Atvar H’sial entered the lower hatch, bowing low — not from any idea of respect for Louis Nenda, but because she was squeezing in through an entrance designed for something half her height. Inside, she pulled off her breathing mask. J’merlia followed, with an odd little whistle of greeting to Kallik, then scurried forward to crouch in front of his owner.
The Cecropian straightened and moved closer to Nenda. “You chose not to use your weapons on us,” J’merlia translated. “A wise decision.”
“From your point of view? I’m sure it was. But what’s this talk of weapons?” Nenda’s voice was mocking. “You’ll find no weapons here.”
“You may be right,” Atvar H’sial said through J’merlia. “If the inspection facility on Opal could not find them, it may be that we could not.” Atvar H’sial’s broad white head turned up to look at the ceiling. “However, if you will permit me half an hour for inspection of your starship’s upper deck…”
“Oh, I don’t think so.” Louis Nenda grinned. “It might be fun, but we really don’t have half an hour to play around. Not with Summertide breathing down our necks. Suppose we stop fencing for a while? I’ll not ask what tools and weapons you’re carrying on you, if you’ll stop worrying about what’s on this ship. We’ve got more important things to talk about.”
“Ah. A truce, you suggest.” The words came from J’merlia, but it was Atvar H’sial who held out a long foreleg. “Agreed. But where do we begin? How do we discuss cooperation, without revealing too much of what we each know?”
“For a start, we send them” — Nenda pointed at J’merlia and Kallik — “outside.”
Atvar H’sial’s yellow trumpet-horns turned to scan the Hymenopt, then moved down to the Lo’tfian crouched beneath her carapace.
“Is it safe there?” J’merlia translated.
“Not specially.” Nenda raised bushy eyebrows. “Hey, what do you want, carnival time on Primavera? It’s not safe anywhere on Quake right now, and you know it. Is your bug extrasensitive to heat and light? I don’t want to fry him.”
“Not particularly sensitive,” J’merlia translated, with no sign of emotion. “Given water, J’merlia can survive heat and bad air for a long period, even without a respirator. But the communication between you and me…”
“Trust me.” Nenda pointed to J’merlia and Kallik and jerked a thumb toward the hatch. “Out. Both of you.” He switched to Communion talk. “Kallik, take plenty of water with you for J’merlia. We’ll tell you when to come back in.”
He waited until the two aliens were outside and the hatch was closed, then moved forward to sit in the shadow of Atvar H’sial’s carapace. He took a deep breath and opened his shirt, revealing a chest completely covered with an array of gray molelike nodules and deep pockmarks. He closed his eyes and waited.
“Be patient.” The coded pheromones diffused slowly into the air. “It is not easy… and I lack… recent practice.”
“Ah.” Atvar H’sial was nodding her blind head and pointing her receptors to the chest array. “A Zardalu augmentation, I assume? Heard of but never encountered by me. May I ask, at what physical price?”
“The usual.” Louis Nenda’s face showed a harsh ecstasy. “Pain — the going rate for every Zardalu augment. That’s all right, I’m getting there. I’m going to talk in human style as we go, if you don’t mind. It helps me frame my thoughts.”
“But there is no need for this!” In addition to the literal meaning, Louis Nenda’s pheromone receptors picked up Atvar H’sial’s disdain and contemptuous amusement. “J’merlia is totally loyal to me, as I assume Kallik is to you. They would die before they would reveal any conversation of ours.”
“They certainly would.” Louis Nenda managed to chuckle. “I’d make sure of that. But I don’t know how smart J’merlia is. Things can always come out by accident, specially if someone tricky asks the questions. Only way to be really safe is if they’re not here to listen.” The laugh changed to a grunt of discomfort. “All right, let’s get down to business and finish this as quick as we can. It’s hard on me.”
“We need a protocol for the exchange of information.”
“I know. Here’s my suggestion. I’ll make a statement. You can agree, disagree, or make a statement of your own, but no one is obliged to answer any question. Like this. Fact: You have no interest at all in environmentally stressed life-forms on Quake. That’s all bull. You came here because you are a specialist on the Builders.”
“To you, I will not deny it.” Atvar H’sial reared up to full height. The red-and-white ruffles below the head expanded. “I am more than a specialist. I am the specialist on the Builders in the Cecropia Federation.” The pheromones carried a message of pride more powerful than words ever could. “I was the first to fathom the mystery of Tantalus; the first — and only — Cecropian to survive a transit of Flambeau. I realized the significance of Summertide before Darya Lang was foolish enough to publish her findings. I—”
“All right. You’re smart, I hear you.” Nenda’s breathing was becoming easier. “Tell me something I need to know, or we’ll be here till Summertide and we’ll all fry.”
“Very well. You are here because you want to know what will happen at Summertide. But I say that you did not initiate that idea. You know too little science or history. Someone else applied Darya Lang’s idea and told you the significance of this time and place. It would be of interest to know who that someone is.”
“That sure sounds like a question to me, even if it’s not phrased like one. But I’ll tell you.” Nenda jerked his thumb to the ship’s hatch. “Kallik.”
