Dirge

  Derwent remembered the school, and his teeth clenched. Everyone had their limits. Despite his outwardly stoic demeanor he wanted to find something to hold responsible as badly as did everyone else. He wanted something to kill. Sure, he was first and foremost a professional, and he prided himself on his professional detachment.

  But when it came down to it, no matter how hard he tried to affect an air of indifference and aloofness, he was only human.

  Chapter 9

  he outrage and anger felt by the rest of humankind at the awful butchery that had taken place on Treetrunk were shared by every known sentient species. Ships of the thranx, the Pitar, the Quillp, and others were instructed as well as warned to be on the lookout for any unfamiliar or infrequently encountered species that might have the technological capability to perpetrate planetary genocide on the scale it had been committed on Argus V This request from Earth was readily, even eagerly, complied with. In addition, the thranx and the Pitar of their own accord sent out ships whose mission was specifically to search for the home of an as yet unidentified and unknown race of maniacal aliens.

  Nor did humans neglect to investigate possible motivations that might have arisen from within their own tortured racial history. Like any colony, Treetrunk had been settled by a heterogeneous broth of folk of every ethnic, religious, and social background. Nevertheless, the possibility that some powerful group, either from Earth itself or one of its distant colonies, held a grudge against a significant component of Treetrunk's population could not be and was not ex officio ruled out. In the absence of explanation, no prospect, no matter how outrageous, was automatically discounted. Every theory was investigated, every suggestion taken, every lead acted upon.

  But despite the remorseless and dedicated perseverance of both humans and their alien allies alike, nearly a year passed without so much as a single hint or clue emerging as to the identity of the perpetrators of the carnage. Human exploration and development of Earth's recognized sphere of influence were slowed as xenophobia and fear on Earth and its existing colonies gained sway over those who favored continued expansion. Few people were anxious to settle on new worlds knowing that the butchers of Treetrunk's six hundred thousand were still out there - unpunished, unidentified, and unknown - ready to annihilate the next rush of humans rash enough to try and settle themselves on yet another empty, inviting world.

  On Earth and elsewhere recriminations raged among a distraught and frustrated populace. How could such a catastrophe have been allowed to happen? Who had been negligent? In the absence of answers blame was readily placed elsewhere. Many who were innocent of oversight or neglect became inevitable scapegoats. There was finger-pointing in the media and in private, there were riots and accusations, while lawsuits and calumny raged aplenty. The only thing there was a dearth of was answers.

  Inevitably, gradually, the rotating military and forensic teams that were assigned to investigate Treetrunk completed their work. As one contingent after another was withdrawn, that hospitable world with its ringing waterfalls, racing streams, and globe-girdling forests was abandoned to its indigenous life-forms. No possibility had been overlooked, not even the remote chance that some advanced native civilization had managed to keep in hiding while their planet was settled, only to emerge one day to murder every unwary, unprepared settler. The highest form of life on Argus V was an arboreal saurian with sloe eyes and an accusative yip. Although it displayed some rudimentary tool-using behavior, it could not cope with the larger, dull-witted carnivores that preyed upon it, much less wipe out so much as a handful of well-armed humans.

  Reldmuurtinjak was a member of one of several thranx teams that had offered their services to help try to resolve the appalling riddle. Together with specialists from the Pitar and Quillp worlds, they, along with their human counterparts, poured over and through the scant available evidence, finding very little light in the unwholesome darkness that now shrouded the planet.

  If anything, the exceedingly organized thranx were more frustrated than their human colleagues. Such things simply did not happen in a part of the galaxy where sentience and civilization held sway. Yes, death and dissention and violent disagreement were still present, but they could always be explained if not justified. In the absence of reason, there were still reasons.

  Reldmuurtinjak was working in the ruins of one of Weald's few surviving administrative buildings when he looked up long enough to observe the tall human advancing toward him. He had never met a human being prior to being assigned to this grim duty. Scrutinizing the barren devastation for clues was difficult enough for him: He could only imagine what it must have been like for the first human crews forced to deal with thousands of corpses lying amidst the destruction.

