Wasteland of Flint

by Thomas Harlan

  "Mister Parker? Yes, you've got two more passengers coming into camp for your milk run. I'd appreciate it if Bandao-tzin waited for them."

  There were some disgruntled noises and Gretchen had to smile as she adjusted her hat. Despite the crestfallen attitude of the dig team, she wanted to go over their excavation herself. It had been a while since she'd had a chance to do her work, and she wasn't going to pass up the opportunity. A failed dig was almost more interesting than a successful one.

  "We'll all be going back to the ship tomorrow," she said into the comm as she stepped out into the blaze of sunlight. "No, no, we don't have to pack the whole camp. People should just take their personal baggage. Well, bedding would be a good idea. Lennox and I need to decide if we're going to continue operations here or not But that can wait a couple of days."

  Still listening to Parker and Delores bicker about the damage to shuttle two, she hiked back down into the bowl and began a long counterclockwise circuit around the excavation. People working tended to fall into patterns, and her moderately-experienced eye could see most of the dig crew here were right-handed. All of the paths tended to circle to the right, to pass around the righthand—or western—side of the obelisks. So, keeping a close eye on the ground, she moved left, peering into the trenches, inspecting the gridding, generally being as nosy as possible.

  The sun drifted with her, and the shadows in the excavation slowly lengthened. By the time she'd reached the far side of the I bowl, the trenches were almost completely in the shade. A ladder let her climb down into one of the larger cuts and Gretchen paused, seeing something odd lying in a cross-trench from the main. She stepped closer, head dropping into blessed shade. A cylinder.

  She stopped abruptly, her boots skidding in loose gravel. Her heart was pounding. "Oh, Mother Mary! Wait a minute."

  Gretchen padded forward and knelt down. A pulque can was lying in the trench, abandoned and forgotten by someone. None of our crew would be so sloppy, she hoped. Must have been one of Blake's security people. She started to pick up the litter, then paused, taking a closer look. What is that?

  Crouching down, head almost on the ground, she adjusted her lenses to higher mag and gave the can—a Mayauel from the faded rabbit on the label—a careful inspection from one end to the other. Something odd had happened to the can. The bottom, in particular, seemed to have fused with the ground, or more accurately, the ground had grown up around the underside of the can. Under hi-mag, she saw thin shoots of a stonelike substance working their way up the aluminum surface.

  "Well now, this is interesting." Gretchen took an optical probe from her vest and moved around to face the opening in the top of the can, now lying sideways. Gingerly, she adjusted the tiny wand and eased it up to the mouth hole. Closing one eye, she clicked the worklens control around to match the input from the wand. A moment later, a highly magnified, light-enhanced view of the can sprang into view on the inside of her right lens. Then, gently, she drifted the wand into the opening.

  The inside of the can was almost entirely filled with a delicate web of stonelike filaments. In the faint, reflected sunlight she could see hundreds—or thousands—of tiny cilialike fronds and a denser, hexlike structure of mineralized accretions. After taking a good look, she sat up, working a kink out of her shoulder.

  "Personal log on," she said, cueing her throat mike. "I've found a discarded pulque can in the observatory dig. Looks like it's been here a couple weeks. Close examination finds the Ephesian microbiota Sinclair and Tukhachevsky tried to explain to me this morning in evidence. Something very much like what Parker found in the shuttle engines is eating the can." Gretchen stood up, stretching. She hadn't been grubbing in the dirt in months either. Her knees were already complaining. "Pretty soon the whole can will be gone, and the result will look just like everything else here, a mineral layer like sand and rock over this ... mineral life form."

  She stared up at the slender finger of the nearest obelisk. The pale cream texture made a sharp contrast against the blue-black sky. "Lennox's team was disappointed," she said, "to find their 'observatory' made of nothing but rock and mineral deposits—not set down by the hand of the First Sun people. They've decided the whole structure is just a natural formation, a quirk of geology. I wonder.... I need to talk to Sinclair about his microbiota. There's something ... something here almost makes sense. Log off."

  Giving the Mayauel and its tiny colony a wide berth, Gretchen continued her circuit, eventually climbing out of the excavation as the sun was setting. Her suit recorded a brief moment of moderate temperature before shifting from cooling to heating. Night came swiftly out of the east, flooding across the desert plains. Without mountains or more than a high thin cloud to catch the last light of the sun, darkness was quickly upon her.

