Startide Rising u-2

by David Brin

  Toshio had always taken a lot of kidding from fins. They kidded all human children, while protecting them ferociously. But on signing aboard Streaker, Toshio had expected to be treated as an adult and officer. Sure, there'd be a little repartee, as he'd seen between man and fin back home, but mutual respect, as well. It hadn't worked out that way.

  Keepiru had been the worst, starting right off with heavy sarcasm and never letting up.

  So why am I trying to save him?

  He remembered the fierce courage Keepiru had shown in saving him from the weed. There was no rescue fever then. The fin had been in full control over his harness.

  So, he thinks of me as a child, Toshio realized bitterly. No wonder he doesn't hear me now.

  Still, it offered a way. Toshio bit his lip, wishing vainly for an alternative. To save Keepiru's life he would have to humiliate himself utterly. It wasn't an easy thing to decide to do, his pride had taken such a beating.

  With a savage curse, he pulled back on the throttle and set the bow planes to descend. He turned up the hydrophones to maximum, swallowed, then cried out in pidgin Trinary.

  * Child drowning — child in danger! *

  * Child drowning — child's distress *

  * Human child — in need of savior *

  * Human child — come do your best! *

  He repeated the call over and over, whistling through lips dry with shame. The nursery rhyme was taught to all the children of Calafia. Any kid past the age of nine who used it usually pleaded for transfer to another island to escape the subsequent razzing. There were more dignified ways an adult called for help.

  None of which Keepiru had heard!

  Ears burning, he repeated the call.

  Not all Calafian kids did well with the fins, of course. Only a quarter of the planet's human population worked closely with the sea. But those adults were the ones who had learned the best ways to deal with dolphins. Toshio had always assumed he'd be one of them.

  Now that was all over. If he got back to Streaker he'd have to hide in his cabin… for at least the few days or weeks it took for the victors of the battle over Kithrup to come down and claim them all.

  On his sonar screen, another fuzzy line of static was approaching from the west. Toshio let the sled slip a little deeper. Not that he cared. He continued to whistle, but he felt like crying.

  # where — where — where child is — where child is? where #

  Primal Dolphin! Nearby! Almost, Toshio forgot his shame. He fingered a rope left over from Brookida's lashings, and kept whistling.

  A streak of gray twilight flashed past him. Toshio gathered his knees under him and took the rope in both hands. He knew Keepiru would circle below and come up the other side. When he saw the first hint of gray hurtling upward, Toshio launched himself from the sled.

  The bullet-like body of the dolphin twisted in an abrupt, panicky attempt to avoid collision. Toshio cried out as the cetacean's tail struck him in the chest. But it was a cry more of glee than pain. He had timed it right!

  As Keepiru twisted around again, Toshio flung himself backward, allowing the fin to pass between himself and the rope. He clamped his feet around the dolphin's slick tail and pulled the rope with all the will of a garroter.

  "Got you!" he cried.

  At that instant the aftershock hit.

  The cycloid clutched and pulled at him. Bits of flotsam struck him as the suction tossed his body about in apparent alliance with the mad, bucking dolphin.

  This time Toshio felt no fear of the wave. He was filled with a fierce battle lust. Adrenalin seared through him like a hot flux. It pleased him to save Keepiru's life by physically punishing him for weeks of humiliation.

  The dolphin writhed in panic. As the shock rolled past them, Keepiru cried out the basic call for air. Desperately, the fin drove for the surface.

  They breached, and Toshio just missed getting blasted by the spume from Keepiru's blowhole. Keepiru commenced a series of leaps, gyrating to shake loose of his unwelcome rider.

  Each time they went underwater Toshio tried to call out.

  "You're sentient," he gasped. "Damn you, Keepiru… you're… you're a starship pilot!"

  He knew he should be doing his coaxing in Trinary, but it was no use even trying, when he could barely hold on for dear life.

  "You pea-brained… phallic symbol!" he screamed as the water slammed against him. "You over-rated fish! You're killing me, you goddamed… The Eatees own Calafia by now because you fins can't hold your tongues! We never should have taken you along into space!"

