“I ought to have guessed,” she muttered.
The figure jerked in surprise, spun about.
“Why aren’t you decently dead, like you’re supposed to be?”
Flinx hesitated, replied without the hint of a smile, “It wasn’t destined to be part of the game.”
“You’re joking with me . . . even now. I should have killed you the same time I finished Challis. But no,” she said bitterly, “I had to keep you around as an amusement.”
“Are you sure that’s the only reason?” he inquired, so gently that she was momentarily taken aback.
“You play word games with me, too.” She raised the muzzle of the beamer. “I only regret I haven’t got time to kill you slowly. You haven’t even left me that.” She shrugged tiredly. “The price one pays for undersight, as my aunt would say, corruption be on her spirit. I am curious, though—how did you manage to tame and train these creatures?”
Flinx looked at her pityingly. “You still don’t understand anything, do you?”
“Only,” she replied, her finger tightening on the beamer’s trigger, “that this comes several months too late.”
“Wait!” he shouted pleadingly, “if you’ll give me one mm—”
The finger convulsed. At the same time someone doused her eyes with liquid fire. She screamed, and the beam passed just to the right of Flinx to obliterate the viewer nearby.
“Don’t rub!” he started to yell, rushing around the chair he’d been sitting in—already too late. At the moment of contact she’d dropped the beamer and begun rubbing instinctively at the awful pain in her face. She was on the floor now, rolling over and over.
The distance between them was no longer great, but by the time he reached her she was unconscious and stiff. Thirty seconds later she was dead.
“You never did take the time to listen, Teleen,” he murmured, kneeling numbly by the doubled-over corpse. Nervously flicking his long tongue in and out, Pip settled softly on Flinx’s shoulder. The minidrag was taut with anger.
“Your life was too rushed. Mine’s been too rushed, also.”
Something moved in the doorway. Looking up, Flinx saw a wheezing Sylzenzuzex standing there, favoring her splinted leghand. One truhand had a firm grip on a thranx-sized beamer.
“I see you found her,” she observed, her breath coming through the spicules of her b-thorax in long whistles. “Softsmooth tells me that the last bits of resistance are almost cleaned out.” Her compound eyes regarded him questioningly as he looked back down at the body.
“I didn’t find her. She found me. But before I could make her listen, Pip intervened. I suppose he had to; she would have killed me.” Unexpectedly, he glanced at her and smiled.
“You should see yourself, Syl. You look like a throwback from Hivehom’s pre-tranquility days. Like a warrior who has just concluded a successful brood raid on a neighboring hive. A wonderful advertisement for the compassionate understanding of the Church.”
She didn’t respond to the jibe. There was something in his voice. . . . “That’s not like you, Flinx.” She studied him as he turned back to stare at the corpse, trying to remember everything she knew of human emotion. It seemed to her that his interest in this woman, who for a few tams of vackel had worked willingly with the sworn enemies of humanx kind, was abnormal.
Sylzenzuzex was not her uncle’s equal when it came to intuitive deduction, but neither was she stupid. “You know something more about this human female than you have said.”
“I must have known her before,” he whispered, “though I don’t remember her at all. According to the time intervals given on the tape that’s not too surprising.” He gestured limply at the chamber behind him. “This was Challis’ apartment.” His hand returned to indicate the corpse. For a moment his eyes seemed nearly as deep as Moam’s. “This was my sister.”
Not until the following afternoon, after the bodies had been efficiently buried by the Ujurrians, did Sylzenzuzex insist on hearing about everything that had been recorded on the stolen tape.
“I was an orphan, Syl, raised on Moth by a human woman named Mother Mastiff. The information I found said that I’d been born to a professional Lynx named Rud, in Allahabad on Terra. The records also said I was a second child, though they didn’t give details. Those facts were to be found on the tape Challis stole, the tape I didn’t read until last night.
“My mother also had an elder sister. My mother’s husband, who according to the tape was not my father, gave that elder sister a position in his commercial firm. After he died, under still unexplained circumstances, the sister took control of the company and built it into a considerable business empire.
“It seems my mother and her sister were never the best of friends. Some of the details of what amounted to my mother’s captivity, and that’s what it reads like, are . . .” He had to stop for a moment.
“It’s easy to see how a mind like Challis’ would be attracted to details like that. My mother died soon after her husband. A number of unexplained incidents followed. No one could be certain, but it was theorized they might be attributable in some way to her male nephew. So . . . I was disposed of. A small sale in so large a commercial concern,” he added viciously.
“It amused the elder sister, Rashalleila, to keep the girl niece around. The sister’s name was Nuaman. The niece—my sister—was called Teleen. She became a mirror image of her aunt, took the company from her, and merged her mother’s name with her aunt’s. Symbospeeched it. Teleen of Rud and Nuaman . . . Teleen auz Rudenuaman.
“As for me—I was long forgotten by everyone. Challis’ researchers were interested in the part about my causing some ‘unexplained incidents,’ as they were called. He never troubled to make any other connections from the information.”
