“That’s got the bitch!” Once again Betsy emerged. “Now test the entire external web circuitry—sneetch and all!”
The Inuit technician punched out the requisites and studied the readout with increasing excitement. “Hot zot, Bets, we’re in business!”
Betsy yelled. “Ready on the flight deck?”
“Flight deck aye,” came the dulcet reply of the Baroness.
“Light her up!”
As Betsy clapped the hatch back into place and fastened it, the deeply resonant hum of all sixteen operating generators filled the belly of the exotic aircraft. He and Ookpik linked pinkie fingers and grinned. Then he called out, “Power input to the external web, Charly.”
“X-web aye,” said the Baroness. “You guys just ground-testing, or do we fly at last?”
Betsy dusted himself off. The apricot brocade of his gorgeous gown was stained and torn and most of the ruching around the cuffs was scorched away. But the rope of pearls still gleamed magnificently above his cleavage and the upstanding collar of golden lace was hardly damaged at all. He look off the magnifying goggles and stowed them in his reticule, then went forward.
“All the engine-cluster idiot lights are cyan,” said Baroness Charlotte-Amalie von Weissenberg-Rothenstein. She gestured out the ports on either hand. “And as you can see, we’re about as well webbed as possible. I vote for flight-test. We’ve got time before supper.”
Betsy squinted at the craft’s anomalous swept-back wings, which crawled with the purplish fire of the rho-field. “Oh, fudge! Take her up!”
The Baroness’s hands flew over the exotic controls, readying the gravomagnetic flyer for lift. Betsy sank gratefully into the righthand seat while Ookpik lounged against the navigation tank, chewing a corner of his mustache thoughtfully and eyeing the dupe panel readouts.
Inertialess, the craft rose vertically into the air without a tremor, then flew slowly along the crater rim toward where the others were parked.
The R.F communicator said, “Oho! Welcome to the flock, Number Two-Niner. Are you now a total go?”
“Keep us onscreen, Pongo,” the Baroness replied laconically. “We’re about to find out.”
The landscape outside the flyer vanished in a blur. The sky went from cobalt to purple to black in less than two seconds. The people on the flight deck experienced no sensation of motion or acceleration. Only the tumbling vista outside the ports and the exotic flight instrumentation revealed that they were now traveling in the outermost reaches of Earth’s atmosphere at a velocity approaching 12,000 kph, maneuvering in intricate zigzag patterns in response to the delicate promptings of the Baroness’s joystick and throttle treads.
They plummeted, glowing dully in reentry. She homed on the crater lake north of the Pliocene Danube that marked the site where Brede’s Ship had crashed a thousand years earlier.
Now the dull-black aircraft seemed to change from a missile into a bird. With its wings fully extended in glide configuration, it banked and swooped above the water as gracefully as a swallow. Down along the southern edge of the lake’s cup stood twenty-eight other long-legged exotic flyers, wings drooping to the ground and pointed snouts bowed as in meditation. Further west and north were areas where the crater rim was torn and scarred and partially collapsed, and where fragments of twisted cerametal protruded from burnt maquis vegetation. Some of the flyers had crashed on testing. One had exploded on initial light-up. Others had proved impossible to repair and had been dumped into the lake after parts cannibalization. Of the forty-two aircraft that Basil’s Bastards had found more than a month earlier, this twenty-ninth would be the last to be salvaged, thanks to the persistence of Betsy and his crew. Rehabilitating the exotic flyers had cost the lives of two pilots and four technicians; and Seumas Mac Suibhne, a bibulous engineer, had fallen out of a belly-hatch one night at the close of a long shift and broken both legs.
All in all, the expedition had thus far been a surprising success.
“She flies. We’re coming in,” said the Baroness to the RF com. “This is Two-Miner coming in hot.”
“Roj on the hot touch, Charly. And hoo-raw at last. We thought you guys were stuck with a deader for sure.”
Betsy sighed deeply and said into the second headset, “I really thought I’d have to give up on her, Pongo. If Dmitri hadn’t suggested that bypass on the MHD tertiary, we’d still be ground-bound. I’ve had it up to here trying to fix these barbarian clunkers.”