  The words were hateful. Contemptuous. At last Keepiru seemed to have heard. He reared out of the water like an enraged stallion. Toshio felt his grip tear loose, and he was flung away like a rag doll, to hit the sea with a splash.

  Only eighteen cases were known, in the forty generations of dolphin uplift, in which a fin had attacked a human with murderous intent. In each case, every fin related to the perpetrator had been sterilized. Still, Toshio expected to be crushed at any instant. He didn't care. He had realized, at last, the cause of his depression. It had come to the surface when he was wrestling with Keepiru.

  It hadn't been his ability to go home that had hurt, these last few weeks. It was another fact that he had not allowed himself to think of even once since the battle off Morgran.

  The ETs… the extraterrestrials… the Galactics of every stripe and philosophy which were chasing Streaker… would not settle for hunting down the dolphin-crewed ship.

  At least one ET race would have seen that the Streak might successfully go into hiding. Or they might imagine, erroneously, that her crew had succeeded in passing the secret of her discovery to Earth. Either way, the logical next step for one of the more amoral or vicious Galactic races would be coercion.

  Earth might be able to defend herself. Probably Omnivarium and Hermes, as well. The Tymbrimi would defend the Caanan colonies.

  But places like Calafia, or Atlast, must be captured by now. They were hostages, his family and everyone he had known. And Toshio realized that he blamed the fins.

  Another aftershock was due any minute now. Toshio didn't care.

  Pieces of floating debris drifted all about nearby. Not more than a kilometer away Toshio could see the metal-mound. At least it looked like the same one. He couldn't tell if there were dolphins stranded on the shore or not.

  A large piece of flotsam drifted near him. It took him a moment to realize that it was Keepiru.

  Toshio treaded water as he opened his faceplate.

  "Well," he asked, "are you proud of yourself?"

  Keepiru turned slightly to one side, and one dark eye looked up at Toshio. The bulge at the top of the cetacean's head, where human meddling had created a vocal apparatus from the former blowhole, gave out a long, soft, warbling sound.

  Toshio couldn't be certain it was just a sigh. It might have been an apology in Primal Dolphin. The possibility alone was enough to make him angry.

  "Can that crap! I just want to know one thing. Do I have to send you back to the ship? Or do you think you can stay sentient long enough to help me? Answer in Anglic, and it had better be grammatically correct!"

  Keepiru moaned in pure anguish. After a moment of heavy breathing he finally spoke, quite slowly.

  "Don't sssend me back. They're still calling for help! I will do what you ask-k-k!"

  Toshio hesitated. "All right. Go down after the sled. When you've found it, put on a breather. I don't want you hampered by need for air, and you need a constant reminder with you, too!

  "Then bring the sled up near the island, but not too close!"

  Keepiru flung his head up in a huge nodding motion. "Yesss!" he cried. Then he flipped and dove into the water. It was just as well Keepiru had left all the thinking to him.

  The fin might have balked if he'd caught onto what Toshio had in mind to do next.

  A kilometer to the island; there was only one way to get there fast and avoid a scramble up the slanting, abrasiv
e, metal-coral surface. He checked his orientation one more time, then a drop in the water level told him that the wave was coming.

  The fourth wave seemed the gentlest by far. He knew the feeling was deceptive. He was in water deep enough so that the swell came at him as a gentle lump in the ocean, rather than a crested breaker. He dove down into the hump and swam against the direction of motion for a time before rising to the surface.

  He had to gauge it just right. Swim back too far and he wouldn't reach the island before the following trough arrived and pulled him out to sea again. To remain at the front of the wave would be to body-surf a vicious breaker onto the beach, undertow and all.

  It was all happening too fast. He swam hard, but couldn't tell if he had passed the peak of the wave or not. Then a glance told him that it was too late for remedial measures. He flipped around to face the looming, foliage-topped mound.

