month, and joined the core group in their makeshift camp on the outskirts of the Praxian inland city. He wasn't fond of the scene, which reminded him more of a recreational campground than the billet it was supposed to be. Things were not just lax, but loose, as though everyone but him had grown to accept the situation. There was a logic to it, of course; it made no sense to walk around tied up in knots. But just the same, Rick had no patience with complacency, and he silently hoped that an idea would come to them one night while sitting around these camp-fires comparing cultural notes. So he stood in line with the rest of them now, Human and XT alike, and helped himself to the Praxian gruel the mess staff was cooking up to supplement the reconstituted meals and nutrient pills taken from the base's dwindling stores. Moreover, these sessions were the only waking hours he got to spend with Lisa-the new Lisa, that was, the liberated Lisa.