They walked on in silence, past the long gouge in the earth where the cannon tower had stood. Fluff, Moam, Bluebright, and Softsmooth trailed behind. They came upon a small building set alongside the landing field. Earlier, one of the Ujurrians had discovered that it led down to the extensive shuttlecraft hangar. The hangar held complete repair and construction facilities for shuttlecraft, as would be necessary on an isolated world like this. There was also an extensive machine shop and an enormous technical library on all aspects of Commonwealth KK ship maintenance. It would make a very useful branch of the Ujurrian school Flinx was planning to set up.
“I didn’t have time to ask last night, Fluff,” Flinx began, as they passed the end of the scar, “how did you manage that?”
“Was fun,” the big ursinoid responded brightly. “Was Moam’s idea mostly. Also a young She named Mask. While others dug tunnels, they two read much that was in books at the mine.”
“Made some changes in cold minds’ cave digger,” Moam supplied.
“The press drill,” murmured Sylzenzuzex, “they must have modified the press drill. But how?”
“Change here, add this,” explained Moam. ‘Was fun.”
“I wonder if modified is quite the word for turning a harmless tool into a completely new kind of weapon,” Flinx mused. He looked skyward. “Maybe we’ll let Moam and Mask and their friends play with the library and machine shop below. But first we have some other modifications that have to be carried out in a hurry. . . .”
The big freighter came out of KK drive just inside the orbit of Ulru-Ujurr’s second satellite, moving nearer on short bursts from its immensely powerful space-spanning engine. The freighter entered a low orbit around the vast blue-brown world, remaining directly above the only installation on its surface.
“Honored One, there is no response,” the disguised AAnn operating the ship’s communicator reported.
“Try again,” a deep voice commanded.
The operator did so, finally looked up helplessly. “There is no response on any of the closed-signal frequencies. But there is something else—something very peculiar.”
“Explain,” the Baron directed curtly. His mind was spinning.
“There is e
vidence of all kinds of subatmospheric broadcasting, but none on any frequencies I can tap into. And none of it is directed at us, despite my repeated calls.”
A man named Josephson, who was a very important executive in Rudenuaman Enterprises, moved next to the Baron. “What’s going on down there? This isn’t like Madam Rudenuaman.”
“It is not like many things,” observed the Baron cautiously. He turned his attention to another of the control pod operatives. “What is the cloud cover like above the base?”
“Clear and with little wind, sir,” the atmospheric meteorologist reported quickly. “A typical Ujurrian autumn day.”
The Baron hissed softly. “Josephson-sir, come with me, please.”
“Where are we going?” the confused executive wanted to know, even as he followed the Baron down the corridor leading to the far end of the command blister.
“Here.” The Baron hit a switch and the door slid back. “I require maximum resolution,” he instructed the on-duty technician.
“At once, Honored One,” the disguised reptilian acknowledged as he hurried to make the necessary adjustments to the surface scope. Sitting down alongside the tech, the Baron punched the requisite coordinates into the scope computer himself.
Then he remained motionless for several minutes, staring through the viewer. Eventually he moved aside, gestured that Josephson should take his place. The human did so, adjusting the focus slightly for his eyes. He gave a verbal and physical start.
“What do you see?” the Baron inquired.
“The base is gone, and there’s something in its place.”
“Then I may not be mad,” the Baron observed. ‘What do you see?”
“Well, the landing strip is still there, but something like a small city is climbing from the lakeshore up into the mountains. Knowing the terrain, I’d say several of the unfinished structures are a couple of hundred meters high.” His voice faded with astonishment.
“What does this suggest to you?” the Baron asked.
Josephson looked up from the scope, shaking his head slowly.
“It suggests,” the Baron hissed tightly, “that the structures may be built deeply into the mountains. By whom or how deeply we will not know, unless we go down to see for ourselves.”
“Wouldn’t advise that,” a new voice boomed.
Josephson gave a cry and stumbled out of the chair, pressing himself back against the console. The technician and the Baron whirled, both reaching simultaneously for their sidearms.
An apparition stood solidly in the center of the room. It was a good three meters tall, standing on its hind legs, and its bulk nearly dented the deck. Huge yellow eyes glared balefully down at them.
“Wouldn’t advise it,” the apparition repeated. “Get lost.”
The Baron’s hand beamer was aimed—but now there was nothing to shoot at.
“Hallucinations,” Josephson suggested shakily, after his voice returned.
The Baron said nothing, walked to the place where the creature had stood. He knelt in a way no human could, hunting for something on the floor. “A very hirsute hallucination,” he commented, examining several thick, coarse hairs. His mind was churning furiously.
“You know I’ve never been outside the main installation,” Josephson declared. “What was it?”
“An Ujurrian primitive,” the Baron explained thoughtfully, rubbing the hairs between false-skinned fingers
“What . . . what was it talking about?”
Disgust was evident in the Baron’s voice. “There are times when I wonder how you humans ever achieved half of what you have.”
“Now, look,” the executive began angrily, “there’s no need to get abusive.”
“No,” the Baron admitted. After all, they were still within Commonwealth territory. “There is no reason to get abusive. I apologize Josephson-sir.” Turning, they left the room and the wide-eyed technician.
“Where are we going now?”
“To do what the creature said.”