  The breaker started a hundred yards ahead, but the slope rapidly ate away at the wave as bottom dragged the cycloid into a crested monster. The peak moved backward, toward Toshio, even as the wave hurtled upward onto the beach.

  The boy braced himself as the crest reached him. He was prepared to look down on a precipice, and then see nothing more.

  What he saw was a cataract of white foam as the wave began to die. Toshio cried out to keep his ear channels open, and started swimming furiously to stay atop the churning tide of spume and debris.

  Suddenly, there was greenery all around. Trees and shrubs which had withstood the earlier assaults shook under this attack. Some tore loose of their moorings even as Toshio flew past them. Others stood and flailed at him as he hurtled through.

  No sharp branch impaled him. No unbreaking vine garroted him as he passed. In a tumbling, tossing confusion he finally came to rest, somehow hugging the trunk of a huge tree, while the wave churned, and finally receded.

  Miraculously, he was on his feet, the first man to stand on the soil of Kithrup. Toshio stared dazedly at his surroundings, briefly not believing his survival.

  Then he hurriedly opened his faceplate, and became the first man to lose his breakfast on the soil of Kithrup.

  8 ::: Galactics

  "Slay them!" The Jophur high priest demanded. "Slay the isolated Thennanin battlecruisers on our sixth quadrant!"

  The Jophur chief of staff bowed its twelve-ringed trunk before the high priest.

  "The Thennanin are our allies-of-the-moment! How can we turn on them without first performing the secret rituals of betrayal? Their ancestors will not be appeased!"

  The Jophur high priest expanded its six outer sap-rings. It rose high upon its dais at the rear of the command chamber.

  "There is no time to perform the rites! Now, as our alliance finishes sweeping this sector, as our alliance has become the strongest! Now, while this phase of the battle still rages. Now, while the foolish Thennanin have opened up their flanks to us. Now may we harm them greatly!"

  The chief of staff pulsed in agitation, its outer sap-rings discoloring with emotion.

  "We may change alliances as it suits us, agreed. We may betray our allies, agreed. We may do anything to win the prize agreed. But we may not do so without performing the rituals! The rituals are what make us the appropriate vessels for the will of the ancients! You would bring us down to the level of the heretics!"

  The dais shook with the high priest's anger.

  "My rings decide! My rings are those of priesthood! My rings…"

  The oration-peak of the pyramidal high priest erupted in a geyser of hot, multi-hued sap. The explosion spewed sticky amber liquor across the bridge of the Jophur flagship.

  "Continue fighting." The chief of staff waved the crew back to work with its sidearm. "Call the Quartermaster of Religiosity. Have it send up rings to make up a new priest. Continue fighting while we prepare to perform the rituals of betrayal:

  The chief of staff bowed to the staring section chiefs. "We shall appease the ancestors of the Thennanin before we turn on them.

  "But remember to make certain the Thennanin themselves do not sense our intentions!"

  9 ::: From The Journal of Gillian Baskin

  It's been some time since I've been able to make an entry in this personal log. Since the Shallow Cluster it seems we've constantly been in frantic motion… making the discovery of the millennia, getting ambushed at Morgran, and fighting for our lives from then on. I hardly ever see Tom any more. He's always down in the engine or weapons pods. I'm either here in the lab or helping out in sick bay.

  Ship's surgeon Makanee has a mouthful of problems. Fen have always had a talent for hypochondria. A fifth of the crew shows up every sick call with psychosomatic complaints. You can't just tell them it's all in their heads, so we stroke them and tell them what brave fellows they are, and that everything's going to be all right.

  I think if it weren't for the captain, half of this crew would be hysterical by now. To many of them he seems almost like a hero out of the Whale Dream. Creideiki moves about the ship, watching the repairs and giving little lessons in Keneenk logic. The fen seem to buck up whenever he's nearby.

  Still, reports keep coming in about the space battle. Instead of tapering off, it's only getting thicker and heavier!

  And we're all getting more than a little worried about Hikahi's party.

