Acorna's Triumph

by Anne McCaffrey

  Grimalkin leaped down from Vaanye’s shoulder. Immediately, the wretched ship’s cat landed on him with all talons extended, sharp fangs sinking into his head.

  (Scum-sucking phony, I’ve had enough of you!) RK growled, rolling over with him to try to get at Grimalkin’s underside. (I knew you were nothing but a flea-bitten mite-eared, worm-tailed moggy from the first time I saw you.)

  (That’s no way to treat one of your ancestors,) Grimalkin squawled in protest. (What is it with you anyway? You’re a cat, I’m a cat, what’s the problem?)

  (This is my turf, and those people you’ve been upsetting are my people. Give them back nyow or I’ll gut you and go fishing with your entrails.)

  RK’s back claws gouged hunks out of Grimalkin’s hindquarters. The ship’s cat twisted to bring himself onto Grimalkin’s exposed belly.

  Grimalkin changed back to his Linyaari form.

  RK still clung to him.

  Grimalkin batted at him ineffectually with both his hands, screeching, “Someone get this monster off me!”

  Someone did. “Cut it out, you fuzz-butted fraud. Let him alone!” Becker thundered as he pried RK’s claws loose.

  “Thank you,” Grimalkin said, trying to regain his dignity. Unfortunately, his dignity was in shreds, along with several other parts of him. “I don’t know what he has against me.”

  “I do. And I was talking to you, not RK. What did you do with Aari and Acorna?”

  Grimalkin ignored him and backed up to Vaanye. “Please. I am in pain. Heal me.”

  “Please answer Captain Becker first,” Vaanye said.

  “But you were with me. You know they’re fine.”

  “I did not see where we were. You changed times so rapidly I saw nothing except that they were gone, and you and I returned here. I cannot believe you continue to be so devious and secretive when the three of us just risked our lives and worse to go back to face the Khleevi and save you.”

  “Devious? Secretive? Me? I was simply rewarding my dear friends by taking them somewhere beautiful and peaceful where they could finally be alone together and enjoy each other before returning to yet another disaster.” He motioned to the lines of people from ships to the cave entrance, the pumps, the mud, and the air of urgency. “I have been trying to help them all along, and for my trouble have received only distrust and anger. Not from you, of course, Vaanye. At least, not until now. I am an empath. I suffer when you suffer. I suffered when they suffered. When this crisis is done, I will fetch them back. Meanwhile, they have earned a little holo day, don’t you think?”

  Vaanye sighed, misunderstanding as Grimalkin had figured he would. “Yes, yes, of course they have. It’s just that Feriila and I have had so little time with Khornya ourselves. But what time we’ve had we owe to you. We can be patient a bit longer.” His posture had relaxed, and his voice softened, but it hardened one more time as he said, “Just so they return as you say they will. Meanwhile, I think it might be a good idea if I keep the timing device for you, in case you are tempted to disappear again.”

  “Good thinking, Acorna’s Dad,” Becker said. He stood with his feet slightly apart, his fists balled at his sides as if he wished they were holding wrenches, crowbars, or other blunt and weighty objects capable of inducing trauma.

  “Very well,” Grimalkin said, and removed the timer from his neck, where it rested when he was in cat form and could be programmed with touches from his hind foot. As he feinted with it toward Vaanye, he pressed the preprogrammed tab, then popped the device back around his own wrist. He had to laugh at the looks on their faces just before they vanished from his timescape.

  They’d probably accuse him of deviousness again, but he was only thinking of everyone’s greater good. He could not surrender his timer. He had events to arrange, histories to shape, fate to engineer. If people were occasionally resentful of his power, it was because their understanding of the cosmos was too limited to encompass an understanding of his responsibilities.

  Like the one he must discharge now, knowing even as he did so that somehow or other it was bound to cause him more trouble.

