The Winds of Altair

by Ben Bova

  Thunder moved meekly aside, limping slightly and obviously in great pain.

  Crown growled inwardly as the clan leader approached him. He knew what his role must be: to raise his head, expose his throat, in a signal of submission to the acknowledged leader of the clan. To do anything less would mean that he would have to fight Brutal.

  Yet Crown's anger seethed inside him, and he knew that Brutal and all the other wolfcats could easily sense it. There would be nothing to stop Brutal from slashing Crown's throat out when he made the signal of submission. Crown himself knew that Brutal would be wise to kill him while he had such an easy chance.

  So when the mountainous wolfcat stood before him, and all the others backed away, Crown snarled defiantly. Brutal did not seem surprised. He expected the challenge; he even appeared to be delighted by it. The two wolfcats eyed each other, growling, knowing that this would not be merely a ritual battle of obedience. This fight would go to the death.

  I'm with you, Crown. I don't know what I can do to help, but I'm with you.

  Laura sat in the control room, one eye on Jeff's seemingly unconscious form lying on the contact couch, the other on the instrument readouts displayed before her. Jeff's adrenaline level was soaring, his heartrate was climbing fast.

  She bit her lip in indecision. If I call Amanda, she'll disconnect Jeff right away and send us both back to the dorm. Jeff will be furious with me for pulling him away from the wolfcat.

  She watched the viewscreen, seeing what Crown saw, staring at the snarling face of the biggest wolfcat she had ever seen.

  But if Crown is badly hurt, or killed, what will it do to Jeff? Laura reached for the switch that started the automatic disconnect sequence. Her hand hovered over it uncertainly.

  Crown could see that Brutal bore the scars of many fights on his head and shoulders. But the giant wolfcat showed no hesitation about fighting again. He did not circle warily around his younger opponent, he moved straight in on Crown, reared back to free his forelegs, and jabbed one forepaw lightly at Crown's snout.

  Crown blocked it and instinctively backed away.

  Brutal moved relentlessly forward. This was no argument over food, or even over territory. This was a fight for survival, life or death. A wolfcat clan can have only one leader, they both knew. All other males must either submit or be killed.

  All the other wolfcats dropped down onto their haunches or bellies, forming a ring around the combatants as they watched the opening moves of their struggle.

  For long moments Crown and Brutal stood facing each other, radiating hatred and fighting pride, snarling, tails twitching, ears flattened back on their skulls. Then, with a sildden bunching of muscles, they leaped at each other.

  Six tons of wolfcat collided with an earthshaking thud as they reared on their hind legs and slashed at each other with the claws of their fore-and mid-paws. Crown felt searing pain rake him from chest to abdomen, but he saw that he also slashed Brutal along one shoulder.

  Both animals bounced off and backed away for a moment. Crown felt hot blood dripping down his flank. But he had less than a heartbeat to think before Brutal reared again and attacked. Again they jarred the grassland with the concussion of their furious collision. Muscle and bone, strength and anger smashed against each other time and again, without either wolfcat scoring a telling blow. Their mightily fanged jaws played no role in this stage of the fighting: it was claws against claws, for now, a fencing match where the two ponderous beasts stood facing each other, snarling, glaring, tails twitching—then a roar and a leap, claws flashing. Then back on all sixes again, looking for a weak spot, a half-second's delay, a place and a time to press home the killing attack.

  Crown was getting the worse of it. He was as fast as the older male, perhaps even a shade faster. But Brutal was more experienced, more sure of himself, deadly accurate with his claws. Crown was bleeding from a dozen long, raking slashes. None of them was dangerous in itself, except that soon enough the loss of blood would wear him down, tire him, slow him to the point where Brutal could finish him off with a final snap of his fanged jaws.

  But the part of Crown that was Jeff was learning faster than any wolfcat had ever learned. Jeff felt the pain, but he and Crown together were watching the way the bigger wolfcat moved, the way he tensed his shoulders just before he leaped, the way he lowered his head to keep his throat protected.