  Gillian put down her stylus. From the small circle of her desk lamp, the rest of the laboratory appeared dark and gloomy. The only other light came from the far end of the room. Silhouetted against the spots was a vaguely humanoid shape, a mysterious shadow, lying on a stasis table.

  "Hikahi," she sighed. "Where in Ifni's name are you?"

  That Hikahi's survey party hadn't even sent back a monopulse confirmation of the recall order was now of great concern. Streaker couldn't afford to lose those crewfen. For all of his frequent unreliability outside the bridge, Keepiru was their best pilot. Even Toshio Iwashika had a lot of promise.

  But most of all, the loss of Hikahi would hurt. Without her, how could Creideiki manage?

  Hikahi was Gillian's best dolphin friend, at least as close to her as Tom was to Creideiki or Tsh't. Gillian wondered why Takkata-Jim had been appointed vice-captain instead of Hikahi. It made no sense. She could only imagine that politics was behind it. Takkata-Jim was a Stenos. Perhaps Ignacio Metz had had a hand in choosing the complement for this mission. Metz was a passionate advocate of certain dolphin racial types back on Earth.

  Gillian didn't write these thoughts down. They were idle speculations, and she didn't have time for speculation.

  Anyway, it's time I got back to Herbie.

  She closed her journal and got up to walk over to the stasis table, where a dry, dessicated figure floated in a heavily shielded field of suspended time.

  The ancient cadaver grinned back at her through the glass.

  It wasn't human. There hadn't even been multi-cellular creatures on Earth when this thing had lived and breathed and flown spaceships. Yet it looked eerily humanoid. It had straight arms and legs, and a very man-like head and neck. Its jaw and eye orbits were strange-looking, but its skull still had a very man-like grin.

  How old are you, Herbie? she asked in her thoughts. One billion years? Two?

  How is it your fleet of ancient hulks waited undiscovered by Galactic civilization for so long, waited until we came along… a bunch of wolfling humans and newly uplifted dolphins? Why were we the ones to find you?

  And why did one litle hologram of you, beamed home to Earth, make half the patron-lines in the galaxy go crazy?

  Streaker's micro-Library was no help. It refused to recognize Herbie at all. Maybe it was holding back. Or perhaps it was simply too small an archive to remember an obscure race so long extinct.

  Tom had asked the Niss machine look into it. So far the sarcastic Tymbrimi artifact had been unable to cozen out an answer.

  Meanwhile, between sick bay and her other duties, Gillian had to find a few hours a day to examine this relict non-destructively, and maybe figure ou
t what was stirring up the Eatees so. If she didn't do it, no one would.

  Somehow she would make it until tonight.

  Poor Tom, Gillian thought, smiling. He'll be coming back from his engines, wiped out, and I'll be feeling amorous. It's a damned good thing he's a sport.

  She picked up a pion microprobe.

  Okay Herbie, let's see if we can find out what kind of a brain you had.

  10 ::: Metz

  "I'm sorry, Dr. Metz. The captain is with Thomasss Orley in the weapons section. If there's anything I can do…?"

  As usual, Vice-Captain Takkata-Jim was unfailingly polite. His Anglic, diction, even while breathing oxywater, was almost perfect. Ignacio Metz couldn't help smiling in approval. He had a particular interest in Takkata-Jim.

  "No, Vice-Captain. I just stopped by the bridge to see if the survey party had reported in.

  "They haven't. We can only wait."

  Metz tsked. He had already concluded that Hikahi's party was destroyed.

  "Ah, well. I don't suppose there has been any offer of negotiations by the Galactics yet?"

  Takkata-Jim shook his large, mottled-gray head left to right.

  "Regrettably, no sir. They appear to be more interested in slaughtering each other. Every few hours, it seems, yet another battle fleet enters Kthsemenee's system to join in the free-for-all. It may be a while before anyone initiates diplomacy"

  Dr. Metz frowned at the illogic of it. If the Galactics were rational, they'd let Streaker hand her discovery over to the Library Institute and have done with it! Then everyone would share equally!