3xT

by Harry Turtledove

  The viewscreen had been dark all through the journey; in hyperdrive, what was there to see? It was dark still, but dark in a different way, dark with the velvety blackness of space. A couple of stars gleamed, like tiny jewels set on the velvet.

  Greenberg and Jennifer stared at each other. "Status report!" he snapped.

  "Ship has returned to normal space," the computer answered. "Reason unknown."

  They looked at each other again, this time fearfully. If they couldn't get back into hyperdrive, the way home was laser driver, light-sail, and frozen sleep. Inside human space, that was feasible; every human planet listened for rescue beacons and maintained rescue ships. Starting out from somewhere in the middle of the Foitani sphere, though, they could travel for ten thousand years before they ever got back to the edge of human space.

  "Condition of hyperdrive engine?" Greenberg said urgently.

  After a moment, the computer reported, "All systems appear to be performing satisfactorily. The hyperdrive, however, is not functional."

  Greenberg made hair-tearing gestures. Jennifer stifled a nervous laugh—she wondered if he'd really pulled his hair before he went bald. Just then, what looked like a supernova blossomed in the viewscreen. Jennifer threw up her hands to protect her eyes. "Radiation!" the computer screeched. "Protective screens—" There was a pause of several seconds. "—holding."

  The flat voice of a translator came from the comm speaker. "Foitani ship Horzefalus Kwef to human ship Harold Meeker. You may proceed in normal operation."

  "First tell us what the hell just happened," Greenberg said. His own voice was shaky; Jennifer blamed him not at all.

  "We have successfully destroyed a hyperdrive trap that dates from the days of the Great Ones. As soon as a ship is forcibly returned to normal space, a normal-space missile left behind in the area homes on it. That missile is now detonated. You may proceed."

  For the third time in a couple of minutes, Jennifer and Greenberg stared at each other. She was not surprised that he found words first: "There's no way you can pull a ship straight out of hyperdrive like that!"

  "On the contrary," the Foitan aboard Horzefalus Kwef answered, "there is a way. You have just seen it demonstrated. Our science has not succeeded in reconstructing what that way is. I gather from what I infer to be your surprise that human science has not either. But the Great Ones knew. I tell you once more, you may proceed. Failure to do so will be construed as lack of good faith."

  "We're going, we're going," Greenberg said. He gave the computer the necessary orders. The Harold Meeker had no trouble returning to hyperdrive. Greenberg gaped at the blank black viewscreen and shook his head. He spoke to the computer again. "Save multiple copies of all data pertaining to this incident."

  "It shall be done," the computer said.

  Jennifer said, "Just knowing that a hyperdrive trap is possible is going to drive human engineers crazy for years. Nobody's ever even imagined such a thing. And you'll have the only tapes of one in action." The Harold Meeker was his ship; they were his tapes. Trading Guild regs spelled that out in words of one syllable; she was just a passenger here.

  "We'll have," he corrected. "I wouldn't try to go all regulation on you. You wouldn't be in this mess if it weren't for me. And besides . . . those tapes have enough money in them for a lot more than two people."

  "You don't have to do that," she said. "I didn't go into trading for the money. And all the same, I'm a long way from broke."

  "You're also a long way from home, and that's my fault. Computer, log that any profits from tapes of the hyperdrive trap will be divided equally between journeyman trader Jennifer Logan and me."

  "Logged," the computer said.

  Jennifer saw that any further protest would be worse than useless. "Thank you, Bernard."

  He brushed that aside. "Let's just see if we can get back to human space to turn the tapes into money. Right now, I have to say that's rather less than obvious."

  Some people would not have been generous at all. That wouldn't have bothered Jennifer; the tapes belonged to Greenberg because he was shipmaster. Some people would have been generous and then expected something—probably a lot—in return. Very few people were like Bernard Greenberg, to be generous and then act as if nothing had happened. She thought that was wonderful, and knew he wouldn't want her to say so.