  Brutal leaped at Crown again, but this time Crown dodged sideways, twisted in midair, suddenly a three-ton acrobat, and landed on the back of his surprised enemy. His jaws closed on Brutal's neck while all six of his paws dug deeply into the doomed wolfcat's flanks.

  A single strangled scream of pain and fury, then it was finished. The old leader lay dead, his blood staining the grass. Crown stood over the corpse—panting, bleeding, but victorious.

  He lifted his head and roared long and full and joyously. The other wolfcats got to their feet and approached him. Thunder was the first, and Crown nodded and grunted toward Brightfur and Tranquil. They were Thunder's mates, and no other wolfcat would touch them as long as Crown headed the clan.

  Jeff opened his eyes, a contented smile on his face.

  Laura came into the contact room, bubbling with excitement.

  "You did it!" she exulted. "You did it! You beat that horrible bully!"

  Jeff smiled at her. "Crown did it . . . although, maybe I helped a little."

  "You're marvelous," she said as she unfastened his cuffs.

  Jeff lifted the helmet off his head and swung his legs off the couch. Laura clasped her arms around his neck and they clung together in a long, happy kiss.

  "Hey there, that isn't the kind of contact work I expected you two to get into."

  They broke apart guiltily, then saw Amanda grinning at them.

  "I made contact with Crown," Jeff blurted, "and he's . . ."

  Amanda stopped him with an upraised hand. "Don't tell me. I don't want to know. I never authorized you to use this equipment. As far as I'm concerned, you left this lab right after I talked to you this morning."

  "Oh! Yes, sure."

  "So get out of here before somebody spots you and reports back to Foy," Amanda said, trying to sound stern, and failing.

  "We're going," Jeff said.

  "But be prepared to report for duty tomorrow morning at 0700 hours," Amanda added. "The orders were issued this afternoon; we start back to work with the animals tomorrow."

  Jeff's heart sank. "Not again. Not after everything that's happened."

  Amanda nodded gravely. "Bishop Foy's orders. We either whip this planet into shape or die trying."

  Jeff looked back at the empty contact couch. "It's the animals down there who will die."

  Laura whispered, "What can we do?"

  "Nothing," said Amanda.

  "That's what you think," Jeff snapped.

  CHAPTER 25

  The Tabernacle was filled for the evening service. Even the scientists and social technicians were there, at Bishop Foy's express command.

  After the opening prayers, the hymns of praise, and the special prayers for strength and guidance, the Bishop—in his full regalia of green and gold—paced slowly, wearily to the lectern to begin his sermon.

  With an intensity that even Jeff could see, from his pew halfway toward the doors, Bishop Foy's bony, blue-veined hands gripped the lectern. It had been made of wood taken from the original Church of Nirvan, in St. Thomas. The Bishop seemed to gain strength from touching it.

  "Tomorrow," he began, in a voice that Jeff could barely hear from his pew, "we return to the work that God has given us, a task that will determine the fate of millions of souls spread over the dark distances between here and Earth, and uncounted billions of souls of the yet-unborn."

  He took in a long, weary breath. His body straightened, his voice grew stronger. "Tomorrow, after fourteen days of mourning, we renew our faith and our commitment and take up once again the task to which we have dedicated our lives. Tomorrow, we pay homage to our dead i
n the way they would have wanted us to: by returning to the work for which they sacrificed their lives."

  Jeff knew it was an old orator's trick: start out softly and increase the volume as you drive your points home. And it always worked; it never failed to stir an audience. He probably has the amplifiers set on a feedback loop, Jeff thought, so that the louder his voice, the more wattage they pour into the speakers.

  The Bishop became eloquent, powerfully stirring up the images of duty and faith that would strike at the students' souls. He spoke of God's infinite wisdom, and of Nirvan's promise of eternal paradise for those who obeyed God's will.

  But how does he know God's will? Jeff asked himself silently. How do I know that he isn't confusing his own desires with the wisdom of the Almighty?