  She switched on a lamp as she trudged up the slope to the crawler. In the starlight, everything seemed very quiet and still, frosted with silvery light. Her spot danced on the ground, a pale circle of yellow sliding over rocks, boulders, the tracks of the crawler. Gretchen paused, hands on the ladder leading up into the cabin. What was that?

  The hum of the respirator masked most sounds and the wind had died with the passing of the sun. Gretchen turned off her lamp. Darkness folded around her again, then slowly lightened as her lenses adapted to the starlight. Everything seemed very still. She waited, listening.

  Only the hum of the suit fans reached her ears. Annoyed, she shut down the respirator. There was a click and then nothing. Now she could hear her heart beating, a steady thump-thump-thump. Gretchen stepped away from the crawler, taking one step, two steps down toward the bowl. Her head cocked to one side, listening.

  There was a sound. Something like the wind stirring sand and gravel, a faint tik-tik-tik. She slowly dropped into a squat on the trail, holding her breath. Now the sound was a little more distinct and she could hear—feel almost—a slow, pervasive susurration all around her. Gretchen breathed again, feeling faint. The respirator wasn't just for show, she reminded herself. Her thumb slid the control to on, and the fans started up again, and her nose tube felt cold with the slow breeze of a suitable air mixture. Gretchen stood, the faint, delicate sound drowned out by the clamor of her breath and machines, but she was smiling.

  Treading carefully on the fragile ground, she walked back to the crawler and climbed aboard.

  Inside the cabin, her mask hooked to the vehicle's reserve air bottle, she sat for a long time, listening to the busy night and watching the stars slowly wheel overhead. Her comm was shut down, the crawler's engine cold. Gretchen thought, sitting there in the darkness, a rime of frost slowly congealing on her mask around the waste gas vent, she knew how Russovsky felt.

  Am I an old-timer, then? The thought was very amusing. She was sure none of the outbackers on Mars would think so. She doubted if any of the dig scientists had stayed out past nightfall. I should go in. Parker's probably mustering a search party by now.

  Sighing, she shook her arms, sending a cascade of C02 frost to the floor of the crawler, then switched on machine power and let the big tracked vehicle start its diagnostic. A heavy rumble trembled through the seat and soles of her boots. Her respirator whined on, and the suit began to percolate heat through her limbs. "Damn!" Stabbing pains cramped her arms and legs. "Too cold to sit here."

  Ten minutes later, she threw the Armadillo into gear and rumbled off down the road, the yellow headlights of the big tank dancing across the rutted track, a slow heavy cloud of dust rising behind. In the darkness, swathes of minute, glittering lights flared for a moment as the cloud of water vapor settled onto the desert floor, then faded as the windfall of energy from the sky was consumed.

  ABOARD THE PALENQUE

  Hummingbird swung onto the bridge of the Company spacecraft and paused, one hand on the railing leading up to the captain's command station. There was no threat-well, no gleaming banks of combat monitors, no subdued lighting or perfect climate control. Instead, bights of ratty wire and conduit hung from open panels i
n the overhead, there was an acrid, burnt smell in the air, and a racket of chattering comm feeds hissed from the communications station. Most of the control panels were dark and the deck had an uneven, mottled quality.

  Lieutenant Isoroku started to say something, but the tlamatinime shook his head slightly.

  "I've seen a damaged ship before, Sho-sa," he said quietly. His interest fixed on a panoramic view of the planet below—a sharp dun-red crescent silhouetted against ebon night, with the peaks of the Escarpment beginning to glow in the morning sun. Somewhere down there, Russovsky found a book and a weapon—not so unalike. And where there is one, there will be others. . ..

  Hummingbird pushed himself to the main comm panel, scarred fingers brushing over the controls. "How awake is main comp—"

  "Hsst! Who are you, stranger?" A sharp, inhuman voice cut across the tlamatinime's question. "Stand away from my station!"

  Hummingbird turned and found the brawny shape of Isoroku blocking the movement of the Hesht female onto the bridge. The engineer's back was tense, though nothing in comparison to the slitted eyes and flattened ear-tufts of the alien. Enraged,the Hesht loomed over the human, her long arms poised to slam he engineer out of the way.

