The male freak in the center was the tallest, if he could be called tall. Throughout the reception hall, no one spoke a word, and everyone stiffened up. Uncel felt a shortness of breath, and tried to calm himself. He hoped it was just a joke, something the Adurian lab scientists had cooked up.
“I am High Ruler Coreq,” the robed monster at the center said, in a whiny voice that sounded Adurian. Motioning to his left and right, he identified the other male as Premier Enver and the female as Warlord Tarix, and then added, “We are, as many of you have surmised, laboratory-bred, but make no mistake about it. This does not make us inferior to any of you in any way. On the contrary, we are far superior in every way imaginable.”
“Gaze upon us and see the future,” Premier Enver said. This one sounded more like a Hibbil, with a deeper voice. “One day, when the time is right, an entire race of HibAdus will be created, and there will be no need for any other races to exist.”
A chill ran down VV Uncel’s spine, and he heard an uneasy murmuring around him.
Warlord Tarix had something to add, in an echoing voice that carried deadly undertones. “Our enemies are on their knees, making their last stands. We have conquered every Human world except for two, and every Mutati world save for one.” She smiled cruelly, revealing sharp white teeth. “They cannot hold out much longer.”
Then, eerily, the three of them spoke in synchronization: “To retain what we have gained, our forces have established impregnable defense systems on every conquered planet. Thanks to Hibbil ingenuity, we have wide-range sensor-guns that sweep considerably more than the areas around pod stations, as the Humans have. Our sensors encompass entire planets. If any unauthorized podship appears, it will be blasted into oblivion.”
The triumvirate began to clap, as if for themselves. Everyone in the reception hall joined in, including Ambassador Uncel, but he felt a dark gloom seeping into his soul.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Those who adapt, survive. This basic rule applies to all living things, and to all places they exist in the universe. Biological creatures, being much smaller and weaker than the natural forces of their surroundings, can only control their environments to limited extents. When things change around them, they must change as well. Or die.
—Master Noah Watanabe, Journal of the Cosmic Sea
It could have been much worse.
At least that was the first impression Princess Meghina got when the space station stopped tumbling and the gravitonics system went back on. The glax-walled gambling room on the orbiter had righted itself, and was lit with soft illumination coming through the windows. But was it really over? And what in the world had happened?
She crawled out from under the gaming table and assessed the bumps and bruises on her face and body. Around her, others did the same. Some were groaning, but as she saw them move, it didn’t look like anyone was seriously injured. Pimyt stood on top of the upside-down gaming table, complaining that one of his hips hurt. His tunic was torn, showing silvery fur on his chest.
Meghina’s dagg whined, and scampered over debris to reach her. The large black animal licked her hand, where a bruise was beginning to show.
“Thank you, Orga ,” she said with a gentle smile. “That makes me feel better already.”
“Are you all right?” It was Kobi Akar, the impeccably dressed Salducian diplomat who was one of her immortal companions. He stood over her, looking down with concern in his dark, close-set eyes. Though he had always been nice enough to her, she’d never really liked him that much. There seemed to be an undercurrent to him, something just beneath the surface that was decidedly unpleasant. Exactly what that might be, she had never been certain. But she didn’t admire the way he sometimes alluded to getting away with things that others could not, because of his diplomatic immunity. Even so, he could be funny and witty at times, and the others in her elite group of elixir-immortals all seemed to like him.
Typical of his race, Akar was sturdily built, with an oblong head, two small, crablike pincers for hands, and a multi-legged underbody concealed beneath a long robe. The Salducians, while trading partners and military allies of the Merchant Prince Alliance, were a galactic race of their own, and had settled in only a small sector of the galaxy.
“I’m fine,” Meghina said. She looked around. “And the others?”
“All minor injuries, it appears.”