  The rest of the trip to Gilver was uneventful. The only misfortune that took place was running out of human-style food and having to go over to Foitani rations. Jennifer crunched away at her kibbles with a singular lack of enthusiasm. "No, a plural lack of enthusiasm," she said a few meals later, "because there are lots of ways I don't like them."

  Greenberg answered with a snort. Wordplay wasn't one of his virtues, or vices. People had been arguing about that since the days of Middle English, and longer. Puns were part of why Jennifer enjoyed Middle English science fiction in the original; Robinson, among others, was untranslatable into Spanglish because of them.

  The hours followed each other, as hours have a way of doing. At last the computer announced that the Harold Meeker had reached Gilver's star system. The viewscreen went from blank blackness to velvety blackness; Gilver's sun blazed in the center of it. Gilver itself, a bright blue-green spark, shone in one corner. The computer swung the ship and boosted toward the planet on normal-space drive.

  Alarms went off. "Missiles incoming!" the computer shouted. "Firing laser driver. Many hostile targets, converging on ship from many directions. Maneuvering to position laser driver. Firing . . . Maneuvering . . ."

  "Human ship Harold Meeker to Horzefalus Kwef," Greenberg called urgently. "What the bloody hell is going on? I thought you people said Gilver was a dead world except for the Great stinking Unknown. Where are all these ancient missiles from the time of the Great Ones coming from?"

  While he and Jennifer waited for an answer, the ship's weaponry blasted three missiles. But more bored in. Then those, too, began winking off the screen, some just vanishing, others exploding in spheres of radioactive fire. Jennifer found herself wondering about the Harold Meeker's shielding and wishing she were wearing something more protective than thin synthetic underwear and cotton coveralls cut down to fit her. A lead suit of mail might have been nice.

  At last the Horzefalus Kwef deigned to reply. "Human ship, these missiles are not of Great One manufacture. We are under attack by elements of a fleet from the Foitani planet Rof Golan. These Foitani are vicious and treacherous by nature. They must somehow have stolen information that led them to Gilver. We shall endeavor to protect your feeble ship as well as—" The transmission cut off.

  "Did they get hit?" Jennifer asked. She half hoped the answer would be yes. The Horzefalus Kwef might be protecting them from the Rof Golani ships, but if it was gone they could try to head back to human space. The Foitani electronics aboard gave them some chance of making it in one piece.

  But after checking the telltales, Greenberg said, "No, they're still there. The other ships are jamming their radio traffic. There they go, down toward the surface of the planet. I think we'd better follow them."

  Regretfully, Jennifer decided he was right. The screen and radar plot showed explosions and missiles all around the ship. The Harold Meeker was not built for war. The Rof Golani spacecraft plainly were; they had more acceleration and maneuverability than a peaceful ship would ever need. By the way it performed, Horzefalus Kwef seemed a match for them. Staying close to it seemed the best bet for survival.

  Unintelligible words came from the speaker: a Foitani voice, but not one always calm and self-contained like those of the Foitani from Odern. This one screeched and cried and yelled. "What do you suppose he's saying?" Jennifer asked.

  "Nothing we want to hear, and you can bet on that," Greenberg answered. He studied the radar plot. "There goes one of the bastards! And that wasn't a missile from Horzefalus Kwef, either. Our paranoid friends' ground installations have paid off after all."

  "They certainly don't think much of other Foitan
i, do they?" Jennifer agreed. "And they do think this Great Unknown thing is worth protecting. They didn't want to get caught flat-footed if another Foitani world somehow found out about Gilver."

  "Somebody has, all right," Greenberg said.

  The viewscreen blazed white. Alarms yammered, then slowly quieted. "We cannot sustain another hit so close without serious damage," the computer warned. A moment later, it added, "Entering atmosphere."

  Atmospheric fliers swarmed up from the base on Gilver. With the fight so close to the planet, they were of some use against spacecraft. Jennifer found herself cheering when one of the attacking ships blew up in a burst of supernova brilliance. She stopped all at once, surprised and a little angry at herself. "I never thought I'd be yelling for the miserable folk who kidnapped me," she said.