  "I am Green Hummingbird," the Méxica said, putting a warning hand on Isoroku's shoulder. His voice was very firm and he met Magdalena's eyes squarely. "I am an Imperial Officer from the Cornuelle. There is no cause for territorial dispute, ss'shuma Magdalena. Your pride hunts for mine, and I have need of your place-of-watching."

  Magdalena bared her teeth, circling through the darkened, inactive navigator's station, glittering nails digging into the backs of the seats to propel herself along. "You may be queens-pride, old crow, but you are not welcome here! Look, if you must, but keep your dirty paws to yourself."

  Hummingbird felt a flash of irritation—one he suppressed before the emotion could color his face or make him react—and gave Isoroku a little push. "My thanks, Isoroku-san. I will comm if I have need of anything."

  The engineer, still watching Magdalena with a wary eye, made a sharp, properly polite bow and swam off down the access tube. The Hesht watched him go with undiluted, unfeigned hatred burning in her yellow eyes. The claws of her right hand slipped reflexively out of bony sheaths, then retracted. Hummingbird kicked away from the deck and drifted into her direct line of sight.

  "Sho-sa Isoroku is not one of your hunting-pride," he said, catching her attention. "He takes food from the kill of Hadeishi, who drinks from my watering holes. Do you understand me. Ss'hi'a?”

  Magdalena bristled at the word, black lips curling away from gleaming white teeth. "I am not a child! Insult me again, monkey, and—"

  "You will do what?" Hummingbird drifted closer, ignoring the bared claws. Startled at his boldness, Magdalena backed up. "You will lose your temper? Attack me, without the pack-leader's permission? Have your entire pride seized and imprisoned, this ship-den impounded by the Imperial Navy?"

  The Hesht flinched as if struck, then her anger surged, a deep rumbling in the back of her throat. Hummingbird refused to move, refused to show any reaction at all. Magdalena stood poised and stiff for a moment, then suddenly gave ground. Her tail was twitching, both ears flat against the long angular skull. "What... what do you want?"

  "A civil reception," Hummingbird said, testily. "Where is Anderssen-tzin? On the planet?"

  "Yes," Magdalena hissed, twitching from head to toe. She swung gracefully over into the comm station seat, one leg bracing against the command panel. "She's just returned to the base camp."

  "And the other scientists? Where are they?" Hummingbird took care to remain standing, so he could look down on the Hesht from at least a tiny height. The bitter smell of tension a the air was beginning to abate, but he did not wish to give up any advantage.

  Magdalena pointed sullenly at a v-pane showing orbital tracks, the ring of satellites and various other objects in near-Ephesian space. "Bandao-tzin is carrying them in shuttle one; they will be docking here in an hour and fifty minutes. The other shuttle is still groundside."

  "All of the scientists? What about the security team?" Hummingbird chanted the names of the men and women on the surface—a quick mnemonic to remind him of their names, faces, specialties—under his breath.

  "Not all." Magdalena's eyes narrowed again, yellow-amber wedges reflecting the intermittent glow of the instrument panels. "Our stray sister is still lost and Gretchen is hunting planet-side until tomorrow. Blake and Parker and Fuentes are with her."

  "Russovsky." Hummingbird nodded, remembering, and then turned a sharp eye on the Hesht. "You've not made contact with her by comm? Her ultralight is fully equipped, by my memory."

  "She does not answer. Radar scans have not found her. The planet is large—perhaps you should go look yourself." Magdalena yawned derisively, showing a forest of razor-sharp teeth. "I am looking, but our search is slowed by the damage suffered by the Palenque. Maybe your pride helps, if you want to catch this stray kupil? Hadeishi's ship has excellent eyes."

  Hummingbird did not respond. He was watching the time-to-dock estimate for shuttle one and considering which path was swiftest to his goal. Russovsky could lead us to her discovery site immediately, he thought. But these others will have seen, done things on the planet as well. They are often jealous creatures—they may have withheld knowledge from one another, even from their public logs and records. He sighed, estimating the time he would need to interrogate each of the macehualli technicians. Ah, but the tenacious Anderssen will want to find Russovsky for herself. Let us not duplicate our efforts. Hummingbird looked up, catching the Hesht making an insulting face.