  "Let each of us renew our vows," the Bishop commanded, in a voice that rang with certainty and power, "to devote every gram of strength and purpose in us toward the goal that these fourteen martyrs gave their lives for: To redeem that planet of Satan below us and transform it into a new Eden! To find the salvation of our souls in preparing a living home world for the colonists that are on their way! To work, and work, and work still more—no matter what the setbacks, no matter the pain or danger, no matter the obstacles in our path."

  Raising his eyes toward the brilliantly glowing Globe of Nirvan that hovered over the packed pews of the congregation, the Bishop raised his hands in benediction and murmured, "Let us pray."

  Some four hundred students bowed their heads obediently. Many of the scientists and social techs did also. Jeff lowered his chin a few centimeters, but looked sidelong across the crowded pews. His moment was almost here.

  "Amen," said the Bishop, the signal for everyone to sit up straight again. Then the ritual dismissal: "Let all voices be as one in the praise of the Lord as we return to God's work."

  His palms suddenly slick with sweat, Jeff rose to his feet, feeling his heart fluttering in his chest.

  "Reverend Bishop, may I speak my praise?"

  It was a ritual phrasing, inserted into the liturgy when the founders of the Church of Nirvan realized that many potential converts expected the right to speak during the worship services, if the Spirit so moved them.

  Foy looked startled. He peered at Jeff in a squinting way that made Jeff wonder if the Bishop recognized him at this distance.

  "Every member of the Faithful is free to praise the Lord," Bishop Foy answered, unable to hide the impatient scowl on his face.

  "Reverend Bishop," said Jeff, forcing himself to speak loudly enough to be heard throughout the circular chamber, "you ask us to dedicate ourselves anew to the task before us. But, sir . . ."

  Jeff hesitated. Can I go through with it? Will the others support me?

  He swallowed hard, then went on, "Sir, I find that I cannot in good conscience continue to participate in the destruction of the world we call Altair VI."

  A sigh went through the Tabernacle, a sort of collective moan that escaped unbidden from more than five hundred throats. Jeff saw Carbo whip around from his seat in a front-row pew. Amanda, sitting beside him, swung her gaze from Jeff to the Bishop.

  Foy stared at Jeff. "May I remind you that you swore before God to transform Altair VI. Do you take your vows so lightly?"

  Jeff had expected his legs to turn to putty once the Bishop levelled his guns at him. Instead, he answered firmly:

  "I do not take my vows lightly, Reverend Bishop. But my conscience will not allow me to participate in killing all the living creatures of an entire world."

  The students stirred and buzzed like a single entity awakening from a chrysalis.

  Foy glared, knowing that to control them all, he had to control this one outspoken rebel.

  "You stand in danger of excommunication," the Bishop warned.

  "Nirvan teaches that the individual conscience is the final authority," Jeff countered. "I ask all those whose consciences are troubled to stand with me, and refuse to continue the genocidal work we have been put to doing."

  The Tabernacle went absolutely still. Jeff could hear his heart thudding in his eardrums. Foy stood frozen at the lectern, leaning on it as if he would collapse without its support.

  Then, from her assigned pew, Laura McGrath got to her feet. Across the main aisle, Petrocelli's best friend rose. Then another student, and another. Jeff turned to see a half-dozen more standing behind him, and when he faced forward again, Carbo, Amanda, and two others among the scientists were on their feet.

  So few, he realized. A dozen students. Four scientists. Not very many. But enough. Enough to stop things where they stand.

  Foy thundered, "You fools! Don't you understand that you cannot return to Earth! You students will never be brought back to Earth! You will either transform this planet or die here aboard the Village!"

  None of the students sat down. Two more got to their feet.

  "As your spiritual leader and the head of this project I command you to sit down," Foy said. He lowered his voice and added, "If you sit down now and return to Nirvan's path of obedience, we will forget all about this incident."

  Jeff called out, "Reverend Bishop, you are asking us to put authority above conscience, to obey rather than Believe."

  "I am ordering you to remember your vows to God and this Church, and to be faithful to them."

  "Those vows said nothing about annihilating millions of God's creatures," Jeff replied. "A vow taken in ignorance is meaningless."