  "When they're helping to save your one and only personal neck, that does give you a different perspective," Greenberg answered.

  "So it does," she said, glad he understood and also impressed that he could preserve his wry slant on things when they might turn to radioactive incandescence in the next instant.

  Horzefalus Kwef managed to get a signal through. "Human ship Harold Meeker, land between the two westernmost missile emplacements at our base. Dive below us now; we will provide additional cover for you."

  Deceleration compensators whined softly to themselves as the computer guided the Harold Meeker toward the designated landing site. The base was on the night side of Gilver. Not too far away, a large circle of ground was illuminated bright as day; at its center, the white tower that was the heart of the Great Unknown stabbed outward toward the stars.

  Jennifer caught her breath at the beauty of the scene. She knew then that the esthetic sense of Odern's Foitani was different from her own, and also, she was suddenly sure, from that of their ancient ancestors. None of the pictures in their data base had been taken at night.

  "Landing," the computer announced. "Recommend you do not leave the ship at the present time. The risk of radiation exposure outside appears significant."

  "Did you program it for understatement?" Jennifer asked. Greenberg chuckled softly and shook his head.

  Having nothing else to do, they spent their first hour on Gilver making love. Just as they were hurrying toward the end, a missile made a ground hit close enough to shake the ship. Jennifer laughed softly.

  "What is it?" Greenberg gasped above her.

  "Stupid twentieth-century joke," she answered, clutching him to her. "Did the earth move for you, too?" Then, for a while that could never be long enough, all speech left her.

  Afterward, as he was dressing, Greenberg said, "Now I know you were really meant to be a scholar and not a trader."

  "Why, Bernard?"

  "Because who but a born scholar would come up with thousand-year-old jokes at a time like that? And thousand-year-old stupid jokes—you were right."

  "I told you as much aboard the Flying Festoon. You didn't believe me then; I guess that's why you upgraded me from apprentice to journeyman."

  "Partly I didn't believe you, I suppose. But there was more to it than that. You showed me you were a good trader. You got done what needed doing. You didn't seem to do it the way anybody else would, but it works for you, and that's the only thing that counts in the long run."

  "I was using ancient literature as my data base instead of traders' manuals. No wonder things I tried looked strange to you."

  "That's not all of what I meant, either," he said. "Most traders—just about all traders—push hard at everything they do. Pushing is part of being a trader. You're not like that. You're more reserved, shy almost. You were shy then—less so now, I think. But you still got a lot of business done."

  "It's how I am," Jennifer said.

  "I like how you are." His eyes softened as he smiled at her.

  The communicator had developed a way of spoiling tender moments, almost as if it were a baby that resented anyone else's getting attention. It did not break the pattern now. "Horzefalus Kwef to human ship Harold Meeker. We have beaten the Rof Golani pirates away. You may emerge and join our scientific team."

  "Then again, we may not," Jennifer said, irked at getting interrupted yet again.

  The communicator was silent only a moment. Then the Foitan on the other end said, "Our weapons are trained on you. You will emerge and join our scientific team."

  This time, the look Greenberg shot Jennifer was reproachful. She felt suitably reproached; she'd known since her first contact with the species that the Foitani were humorless. Greenberg said, "Thank you, Horzefalus Kwef. Let us put on our suits, if you don't mind—the computer says it's 'hot' out there. Then we will emerge and join your scientific team." Sighing, he walked over to the air lock. Sighing even louder, Jennifer followed.

  VI

  The planet Gilver had obviously had little to recommend it even before the Foitani from Rof Golan attacked. Back in what on Earth was still the Pleistocene, the Foitani had done a much more thorough job on it during their Suicide Wars. They'd eliminated their own species from the planet, and come too bloody close to destroying the whole ecosystem. Life still clung to Gilver. It no longer thrived there.