  I am lair-guest, for a time, ss'shuma." He made a pointing motion with his nose. "I will not disturb your efforts to repair the ship. Good day." With that, he sprang easily into the mouth of the access tube and then swam down into the main passage. Behind him, there was a spitting hiss, but nothing so loud or obvious he needed to take notice.

  Hummingbird shook his head, coming to light at the entry-way to the hab ring. "A waste of time," he said to himself, eyeing the various cabin doors. Some of the locks were dimly lit with the closed hand of a privacy lock, others were entirely dark. But I am impatient, he realized, feeling the queer, nibbling attraction of the cylinder and its contents. This is not good.

  He found an unused cabin and tapped on his comm. "Sergeant Fitzsimmons? Yes, this is Hummingbird. I have some things by the number one airlock. Can you bring them to ..." He read out the cabin number, then set about testing the lights, shower, refresher. Most things seemed to be working. The common, everyday motions served to settle his nerves.

  A particularly disturbing thought had occurred to him.

  What, he mused, if the planet itself is a lure? So obviously-shaped, marked with the tread of the First Sun people... any spacefaring race would light here and be intrigued. Then—scattered about, perhaps the cylinders are only one such bait—some dangerous items, some helpful devices. These things have happened before. But is the trap here on Ephesus, or are we picking up marker dye to lead something homeward?

  By the time Fitzsimmons and Deckard arrived with his baggage—and he'd brought everything from the Cornuelle save the little shrine to the Lady of Tepeyac—Hummingbird had disassembled the in-cabin comm panel and was wiring the data conduit to take his portable comps.

  "Master Hummingbird?" The sergeant paused in the doorway, surprised to find the wizened old man surrounded by a cloud of components and glassite panels. "Do you need help? I can call Iso—"

  "No, thank you." Hummingbird looked up, measuring the two men with a critical eye. He was not displeased with what he saw. Even aboard this ship, the Marines were carrying their weapons and tools, within a moment's notice of combat readiness. "Put those things there, yes, against the wall."

  Hummingbird watched them move, and was pleased to see they were entirely at home in the z-g environment of the ship. Well trained, he thought. A fine pair of tools. They should not be wa
sted.

  "Tomorrow morning," the tlamatinime said, drawing their attention. "You'll go down to the planet in shuttle one. There is—if you had not heard—a scientist missing from the team. A woman named Russovsky. Find and secure this woman and return her—alive, unharmed—to the ship."

  "Aye, sir." Fitzsimmons seemed startled, pleased and concerned all at once. "With civilian help, or without?"

  "Make use of their pilots," Hummingbird said. "Anderssen will be eager to find her as well. By tomorrow night, I want everyone off the planet with a minimum of fuss."

  The sergeant nodded sharply, then spun backward out of the door. Deckard followed, and both men shot away down the curving hallway of the hab ring. Hummingbird closed the door, then pressed the small round shape of a privacy bomb against the wall. The device shivered, then winked blue. The tlamatinime felt his skin crawl, but the sensation of being watched faded away.

  "Curious, curious cats," he said softly, easing himself back into the cocoon of comp parts and conduit feeds. "Out of my house..."

  "I'm a pap-sucking kitten, am I?" Magdalena's claw adjusted a filter control minutely. A jittery, scrambled image of the Méxica nauallis flickered, jumped, then cleared. The comm panel on the bridge of the Palenque was alive with v-panes, showing dozens of feeds from all over the ship, from Fitzsimmons and Deckard's z-suits, even from Isoroku's navy workrig. The Hesht bared all her teeth, then lashed her tail twice before settling down into the shockchair. "A hunter sees, a kit hides. Now, what are you doing, little bird?"

  As it happened, Hummingbird was still assembling his comps, though Magdalena found the specifics of his equipment very interesting. Still, he was likely to be busy for a few hours. The Hesht turned her attention to the two Marines. After watching them for a few moments, her attention wandered. Her own kind might have amused her for hours, but these slick, shiny pink things ... her claw idled over a glyph, then tapped out a save-for-later. "Males getting ready for the hunt. Hrrrr... boring. But hunt-sister might like to see. Hmm dee hmm."