“We knew you could do it if anyone could, Betsy,” said another voice.
“Is that you, Basil?” asked the Baroness. The rhocraft was descending perpendicularly into the sitting flock of its fellows.
“I was watching you on the scope, luv,” said Basil’s voice. “Fine show. We’re getting a celebration supper ready for you. Extra wild garlic in the old antelope stew.”
Ookpik made a strangled sound.
“The last birdie out of the nest,” murmured the pilot. There was a gentle jar as the field-clad landing gear touched. Smoke rose from bits of dried grass set on fire by the web of purple energy. Then the tail settled and the nose tilted down. The Baroness killed the rho-fietd, shut the rest of the systems down, and sat staring at the dead control panel with an abstracted smile. “I could have danced all night.”
Betsy patted her encouragingly on the shoulder. Ookpik was already opening the belly-hatch. “Come along, Charly dear. Mustn’t keep our noble leader waiting. I’m dying to find out where he plans to hide the bulk of our fleet.”
“If I could have just kept on flying,” the Baroness said. “Out of this crazy place for good! To the other side of the planet. To Pliocene Australia or China where there aren’t any Tanu or Firvulag or crazy runty humans bucking to be King of the World! Oh, Betsy, how I’d love to steal this aircraft!”
“A lot of us know your feeling. I’m afraid Basil does too, however.”
The Baroness collected her paraphernalia. “The ostensible guarding of the fleet against Firvulag marauders was a pretty thin ruse, all right.”
“And then there was Seumas.” Betsy smoothed his goatee and lowered one purple eyelid knowingly.
“You’re kidding—!”
“A very rash young man, for all his skill. I’m sure he and Thongsa must have had it all worked out between them. However, it was a sad miscalculation to think that Sophronisba Gillis would go along with the plot. She’s completely loyal.”
The Baroness smothered a guffaw. “You think Phronsie chucked old Shame out of the belly-hatch that night when he suggested that the three of them scarper off with the flyer?”
Betsy shrugged. “Seumas could still continue to work in spite of his broken legs. And his great and good pilot friend has had a certain air of suppressed terror about him ever since the incident. As any sensible soul would, with the indomitable Miss Gillis watching for any old excuse to whup his ass into the dirt.”
“Phronsie the enforcer. My God.”
“Basil is a fine leader. Devoted to his Bastards. But long years in the jungles of academe have given him a knowledge of human nature. Basil takes his responsibility seriously, and these flyers are such a dreadful temptation, even to the best of us.”
They moved off the flight deck into the belly-compartment. The Baroness said, “Odds on that Taffy Evans is another of Basil’s watchdogs. And Nazir! And that Scowegian hunk, Bengt Sandvik. Yes—now that you mention it, I can see that one or another of them was always in the crew whenever a fresh aircraft went operational—oops!”
She stumbled over one of the haywire testing cables. The dainty hand of the Elizabethan transvestite steadied her in an iron grip, in spite of the fact that she outweighed him by fifteen kilos. With a startled gasp she looked down into his lovely green eyes. “You too, eh, sport?”
“Our supper is waiting,” Betsy said. He gestured to the exit ladder. “After you, darling.”
* * *
The leading aircraft descended to 10,000 meters and hung in the air above the blindingly brilliant c
luster of peaks.
“Fan-bloody-taslic,” exclaimed Pongo Warburton He eased them into a slow holding pattern. “How high she be, Basil?”
The exotic terrain-clearance indicator had been equipped with an improvised converter. Basil and Aldo Manetti worked with this for a few minutes, surveying the central section of the massif and making a permanent chart on a large durofilm sheet. Basil said, “The principal summit, Monte Rosa, is 9082 meters. The neighboring peaks are all above 8000.” The don’s voice was vibrant with excitement.
“How high was Everest?” Pongo wanted to know.
“Around 8850,” said Aldo, “depending on how much snow was in that year’s monsoon. And how recently the garbage-collecting crews had been there, cleaning up after the outworld daytrippers.”