“Just a minute.” Josephson eyed the unblinking AAnn aristocrat firmly. “If the Madam is in trouble down there . . .”
“Sssisssttt . . . use your brain, warm-blood,” the Baron snorted. “Where there was a small base there is now a rapidly growing city. Where there used to be a single welcoming signal there is now a multitude of peculiar local communications. From a few clusters of cave-dwelling natives, there comes a teleport who advises us curtly not to land. Who advises us curtly—in your vernacular I might add, Josephson-sir—to make haste elsewhere.
“I think it reasonable, considering the evidence, for us to comply quickly. I act according to realities and not emotions, Josephson-sir. That is why I will always be one who gives orders and you will always be one who takes them.” He hurried his pace, pushing past the man and leaving him standing, to gape down the corridor after him.
As directed by the Baron, the freighter left Ulru-Ujurr’s vicinity at maximum velocity. Resting in his sumptuous cabin, the Baron pondered what had taken place during his absence. Something of considerable importance, with unknowable implications for the future.
Of one thing he was certain: Madam Rudenuaman and the enterprise they had collaborated on no longer existed. But there could be a host of reasons why.
That the natives were more than ignorant savages now seemed certain . . . but how much more certain he could not say. A single genius among them could have been mnemonically instructed to deliver what had been, after all, an extremely brief message. A new experimental device could have projected him aboard the freighter.
The burgeoning city below could be the product of the Church, the Commonwealth, a business competitor, or an alien interloper. This section of the Arm was still mostly unexplored; anything could be setting itself up on an isolated, unvisited world like Ulru-Ujurr.
He had done well by the venture. There were a number of small stones still in his possession, which he could ration out slowly to the Commonwealth over the years. His status at the Emperor’s court had risen considerably, though the Imperial psychotechnicians’ scheme of implanting suicidal impulse-plays into the Janus jewels and then selling them to important humans and thranx would now have to be abandoned.
That was too bad, for the program had been very successful. Yet this could have been worse. Whatever had wiped out the installation and Madam Rudenuaman could also have taken him, had he not gone in pursuit of the human child.
A pity the way she happened to encounter that human patrol vessel, forcing him to abandon any hope of eliminating her. Almost as if she’d known what she was doing. But it did not matter much, he knew. Let her rave about Ulru-Ujurr to any who might be credulous enough to listen—for now that world was no concern of his.
In the future, given the inevitable triumph of the Empire, he could return with an Imperial fleet, instead of skulking about in disguise like this and in the forced company of despised mammals and insects. Then he might re-establish control, nay, sovereignty over that enigmatic world, holding all the glory and profits to be gained therefrom for himself and the house of WW.
Maybe so, he mused pleasurably, maybe so.
He did not hear the voice that echoed in response from the depths of Someplace Else. A voice that echoed . . . maybe not!
The day dawned bright and warm. Sylzenzuzex found she could walk about freely with only the flimsiest covering.
She had developed a special rapport with the shy adolescent female called Mask, who had turned out to be a wonderful guide to the history and unexpectedly complex interrelationships of the Ujurrians. So Sylzenzuzex was reveling in her study of a subject dear to her heart.
Perhaps someday it would form the basis for a monograph, or even a full dissertation, one important enough to win reinstatement in the Church for her. Although the discovery that the Church had indeed been responsible for quarantining these people continued to cause her to question that organization’s standards, and her own future participation in it.
She le
ft her quarters in the building, intending to mention yesterday’s revelations to Flinx. But he did not seem to be anywhere around, nor was he at the landing strip school, nor at any of the factory centers ringing the old mine. One of the ursinoids finally directed her to a place at the far end of the valley, where she had once fled Rudenuaman’s grasp. After a fair climb up a steep bluff, she found him sitting cross-legged on a ledge consorting with a local insect no larger than his finger. It was enameled green and ochre, with yellow-spotted wings.
Pip was darting through the nearby bushes, worrying an exasperated, sinuous mammal half his size.
From here one could look back down the full length of the valley, see the azure lake cradled between snowcapped peaks, and watch the steady progress of construction along the south shore.
When Flinx finally turned to her, he wore an expression so sorrowful it shocked her.
“What’s the matter . . . why so sad?” she inquired.
“So who’s sad?”
She shook her valentine-shaped head slowly. When he didn’t respond, she gestured toward the lake valley.
“I don’t know what you have to be disappointed about. Your charges seem to have taken to your game of civilization with plenty of enthusiasm. Is it the ship Maybeso boarded? Whatever he told them must have been effective. They haven’t come back, and there’s been no sign of another ship in the months since.”
By way of reply he pointed toward the north shore of the lake. A vast metal superstructure was rising there. It was nearly as long as the lake itself.
“Something about the ship?”
He shook his head. “No . . . about the reason behind it. Syl, I’ve only accomplished half of what I set out to do. I know that my mother’s dead, but I still don’t know who my father was or what happened to him.” He stared hard at her. “And I want to know, Syl. Maybe he’s long dead, too, or alive and even a worse human animal than my sister turned out to be; but I want to know. I will know!” he finished with sudden vehemence.
“How does that connect with the ship?”