“That’s good.” She rose to her feet and gazed out through the clearglax walls in all directions, onto a star-encrusted canvas of space. Looking down along the connected modules of the space station, she noticed large dents that had not been there before, and jagged pieces hanging loosely from sections that were too badly damaged to be saved by airtight emergency doors. Beyond this startling view, she saw something just as unsettling: a brown planet that was obviously not Canopa, where they had been orbiting previously. Sunlight came from behind the orbiter.
An odd, queasy feeling came over her. “Where are we?”
Akar scratched the thin line of hair on his forehead, the last patch of his hairline. “Hard to say.”
He was considered handsome by his people, and was reputed to enjoy the company of many mistresses. As for herself, the courtesan Princess Meghina had never found him or any other Salducian male physically attractive, and his quirks and deficiencies were irritating. He looked worried now, but often had a rather artificial smile on his overlarge mouth.
Pimyt limped past her, grimacing in pain from his injured hip. “We need medical packs,” he said. He went down a short stairway to the corridor door, and shouted back, “I’ll see what I can find.”
“This space station is seriously damaged,” someone said.
A man’s voice came over the onboard com-system. “I am Colonel Truitt of the Red Berets. All passengers are advised to make your way to emergency stations and put on survival suits.”
“We’re in one of the emergency stations now,” Lorenzo said.
Someone activated ceiling hatches, causing nets to drop down slowly, containing life-support suits and emergency supply canisters. Moments later, Red Beret soldiers entered the chamber, opened the nets, and began handing out suits. The emergency doors for this module, which were supposed to be airtight, were leaking.
“But there are immortals among us,” said Prince Okkco, a nobleman with wavy white hair. “They do not need life-support.”
“Everyone puts on a suit,” Lorenzo said, with a scowl. “No exceptions.”
“We are orbiting an unknown planet in an unknown solar system,” one of the Red Berets said, looking at the readings on a handheld device.
One of his companions, with a similar unit, said, “We’re still taking astronomical readings, but nothing looks familiar.”
In a few minutes, everyone in the chamber including the Red Berets had put on puffy, pale blue survival suits. But they left the face plates hinged open, since the on-board air systems were still functioning.
More guests and soldiers from other portions of the orbiter entered the wrecked gambling hall, since it was one of the principal emergency stations on the orbiter. Colonel Truitt came in as well, a tall man with a thick mustache. He conferred with Lorenzo and Pimyt.
Presently, Lorenzo announced, “Though we’ve lost one of our primary shuttles, we still have two in working order. We’re going to use one of them to send a scouting party down to that planet, and see what we can find out. Our scanners show it has a breathable atmosphere and moderate temperatures on the surface, so we won’t need these suits when we get down there.”
“There could still be unknown dangers,” Meghina said. “As one of the immortals, I’d like to volunteer to go down with the scouting party.”
“No,” Lorenzo said. “You’re staying here. But I’m going down, and so is Pimyt.”
“Why?” Meghina said.
And Pimyt said, too, almost at the same time: “Why?”
“Because,” Lorenzo said, “ one of you is my wife, and the other is my attaché, and b
oth of you will do as I command.”
In shared reluctance, Meghina and Pimyt nodded.
Then the Salducian diplomat said, “If you want an immortal to go along, I’ll do it.”
“No, you’d just get in the way,” Lorenzo said. He scanned the four Human immortals, and seemed to consider taking one or more of them along instead. Then he looked at Pimyt and said, “Make the necessary arrangements. Add a dozen elite Red Beret guardsmen to the scouting party.”
“Fourteen in all, then,” the Hibbil said.
“Right.”
As she watched her husband take charge of the situation, Meghina felt a renewed surge of attraction for him. He looked rather handsome in this time of crisis, and was displaying courage that she hadn’t seen before.
Noticing her looking at him, Lorenzo smiled. But his resolve appeared suddenly shaky. As if to conceal this, he turned and led the others out the door into the corridor.
* * * * *
When the shuttle dropped down through the atmosphere, Pimyt saw predominantly brown hues on the planet, from horizon to horizon. The world had grayish-brown mountains and formations of rock in other muted colors, but he saw no evidence of water or plants.