The pilot adjusted their altitude, bringing them closer to the pristine mountain.
“Sublime,” Basil whispered.
“And virgin,” Aldo added. “I could cry I am crying.”
“Is it the highest on Pliocene Earth?” Pongo asked.
“Undoubtedly,” Basil said, “if geologists are correct in their premise that the Alps exceeded the Himalaya in height during this epoch. Of course, these Helvetides will be greatly worn down during the coming Pleistocene Ice Age, and there will be tectonic adjustments as well—rising and falling of the entire Alpine region. Poor Monte Rosa will eventually yield pride of place to Mont Blanc as highest peak in Europe. In our own Milieu she will only be second highest. And only the locals and a few keen climbers such as Aldo and I will know her name . . .”
The RF communicator of the aircraft said: “Number One, this is Twelve. All of us now in position at twenty kloms high and holding.”
“Maintain altitude,” said Basil. “Enjoy the view while Aldo and I decide which portion of the cold-storage locker to use.”
“We’re gonna put the rhoboats here?” said an anonymous voice in accents of acute dismay. Every one of the Bastards had perforce come along on this first phase of the ferrying mission. Only the Howler guide, Kalipin, had remained at the crater lake.
“That’s my plan, yes,” said Basil.
There were sinister female chuckles. “Any of you mothers figuring to sneak back overland later on and rip off a bird— don’t forget your fur-lined jockstrap. And your ice pick.”
“We’d sooner try to melt your heart, Phronsie,” said the dispirited voice.
Basil said, “The inaccessibility of the place is one of its great advantages, of course. No chaliko-riding exotic or human could possibly get in here. Not even levitating. The beasts would be subject to anoxia and hypothermia, as would unacclimated riders.”
“Some of the Tanu body-fly,” said the voice of Taffy Evans. “And so does that friggerty Aiken Drum.”
“We can’t make the craft completely secure,” Basil admitted. “But up here, if we choose a hiding place with care, the aircraft will be concealed by snow cover very quickly, making their detection by—er—mass-scanning farsense very difficult. And, of course, the Lowlife leadership will be in possession of the only chart showing the parking site. When we’re ready to retrieve the flyers, they can be melted free by soft heat-beam fire.”
The radio chatter continued while Basil and Aldo reconnoitered the terrain, finally landing in a high valley below the northern flank of Monte Rosa that was free of glaciers but still well covered with fresh snow in mid-July. Both of the mountaineers had bodies that had been artificially adapted for high-altitude exploration during a previous rejuvenation; and so, after cautioning Pongo Warburton to remain safely inside the aircraft, they put on warm clothing and went tramping gleefully in the snow, ostensibly doing a final ground survey with sonic probes before calling in the other ships.
Manetti finally sat down on a protruding rock and gazed at the mountain looming above them. “What a perfect place this is to begin the ascent! How do you like the West Col for starters?”
“Quite feasible, I should say. We’re at—er—5924 meters, which leaves quite a respectable jaunt to the summit.” His voice lowered. “It was the reason I came to the Pliocene, you know. To find this, if it existed, and climb it. Well—I’ve got this close.”
“Maybe it’ll be a short war.”
Basil was looking around the perimeter of the valley with a small monocular. “Devilish tight place to get into without an aircraft. You d have to come in from the north. Almost a straight-up slog from the Wallis valley of the Rhône. A logistic nightmare.”
“No sweat as long as you have the two flyers tucked away in the Vosges. Then later, when the Lowlife Air Arm is trained, you can shift this frozen fleet to a more convenient spot. None of my business, of course . . . but aren’t your precautions against theft of the flyers just a trifle extreme?”
“Chief Burke’ s orders, old chap. Like the biblical centurion, I am merely a man subject to authority. And rather glad to be.”
Aldo got up and stretched. “Well, we might as well call down the others, then get back to the Ship’s Grave for the second batch. Looks like we’ll have no trouble getting them all ferried today.”
“We’ll have to post extra guards at the crater tonight,” Basil said as they walked back to their flyer. “With only the two aircraft left now to take us back home . . . well, ‘Quis custodiet ipsos custodes,’ as your old countryman Juvenal will one day remark.”