  He arrived at the healing center three days after he deposited Aari and Acorna in the holo suite there. The center was seldom used, now that the unicorns were on Vhiliinyar and could so readily heal any injuries or illnesses. The holo suite was relatively new, and spacious enough that occupants could go for a romantic walk and never guess they were within a single room. Before he rescued Aari the first time, he had seen to it that the suite was especially tailored to contemporary Linyaari tastes. Whether it was intuition, or a memory from time he had spent in the future, he had known even then that the suite would be needed, though not exactly how or why.

  The pavilion had appointments their people found comfortable. The grasses were those they favored. The climate was carefully controlled to be pleasant and relaxing. Rain would patter down only when the occupants were near enough to the pavilion to enjoy a few refreshing drops before seeking shelter. Dramatic storms occurred only while the occupants were snug inside the pavilion. It was always twilight, or dawn, when the world was at its most beautiful, and not incidentally, at its most indistinct. Even the temperature of the stream was chosen with Linyaari pleasure in mind.

  It turned out to be the perfect place for—what had the humans called it? A honeymoon. This was the perfect place for their honeymoon, where Aari’s and Acorna’s union would be repeatedly consummated and where they could bond in peace.

  Grimalkin stopped by his own den, which changed the spots and stripes of its upholstery, floor, and wall coverings in slow rotation, a cosmic cat joke.

  He checked the observation screen and saw that within the suite it was night. Aari and Acorna slept tangled together in each other’s arms. He gulped, feeling an unfamiliar ache in his upper thorax. They were very beautiful together. Maybe even more beautiful than they were separately.

  He checked the readings from the suite’s internal monitors. What they told him was more definitive than he had hoped or imagined. It was a perfect opportunity. Much more perfect than what he had planned to do. Yet it also made him sad. They would never know, of course. There was no need for them ever to know, and what they didn’t know could not hurt them. And it would be beneficial to the project, the race, and ultimately the universe. He was, of course, overjoyed to be the bearer of such a gift.

  He wished he did not have to—betray was rather a loaded word, wasn’t it? Trick, then. He wished he did not have to trick them again. But he did.

  And he would only feel worse the longer he delayed, so, gathering what he needed, he entered the holo suite.

  It was time.

  Nineteen

  Acorna awoke quickly, though she felt uncommonly drowsy and stiff. But she was aware, even before her eyes opened, that they were no longer alone. Beside her, Aari sat straight up.

  “Grimalkin,” they said together.

  “Hello, lovebirds!” he said, looking even more smug than usual. Becker would say he had that “cat who swallowed the canary” look. Grimalkin was in cat-man form now, standing on two feet but wearing an orange-and-cream-striped tail, an inhuman amount of body fur in the same colors, and ears on top of his head, twitching in all directions. Though his face was more or less human, his pupils were unnaturally wide and round in the dim light of the pavilion, and his eyes glittered with the nocturnal brightness of a cat’s. The mustache under his human nose was composed of very long individual whiskers that drooped like the mustache of one of those Fu Manchu villains in old vids.

  “I hope you have all of that out of your systems and are ready to rejoin your people. I have other things to do than ferry you around, you know.”

  “Yes,” Aari said lazily. “Now that you’re alive and away from the torture machine to do them, I’m sure you do.”

  “Don’t think I’m not grateful,” Grimalkin said in a way that told Acorna that although he thought he ought to be grateful, the cat creature could not quite get his mind aroun
d the concept. “This little vacation was in part my way of thanking you.”

  “What was the other part?” Acorna asked, instantly suspicious.

  Grimalkin’s eyes grew even bigger and filled with kittenish innocence. He was as difficult to read as ever. But he hesitated slightly before answering, “Why, to allow you to rest, of course. Both of you were completely exhausted from your travels, and I felt somewhat responsible…”

  “You were responsible,” they said in unison.

  “Hmph, I said somewhat. Nothing interesting was happening in your usual haunts…”

  “Except for floods and mass destruction,” Acorna said. “But I don’t suppose a little thing like that concerns you.”