  The Bishop's mouth opened, then clicked shut. He glared out at the congregation. shot a special frown at Carbo and the other standing scientists, then snapped, "The service is ended. Go in peace."

  With that, he turned abruptly from the lectern and strode to the gothic-arched door at the far side of the altar, radiating frustration and anger.

  Jeff stood there, his knees rubbery, cold sweat trickling down his flanks. How much easier to be a wolfcat, he thought in a distant part of his mind, and deal in the simplicities of life and death.

  The students stood in their pews for a stunned few moments after the Bishop had fled from the altar. Then hundreds of dazed, hushed conversations burst out.

  Laura pushed her way through the milling crowd toward Jeff's side. "You did it," she said glowingly. "You actually stood up to him. I'm so proud of you!"

  But the other students kept their distance from Jeff. Even those who had stood with him made their way numbly to the Tabernacle's exits and toward their dormitory rooms.

  "I wonder what he's going to do now," Jeff said to Laura, voicing the fear they all felt.

  "What can he do, excommunicate us? We could get that reversed as soon as we get a message back home."

  "If he allows us to send a message back to Earth," Jeff said.

  "He couldn't refuse! We have rights . . . "

  "If we're excommunicated, what rights do we have?"

  Laura looked shocked. "This is a fine time to think of that, Jeff."

  "I thought of it this afternoon."

  "And you still . . . ?"

  He nodded. "I still went ahead and opposed him. I had to. I meant every word that I said, no matter what Bishop Foy does to us."

  Laura began to reply, then realized there was nothing she could say. She stood beside Jeff as the students filed out of the Tabernacle until there was no one left in the huge circular chamber except the two of them, standing alone beneath the dully glowering Globe of Nirvan.

  Stretched out on the soft warm buoyancy of the waterbed, Frank Carbo and Amanda Kolwezi were also worrying about Bishop Foy's next move.

  "Jeff shouldn't have done it," Amanda said, staring through the darkness to the star-filled viewport in the ceiling.

  "He had to. Somebody had to. He's the only one with the guts to do it."

  "But not like that," she said. "Not in front of the whole Village. He's forced Foy to retaliate."

  Carbo gave an exasperated grunt. "You've seen how Foy has responded to persuasion and argument. What else could be done except to face him he
ad-on?"

  "I don't know," Amanda answered. "But what Jeff did is bad strategy. It's forcing Foy into a corner, giving him no alternative except to lash back as strongly as he can."

  Carbo smiled in the darkness. "You talk like an expert in political strategy."

  "I am," Amanda said.

  "Really?"

  "Do you think a princess of a Congo tribe can live to adulthood—even in London—without learning something of politics?"

  He chuckled softly. "No, I suppose not. I am impressed. You are a woman of many, many talents."

  She turned toward him and crabbed two handfuls of his hair. "Which of my many, many talents do you like the most?"

  "Your mind, of course," Carbo said. "I love you for your mind."

  "Oh?"

  "Because it directs such a luscious, beautiful, well-coordinated body."

  She laughed and then kissed him.

  He held her close to him, feeling the cool softness of her body against his bare skin.

  "If a man marries a princess," he asked, "does that make him a prince?"

  "No. That makes him a princess' consort."

  "Consort. H'mph."

  "Would that damage your Italian male ego?" Amanda teased. "Would that weaken your machismo, or soften your, eh . . . pride?"

  "I don't think so. I guess we'll have to get married to find out."

  "A psychobiological experiment?"

  "I want to marry you, Amanda," he said, suddenly quite grave. "Will you marry me, my love?"

  He felt her breath quicken. "Frank—are you serious?"

  "I have never been more serious about anything in my life."

  "Marriage," Amanda murmured. "That . . . that's a major step, isn't it?"

  "Yes."

  "We seem very happy together without it."

  "I agree. But there is more involved than merely our physical passion—delightful though it may be."

  "Maybe?"

  "Be serious, darling. This project is going to end in a disaster, one way or the other. We could be stranded here, or we could be shipped back to Earth."