“I might be tempted myself,” Aldo laughed, “if I only knew how to drive one of the things. And if I wasn’t so eager to climb Rosa with you some fine day, compare mio.”
“We’re so close to finishing our task, Aldo. If something should go wrong now—”
“What could? Tomorrow, we fly home!”
Basil’s expression was pained. “There have been—er— hints of trouble.”
“Thongsa again?” Aldo’s lip curled. “Not to worry. Phronsie’s got that little pillroller so scared he won’t even go to the loo without company.”
“Something more ominous, I’m afraid. I shouldn’t burden you, Aldo. As expedition leader, I shall have to deal with the matter as best I can.”
“A centurion’s lot is not a happy one. He had to give orders as well as take them, I recall.”
The two of them crunched along wordlessly for a few minutes. In spite of the altitude and the surrounding snowfields, the sun was hot. They stripped off their balaclavas and opened their survival vests. The parked aircraft was still half a kilometer away.
“If Chief Burke were here,” Basil said, “he’d make the necessary command decision in a trice. I’m afraid my own blood’s too thinned by centuries of civilization to make me property ruthless . . . May I pose an abstract problem to you?”
The suddenness of the question took Aldo off guard. “Go ahead.”
“Suppose that last night, a trusted member of our company proposed treason, speaking to another member of our company. The second member, being secretly one of my—er—enforcers, notified me of the treacherous proposition after having temporized with the potential renegade.”
“Jesus H. Christ!”
“Suppose this potential traitor is a person who has behaved in an exemplary fashion up until now. Suppose the person is possessed of extraordinary talents that we had counted on utilizing when we begin adapting the aircraft for combat. Suppose this person is not a pilot, and therefore hoped to suborn one in order to implement his treason—”
“To do what, for God’s sake?”
“To turn over an aircraft, and the approximate location of this parking site, to Aiken Drum. In return for the usual perquisites ‘
“Keeping this abstract,” Aldo muttered, “you seem to have two fairly clear choices. Numero uno. You kill the fucking bastard out of hand before he finds himself a pilot with shakier loyally. Numero due—and this one holds good only if the guy’s really valuable—you lock him up tighter than a Lylmik’s bum and lei him live as long as he cooperates.”
Basil pursed his lips and nodded in agreement. “And which of those options, in your view,
represents the most prudent choice?”
“Well . . . so far, the guy’s done nothing but talk. Right?”
“Correct. And the proposition made to my informant was couched in the most ambiguous possible terms. Its basic intent was plain, however.”
“Oh, hell, I don’t know,” Aldo said “You’ve only got this peacher’s word. What if he read the other guy wrong? What if your boy has some private little axe of his own to grind?” Manetti wiped perspiration from his forehead.
“The possibilities had occurred to me, too.”
“Why not keep the traitor under surveillance? Maybe even let him know your doubts about him? He might back off, figure the game’s not worth the risk. Then you’ll still be able to use him. Good rhocraft technicians don’t grow under every bush in this Pliocene Exile.”
“True.” They were approaching the flyer. “I appreciate your counsel, Aldo I think you’ve helped me. A harder-hearted man would have chosen a more uncompromising course. But you and I . . . mountaineers are such romantics at heart. I’d like to give everyone the benefit of the doubt.”
Aldo began to climb up the aircraft boarding ladder. He smiled over his shoulder at the don. “A little artful psychology can do the job just as well as the big fist.”
“I hope you’re right,” Basil said. “I do hope you’re right.”
Basil groaned, shifting on the decamole cot. Someone was shaking him by the shoulder. There were staccato voices outside the tent and a wild sound of weeping. It was very dark.
“Basil, wake up.” Bengt Sandvik was urgent “Emergency.”
“Oh, no.”
The expedition leader pulled himself up and thumbed his wrist chronometer. It was almost four. His head spun from a belated touch of mountain sickness and he could barely understand what Bengt was saying. He groped for his boots and stuffed his feel into them.