“Your Hymenopt? A slave!” Atvar H’sial was more than surprised. She was outraged. “It is not fitting for a slave species to perform such high-level work.”
“Ah, nuts.” Nenda was grinning. “She has a brain — might as well let her use it for my benefit. Anyway, it keeps her happy when she can read and calculate in her spare time. She saw Lang’s work, then did the computing herself. She decided this was the special time and place. Then she got all excited, wanted to tell somebody. I said no way. We’ll tell no one — and we’ll go to Quake ourselves. And here we are. But I want to compare notes with you on something more specific. Let’s talk about what will happen here at Summertide.”
“That sounds like a question to me. I do not choose to answer.”
“So I’ll make a statement instead. Let me tell you what Kallik says, based on her analysis, and you can comment if you want to. She says the Builders are going to return — here, and at Summertide. The secret of their technology and the reason for their disappearance will be revealed to those present. How’s that grab you?”
“That is also a question, not a statement, but I will answer it. Kallik’s suggestion is plausible. However, it is not certain. There is no actual evidence for an appearance of the Builders.”
“So it’s a bet you have to make. And what Kallik didn’t say — but what I think, and it won’t surprise me if you’re way ahead of me — is that anyone who gets the keys to Builder technology will be plenty powerful in this spiral arm.”
“I agree. The technology will be the prize.”
“For some people. But it’s still not the only reason you’re here.” Nenda moved closer and went so far as to tap Atvar H’sial’s shiny abdomen with his index finger. “Fact: You’re another Builder fanatic, as much as Lang and Kallik. You all think you’re going to meet the Builders, seventy hours from now. Know what Kallik calls this Summertide? The Epiphany — when the gods will appear.”
“My own term is the Awakening. Do you accept that there will be some momentous event?”
“Hell, I don’t know. What do you mean by momentous? I’m damn sure the gods won’t appear. The whole thing’s a long shot, but it’s for super-big stakes. That’s my game. I’m a gambler, and I play long shots.”
“You are wrong. It is not a long shot. It will happen.”
Atvar H’sial’s conviction was unmistakable in the pheromonal
message. Nenda knew that subtlety of communication technique was beyond him. He won-dered if the Cecropians had mastered the means of lying with their chemical messengers.
“Already there is evidence of it,” Atvar H’sial went on. “All through the spiral arm, the artifacts are restless. And they point here.”
“Hey, you don’t have to persuade me. I flew eight hundred light-years to land on this crapheap — and I don’t give a damn about the artifacts. You can have them all — you’re as bad as Kallik. Me, I’ll settle for a few new bits of Builder technology. But I’ve another question for you. Why did you come here to see me, knowing I might blow you away? Not just to compare notes with me and Kallik, that’s for sure.”
“Ah. that is true. I came because you need me. And because I need you.” Atvar H’sial gestured to the port, and to the bare expanse of Quake beyond it. “If you and I were the only people on this world, we would enjoy sole knowledge of any new Builder techniques. We might battle later over who should enjoy the powers of the Builders, but I would accept such a contest.”
“That would be your mistake. But I still don’t know why you came to me.”
“Because today we are not the only ones on Quake. Others are here, who would make new knowledge generally available for the sake of science. Now, you are not a scientist, you are an adventurer. You are here for personal gain.”
“Damn right. And so are you.”
“Perhaps.” There was amusement in Atvar H’sial’s message, now that Louis Nenda knew how to read it. “And we do not want the Builders’ powers shared still further. Rebka, Graves, and Perry are on Quake. They traveled the Umbilical just after us. They will not keep new knowledge to themselves. We might do something about that, but we have no way of knowing where they are.”
“I assumed they would follow. What about Darya Lang? She came with you.”
“No problem. She has… already been taken care of.”
Chill certainty in the pheromones. There was a long pause.
“Well, all right,” Louis Nenda said at last. His voice was soft. “You are a cold-blooded son of a bitch, aren’t you?”
The Cecropian’s proboscis trembled. “We attempt to give satisfaction.”
“And you’re taking a risk, telling me this.”
“I think not.” Atvar H’sial was silent for a moment. “There is no risk. Not to someone who has read and remembered the Lascia Four files. May I refresh your memory? A medical-supply capsule was plundered en route to Lascia Four. It never reached the planet, and without the viral inhibitors it carried, three hundred thousand people died. An augmented human, accompanied by a Hymenopt slave, was guilty of that atrocity. The Hymenopt died, but the human escaped and was never captured.”
Louis Nenda said nothing.
“But about the other humans,” Atvar H’sial continued. “We cannot locate them. I am especially worried about Graves.”
“He’s a madman.”
“True. And he reads me and you — even without augmentation, he understands what I am thinking. He is too dangerous. I want him out of the way. I want all three out of the way.”
“Understood. But I can’t find them on Quake, any more than you can. So what are you proposing?”
“Before Summertide they will leave Quake. Their escape route is the Umbilical. That would have been my own line of retreat, until I saw your ship arriving and realized that it is equipped for space travel.”