  Jennifer found depressing a landscape that showed more slagged desert than forest and grassland. When she looked east rather than west, though, she looked toward a landscape with no life at all: the precinct surrounding the Great Unknown was sterile as an operating theater. The column at the heart of the Great Unknown speared the sky, though the research facility of the Foitani from Odern was more than fifteen kilometers away. That seemed to be far enough to keep the big, blue aliens safe from the hideous insanity that plagued them closer to the gleaming white tower. Their instruments wandered the precinct of the Great Unknown and probed what they could; the Foitani themselves were barred.

  "The instruments don't pick up any too much, either," Jennifer complained.

  Aissur Aissur Rus said, "If instruments provided the data we need, we would not have been required to requisition your services."

  She gave the Foitan reluctant credit for not being mealy-mouthed, but said, "If I'm going to do you any good at all"—and if I'm ever going to get out of here, she added mentally—"I'll have to examine your Great Unknown for myself."

  "By all means," Aissur Aissur Rus said. "The human Bernard is already proficient with our ground vehicles. Before you enter the precinct of the Great Unknown, you would be wise to acquire a similar proficiency. Bear in mind that, should difficulty arise, you will have to effect your own rescue, as we shall be unable to come to your aid."

  She had to admit that made sense. The ground vehicle proved simple to operate. It was a battery-powered sledge, tracked for good ground-crossing capability, and steered with a tiller. The size of the tiller was her only problem; she had to stand up to shift it from side to side.

  She and Greenberg rode separate sledges into the area surrounding the tall, white pillar. The Foitani had not argued about that; they believed in redundancy, too. The vehicles purred forward side by side.

  The radiation level had gone down in a hurry; the Foitani from Rof Golan had thrown neutron bombs, no doubt to make their own planned landing easier. Jennifer wasn't sorry it hadn't worked. One set of Foitani at a time was plenty.

  After they'd gone four or five kilometers, she said, "We have more privacy here than we did on the Harold Meeker. Whatever we do, the Foitani aren't going to come after us to stop us."

  "True enough," Greenberg said, "but what do you want to bet these chassis have explosives in them along with the motors?"

  She thought it over. "You own a nasty, suspicious mind, and I've no doubt whatever that you're right."

  They rode on. The sledges had one forward speed, slow, and one reverse speed, slower. Eventually they reached the beginning of one of the colonnaded paths that led inward to the Great Unknown's central column. The path, of gleaming gray stone, was as fresh as if it had been set in place the day before. Not even a speck of dust marred its surface. Howe
ver the Great Ones had managed that, Jennifer wished her kitchen floor were equipped with a like effect.

  The columns that supported the roof overhead gradually grew taller and thicker as they approached the central tower. The effect went from impressive to ponderous to overwhelming. Jennifer did not think that was merely because she was smaller than a Foitan. How any living creature could have felt anything but antlike on that journey was beyond her.

  She said, "I don't like this. Why would the old-time Foitani want to make themselves into midgets? I've seen pictures of our own old monumental architecture—the pyramids of Egypt, the freeways of Los Angeles—but none of it, not even the pyramids, sets out to deliberately minimize observers the way this thing does."

  "The stuff you're talking about was done in low-tech days," Greenberg said. "I suppose the effects were worked out empirically, too—on the order of, it's big, so it must be impressive. The thing to remember about the old-time Foitani is, they knew exactly what they were doing. They had all our modern building techniques and then some, and they were able to figure out just how they wanted this thing to look, too. And if it works on us, just think what it does to their descendants."

  Jennifer thought about the tapes she'd seen, then quickly shook her head. She preferred not to recall the drooling, mindless Foitani who had come to the Great Unknown. She tried to imagine instead what the colonnade might have been used for, back in the days of the great Foitani empire. She pictured hundreds of thousands of big, blue aliens triumphantly marching toward the column, and hundreds of thousands more standing on either side of the path and cheering.

  That wasn't so bad. Then, though, her imagination went another step, as the imagination has a habit of doing. She pictured the hundreds of thousands of triumphal Foitani herding along even more hundreds of thousands of dejected, conquered aliens of other races. She pictured those other aliens going into the base of that clean, gleaming, kilometer-high column and never coming out again.