  “All of that is under control. Don’t you think there are others who can deal with that sort of problem? And you two didn’t need to take on any more trouble just now. You needed to relax. So I brought you here.”

  “Where—or should I say when—is here exactly?” Aari asked.

  “Never mind that. It is time for you to go back to your dreary workaday existences.”

  He grabbed their hands, but first Acorna snatched up their shipsuits and tossed one to Aari. He looked regretfully at it. The Linyaari had no moral issues or societal mores concerning public nudity, but Acorna had been raised by humans. She had her share of rules about clothing. She pulled her suit on before taking Grimalkin’s hand. Aari shrugged resignedly and did likewise.

  One moment they were inside the pavilion holding Grimalkin’s hands and the next they were in the field outside the cave entrance. But Grimalkin was gone.

  They stood beside the Condor, watching the emergency crews remove their flood control equipment. Feriila ran up to greet them. “Khornya! Aari, you’re back. I will let Vaanye know. We have so been looking forward to spending time with you! Vaanye is in the old city inspecting the damage to the time device.”

  Behind them, the robolift descended, and Becker yelled, “Hey, kids! Good to see you finally got out of the sack and came back to work!”

  RK and Maak were with him. Feriila disappeared into the tunnel. Acorna hugged Becker and lifted RK for a kiss, but the cat immediately squirmed to be released. Maak, his horn modification attached to his forehead, patted her carefully on the shoulder and, just as carefully, shook hands with Aari.

  “I’m not even going to ask what you’ve been up to,” Becker said, winking at them, “but we have been real busy here. The flood messed up a lot of the old city. I have some of the most interesting salvage of my career aboard now. Can’t wait to get out of here and find me some buyers. It’s the durndest stuff you ever saw. And I can pack a lot of it aboard because its molecules are so loosely bonded it keeps changing shapes all the time. I literally was able to fit an entire hospital building into Bay 7.”

  “But the waters have receded?” Acorna asked.

  “Not really. We pumped them up and dumped them into the rivers and what’s left up here of the sea. The surface still needs the water. There’s an artesian well down there underneath the time device apparently. The people who used to live there regulated the flow, but the Khleevi you brought back with you busted the regulator. Your dad and some of the other engineers were able to fix that, but so far, they say it looks as if the time machine itself is toast.”

  (Our people have made remarkable strides in trusting this outsider at least,) Aari said. (Remember when they didn’t want him to step onto the surface of narhii-Vhiliinyar?)

  (Yes, and even when the Council decided he could be permitted to land here in an emergency, at first he couldn’t leave the Condor, then he wasn’t to know about the ancient city or the time device.)

  (Perhaps we should have an artificial horn made for him for his natal day?) Aari suggested playfully.

  (Don’t mention that aloud, or he’ll want one,) Acorna said, smiling.

  Becker looked from one of them to the other, grinning uncertainly. “Okay, what are you two thinking at each other? It’s about me, right?”

  “We can’t tell you,” Acorna said. “It’s a surprise.”

  “Oh!” he huffed into his mustache. “Really. Well, okay, then.”

  They strolled toward the tunnel mouth as they talked, reaching it just as Vaanye and Feriila arrived, followed closely by Laarye and Maati.

  Vaanye embraced them both. “I confess I was a little worried about you two being somewhere known only to Grimalkin.” He spoke aloud for the sake of Becker and Maak, and the others followed suit.

  “We worried about it, too,” Aari said, putting his arm around Acorna’s shoulders. “But we finally resigned ourselves to the inevitable and made the best of it. Fortunately for us, for a change Grimalkin proved trustworthy and came to get us.”

  “I still don’t trust him,” Maati said. “He’s a very shifty kitty.”

  “But he has done great good along with all his tricks,” Laarye argued. “We are all back together again because of him. And not dead. I certainly count that as a positive development.”