He heard one of the guardsmen comment on the same thing.
Looking at them, Pimyt said, “If the air’s breathable there must be water and plants somewhere.”
“Maybe our instruments are wrong,” one of the guardsmen said. A lieutenant with gold stripes on his shoulder, Eden Rista was the highest ranking guardsmen in the party.
“Instruments are still showing good oxygen levels,” another guardsman said, as he stood at a console. They were only a few hundred meters above the surface. The shuttle slowed, fired retro-rockets, and set down on a wide expanse of rock.
Four guardsmen went through an airlock and stepped outside, leaving the rest of the party on the shuttle. As Pimyt watched through a porthole, the men performed several tests, using handheld instruments. Then they swung aside the face plates on their suits, and gave the all-clear signal.
Now the entire party disembarked, and climbed down from the rock onto an expanse of dry, dusty earth. The air was a little cool, even in direct sunlight. That didn’t bother Pimyt, but his companions wore jackets.
Moving off by himself, Lieutenant Rista held a ground-penetrating radar unit.
“Network of subterranean waterways down there,” he reported. “Average depth around thirty meters.”
“So, there is water here, after all,” Pimyt said. Looking at Lorenzo, he added, “If you want, sir, I could bring a hibbamatic down here and build something to dig, and to explore the waterways.”
“For what purpose?” Lorenzo asked.
“We’re in an unknown region, on an unknown planet,” the Hibbil said. “Maybe we should take soil, rock, and water samples. Comparing the data with galactic exploration records, it could give us information on where we are.”
“Let’s do it,” the former doge said.
An hour later, they had the hibbamatic set up on the ground. Pimyt made several settings on the machine, then began feeding cartridges of raw materials into the hopper on top.
In a short while, the little Hibbil stood at a glistening black machine, which he had assembled from components that the hibbamatic produced. The new machine was around the size of a small passenger car, except it had a seat on top, and handlebars.
“This thing is dual purpose,” he said. “Watch.”
Pimyt touched a button, and wheels began grinding on the bottom of the machine. Then he climbed onto the seat and plopped himself there, while holding onto the handlebars. The mechanisms started digging, and in short order it had produced a tunnel sloping down into the ground.
The tunnel had just enough headroom for the others to follow down the slope, on foot. At the bottom, Lorenzo found Pimyt on a flat section of rock inside a low-ceilinged rock cavern, by the edge of a stream. The Hibbil knelt beside the black machine, with lights on the unit illuminating the silvery, luminous surface of the cavern and the underground waterway. Pimyt was making adjustments. As he did so, the seat and handlebars melted into the surface of the machine, and like a shapeshifter it enlarged and morphed into a teardrop shape, with a windshield on the fat end.
“Four-man mini-sub,” Pimyt reported. “Perfect for underwater exploration.”
“Clever,” Lorenzo said, walking around the gleaming black boat. “But what does this have to do with taking soil, rock, and water samples?”
“Very little, perhaps,” Pimyt admitted, “but where there’s water there’s life. Or so the saying goes. Undoubtedly there are organisms in the water, but we’re looking for something more substantial. If anyone lives on this planet, we might find them beneath the surface.”
“Follow the water,” Lorenzo said.
“Precisely. And with instruments, we can always get back here.”
“Very well, but for only a couple of hours, at most. If we don’t find any evidence of meaningful life, we take the samples and go back to the orbiter.”
Pimyt nodded.
A number of the guardsmen were older, and said they had experience with a variety of machines. Lieutenant Rista designated two men to go in the sub. The other men lowered the machine into the water, where it bobbed on the surface. Climbing inside the sub, the two guardsmen familiarized themselves with the controls, taking the boat underwater and back up again. The twin engines purred smoothly.
Using a handheld unit, Lorenzo sent a comlink message up to the orbiter, informing them where the landing party was, and what they were doing.