“To the edge of the galaxy, if I want to go. I can see how that might be useful to you, getting off Quake with no risk of running into Graves. But what do you have to offer me? I don’t want to be crude about this, but I’m not your fairy godmother. Why should I provide you with free transportation off Quake? I told Kallik, we can have a pretty good look around her site on the surface, but come Summertide, we’ll be watching from orbit. But that’s for us. I’m not running a bus service. Why should I help you?”
“Because I know the codes for control of the Umbilical. The complete codes.”
“But why should I care…” Louis Nenda slowly looked up at the Cecropian, at the same time as the sightless head swung down close to him.
“You see?” The pheromones added a message more strong and yet more subtle than any words: pleasure, triumph, the touch of death.
“I do. It’s pretty damned clear. But what about them?” Nenda gestured at the window. J’merlia and Kallik were huddled together on the hot ground, trying to find shelter behind the starship from Mandel’s searing summer rays. They were both shaking, and J’merlia seemed to be trying to comfort the Hymenopt. “I’ll go along with what you propose, but there’s no way I’m going to drag them along to watch.”
“Agreed. And we do not need them. Anything that requires J’merlia’s sensitivity to half-micrometer radiation, you can perform in his place.”
“I can see, if that’s what you mean.” Nenda was already at the hatch, calling to Kallik. “Look, I’m not willing to leave them with my ship, either. In fact, I’m not willing to leave the ship here at all. We’ll fly it around to the Umbilical. And we’ll leave J’merlia and Kallik to wait for us here.”
“Not quite that, I suggest.” Atvar H’sial was moving her legs to full extension, towering over Louis Nenda. “We do not want them to have access to the aircar, either.”
“Kallik won’t touch it if I tell her not to.” Nenda waited while the Cecropian stared at him. Even the pheromonal overtones were silent. “Oh, all right. I agree with you. We won’t leave them here. No risk is better than a small one — and I’m not too sure of your Lo’tfian. How do you want to handle it?”
“Very simple. We will give them a beacon and some supplies, and drop them off at a convenient point between here and the foot of the Umbilical. When we have done our work there we will home on them, pick them up, look at the site for the Awakening — and head for orbit before it gets too wild on the surface.”
“Suppose surface conditions get bad, right where we leave them? Perry swore they will, and I don’t think he was lying.”
“If things become bad too soon, that would be a pity.” Atvar H’sial stood with her head turned, as J’merlia and Kallik waited at the open hatch. Both the slaves were quivering with fear and tension. “But you can always find another Hymenopt. And although J’merlia has been an adequate servant — more than adequate; I would be sorry to lose his services — that may be the price… of a larger success.”
CHAPTER 15
Summertide minus eight
Darya Lang did the natural thing: she sat down and cried. But as House-uncle Matra had told her, long before, weeping solved no problems. After a few minutes she stopped.
At first she had been merely bewildered. Why would Atvar H’sial choose to drug her and maroon her in the middle of nowhere, in a region of Quake that they had chosen only because it seemed like a good place for a landing? She could think of no explanation for the Cecropian’s disappearance while she slept.
Darya was thousands of kilometers away from the Umbilical. She had only a vague idea of its direction. She had no way to travel except walking. The conclusion was simple: Atvar H’sial intended that she should be stranded on Quake, and die when Sumemrtide hit.
But in that case, why leave a supply of provisions? Why provide a mask and air filter, and a primitive water purifier? Most baffling of all, why leave behind a signal generator that could be used to broadcast a distress call?
Her confusion had been succeeded by misery; then by anger. It was a sequence of emotions that she would never have anticipated, back in the quiet days before she left Sentinel Gate. She had always thought of herself as a reasonable person, a scientist, a citizen of an orderly and logical universe. Rage was not a reasonable reaction; it clouded the thought processes. But her world had changed, and she had been forced to change with it. The intensity of her own emerging feelings amazed her. If she had to die, she would not do it without a struggle.
She squatted on the soft soil by the nearest lake and systematica
lly inspected every item in the heap of materials. The purifier was a little flash-evaporation unit, one that would produce clean, drinkable water from the most bitter alkalines of any lake. At maximum production the unit would give two pints of water a day. The food in the heap was simple and bland, but it was self-heating, nutritious, and enough to last for weeks. The signal generator, so far as she could tell, was in perfect working order. And the waterproof quilted sheet that covered everything would provide insulation against heat, cold, or rain.
Conclusion: If she died, it would not be from hunger, thirst, or exposure.
That was small comfort. Death would be more immediate and much more violent. The air was hot and steadily becoming hotter. Every few minutes she could feel the earth stirring beneath her, like a sleeper unable to find a comfortable position. Worst of all, a stiffening breeze was carrying in a fine white powder that stung her eyes and gave everything an unpleasant metallic taste. The mask and air filter provided only partial protection.
She walked back to the edge of the lake and saw the ghostly reflection of Gargantua in the dark water. The planet grew more bright and bloated with every hour. It was still far from closest approach to Mandel, but looking up she could already see its three largest moons, moving around Gargantua in strangely perturbed orbits. She could almost feel the forces that Gargantua, Mandel, and Amaranth exerted on those satellites, pulling them in different directions. And the same gravitational forces were at work on Quake. The planet she stood on was enduring terrific stress. Its surface must be ready to disintegrate.
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