  “True,” Maati said. “But he only did it because it suited him to do so while he was doing something else. Still, I’m glad. I know I should feel grateful to him, but I guess I’m still waiting to see what else he’s up to.”

  “I suggest we forget about Grimalkin and what he might do and concentrate on the problems we currently have at hand,” Vaanye said. “Khornya, Aari, you two are more familiar with the time device than any of us. Perhaps you would care to examine the damage the Khleevi inflicted yourselves and make some recommendations?”

  “I, too, would like to see it,” Maak said. “As a fellow device, in a manner of speaking, I might have some helpful suggestions. Before the Khleevi returned with our friends, I collected and processed considerable data about the mechanism. It may help me analyze its operation and participate in its possible repair.”

  Becker accompanied them since he needed to pack up some more salvage. “Pretty nice of them to give me the concession on all this stuff they’re tossing out, seeing as how I didn’t even know the city was there until a few weeks ago.”

  As they slipped and slid down the passageway’s mud-slicked rock floor, he remarked, “This is the cleanest-smelling flood site it has ever been my honor to visit. No smell of mold, no old sewage mixed with the water. The Linyaari horns took care of all that, I guess. The place is pretty well wrecked, of course. But instead of being a filthy mess, this place just looks like it got put through a too-enthusiastic rinse cycle.”

  Acorna saw that Becker was correct when they traversed the freshly washed tunnel. She was glad to see none of the cave’s paintings had been damaged. Instead, they were brighter than ever, gleaming as though they had just been painted. Small pools of water glistening in the indentations of the cave’s floor were the only indication the place had been flooded.

  The time device building was the worse for wear—though the damage seemed to be from the struggling Khleevi rather than the floodwaters. The walls no longer lit when they were touched. Panels had come loose, littering the hallway and leaving openings into the various rooms.

  But the room where the time device had been was the worst. The Khleevi had done more damage than she realized, gouging great holes in the planetary maps within the walls, leaving circuitry exposed. The huge double helix that had once dominated the center of the room was gone. It left behind only the hastily patched container to hold the now placid pool.

  Acorna knew without further examination that the delicate device was damaged beyond her ability to mend it, at least. But she went through the motions of looking at everything, just in case her intuition was wrong, though she was sure it wasn’t.

  Then she heard the footsteps—not single ones, but important, impatient ones, steps of beings with two-hoofed feet and also the steps of beings with four.

  Thariinye, looking very important and impatient himself, stood in the entrance, and announced, “The Linyaari High Council and a Delegation of Ancestors has come to inspect the premises and make a dete
rmination as to its disposition.”

  “Whoa there, big boy,” Becker said. “I think we agreed that I got whatever was to be disposed of.”

  With the Ancestors in the front, the Council members paraded soberly into the room. The Council questioned each of those who had come to fix the time machine. Then, without comment, the Council departed to tour the rest of the city. Acorna climbed after them to the upper level. Crude stairs had been inserted into the hill-like barrier between the lower floor and the upper.

  From this level she could see clearly into the street beyond. It was not a pretty sight. Many of the structures had already been cleared. Some that remained were little more than partial frameworks with bits of facade clinging to them. Others continued to shift their shapes—but each disconnected piece shifted at a different rate into a different sort of building from all of the other parts. To Becker, at least, it looked like the nightmare of an architect who had had far, far too much to drink.

  Thariinye acted as the guide, marching the Council up and down streets. The only place they paused at for any length of time was the shore of the little inland sea at the foot of the incline on which the city was built. The sii-Linyaari lived there now. Maati said the reclamation efforts would have been far less successful without the help of the aquatic people placing pumps and hoses and helping to shut off the artesian well. The sea churned briefly, then was full of horned heads, smacking tails, and gesticulating webbed hands. That consultation continued for some time before the Council performed an about-face and marched back to the time device building.

  “Please be so kind as to follow us back to the surface,” Aagroni Iirtyi said. “There we will advise everyone at once of our decision.”