“I should go,” Pimyt said, to Lorenzo. “If necessary, I can operate the sub, too. I’ve been watching them and listening in, and it looks easy enough to handle. How about you, sir? Want to take a little submarine ride?”
“Are you sure it’s safe?” Lorenzo asked. He shut off his comlink unit, replaced it in a holder at his belt.
Pimyt grinned. “Absolutely not.”
With a grimace, Lorenzo climbed into the four-man craft and took one of the two aft seats, in the narrowest section of the teardrop hull. Pimyt followed, and sat in the remaining seat directly beside him, while the two guardsmen sat side by side ahead of them, in the pilot and co-pilot chairs behind the windshield.
Slowly, the mini-sub proceeded downstream, casting a powerful headlight to illuminate the watery tunnel ahead, through murky darkness. At first they made their way on the surface of the water, like an ordinary motor-propelled boat.
“Low rock overhang ahead,” the pilot announced. He was much thinner and shorter than his companion, and proved to be entirely bald as well when he removed his cap and stuffed it in a uniform pocket.
“The water is deep enough to submerge,” the larger soldier said, reading an instrument panel.
“OK,” the pilot said. “Here we go.” He submerged the vessel, and they proceeded to the other side of the overhang, where they surfaced again. But only for a short distance. The waterway widened considerably, but across the entire width the ceiling dipped so low that they had to submerge again.
As they proceeded underwater, the big soldier looked back at Lorenzo and said, “Quite an adventure we’re on, sir.”
“I’m not afraid,” the former doge said, “not at all. I’ve seen much worse than this.”
But Pimyt heard fear in his voice, and this amused him. He’d never liked Lorenzo, and secretly enjoyed seeing him suffer. The Hibbil had other feelings as well, of a more aggressive nature. In his mind, he savored the possibilities.
Suddenly he felt the mini-sub’s speed increase dramatically, a strong thrust forward. Moments afterward, a warning buzzer went off.
The pilot swore loudly, and slammed the engines into hard reverse.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Effective leadership is primarily a matter of striking a pose and causing others to see you in a favorable light. It is all about perception. If you appear to be in full command, others are assured, and will follow y
ou. If you appear to be unsteady or fearful, they will scurry away from you like insects from a burning structure.
— Doge Paolantonio IV, private comments
“So you’re the great Noah Watanabe?” The palace reception hall echoed with her words, and with her condescending tone.
Though he had never met the young woman before, Noah recognized her instantly from holophotos he had seen. Tall and blonde, Princess Annyette appeared to be around twenty and very businesslike, in a white pants suit and understated gold jewelry. Her hair was closely cropped, more the cut of a man than of a woman. Just behind her stood her six younger sisters, all blonde and similarly attired, but in clothing of different colors. The youngest appeared to be around twelve years of age.
In deference to the rank that Annyette still retained on Siriki (and in what remained of the Merchant Prince Alliance), Noah bowed to her. He had a small entourage of uniformed MPA officers and soldiers with him, along with his rotund adjutant, Subi Danvar.
In the faces and bone structures of the seven princesses, Noah detected resemblances to both Princess Meghina and to Lorenzo del Velli, the royal couple who for years had been thought to be her birth parents. That changed when the famous courtesan confessed publicly that she was not Human at all, but was instead a Mutati, one of the loathsome shapeshifters. Lorenzo del Velli had continued to protect his wife, and much of the public continued to support her, agreeing that she was really more Human than Mutati in her thoughts and loyalties, no matter her unfortunate genetics. But the revelation of Meghina’s true identity meant that she could not possibly have borne Human children sired by Lorenzo. Obviously, in her attempts to deceive him and the public, she had selected the birth parents of her “daughters” carefully, because the girls standing before Noah looked perfect in all respects, and even carried themselves with a certain royal hauteur.
“I have never claimed to be great,” he responded in a respectful tone. “Not in any sense of the word. On the contrary, I see myself as exceedingly small in a very large universe.”
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