  Like the rest of his kind he had heard a lot about the humans. Visuals had helped to put to rest some of the more outrageous tales that had been told about them. They did not tower over thranx; they were simply tall. Most could not bend their bodies into rubbery knots; they were merely flexible. And despite their ridiculous tailless longitudinal axis, they did not fall over. At least, not very often. While excitable and edgy, they could also relax and be pleasant. Personally, he found this last open to dispute. During his sojourn on Tree-trunk, the researcher had not seen very many of them relax.

  The one who now approached looked uneasy but not nervous. His name was Lee, and Reldmuurtinjak had struck up a causal, casual relationship with him as their respective groups labored side by side in search of answers in the ruins of Argus V's capital city. Unusually intense even for a human, he spent more time in the company of the thranx than did any other of his colleagues. Reldmuurtinjak wondered at this. He was soon to find out the reason why.

  Lee peered down at where the thranx was working in a slight depression in the floor. The space had somehow survived the collapse of the upper two floors. Lying within the shallow bowl was an intact desk together with contents. Typically, none of the desk's linking electronics had survived the devastation, but there were always hopes of finding notes, scribblings, jottings that might shed some light on what had happened. Using a translating scanner, Reldmuurtinjak was examining these now, neatly filing each sheet of treated synthesized cellulose into one of three piles.

  "Any luck?" the pale-haired human inquired rhetorically. Reldmuurtinjak replied as expected. "There is much surviving information. Unfortunately, none of it is relevant to our inquiry."

  Nodding to indicate that he understood, the human turned sideways and slip-slid cautiously down into the dimple in the stelacrete floor. "Your people are very good at this kind of work. You never seem to get tired, or bored."

  Reldmuurtinjak struggled to reply in his recently acquired Terranglo, even as the lanky human sought to address him in Low Thranx. Their conversation was a melange of both, an uncertain brew of slippery human vowels and fricative thranx clicks and whistles. The ungainly but evolving interspecies patois had unofficially been dubbed Symbospeech, and the name had stuck. As yet, the results were far from justifying even so semigrandiose an appellation. But with each encounter between the species, the shared vernacular grew.

  "We are accustomed to slow, methodical work." Reldmuurtinjak did not look up from his labor. It was not necessary, since there were few human gestures critical to interpret. Aural conversation conveyed the majority of their communication. "We are glad to help."

  "You know, some of my coworkers - not myself, understand - have wondered about that. Of all the other intelligent species, you and the Pitar were the first to volunteer your assistance." He looked distinctly uncomfortable, but Reldmuurtinjak had not dealt with enough humans for long enough to be able to interpret the extravagant range of human facial expressions. "There's been talk - I haven't participated in it myself - that maybe, and I hope you won't be offended by this, that maybe a rogue element of your people might have had something to do with this."

  It took a moment for the import of the human's words to sink in and for the thranx to review it in his mind to mak
e certain that he had not heard incorrectly.

  "'With this'?" Putting down the four tools he was handling simultaneously, he now turned face and antennae up to the human. "I believe I understand the implications of what you are saying. I just do not want to."

  Lee raised both hands in a gesture unfamiliar to Reldmuurtinjak. "Hey, it's not me! I don't give any credence to it for a moment." To emphasize his stance on the matter he concluded with a fairly fluent double click from the back of his throat. "I just think you ought to know what's being said about you. Not about you personally, understand. About some hypothetical thranx who might have had a hypothetical part in the real tragedy."

  Utilizing the by-now common human gesture, the researcher nodded deliberately. "There is tragedy in what you say, but it has nothing to do with what happened to this world." He turned slowly back to his work.

  The human started to edge a little closer and then, uncertain, held his ground. "I don't believe a word of it, of course. I mean, it doesn't make any sense. What would the thranx, any thranx, have to gain by participating in such a bloodbath? Not new lands to settle. Your kind get chilled in Earth's tropical regions. You'd be uncomfortable here on a midsummer's afternoon, like today. Most of the year you'd just freeze."

  "Quite true," Reldmuurtinjak agreed, trying to bundle his own cold-climate attire more tightly around his thorax. "We have no use for this world."

  "And we've had contact with each other for more than half a century now, with no major conflicts or disputes. Just the usual ranting and raving from xenophobes on both sides." He went silent.

  As the human appeared to be awaiting a response, Reldmuurtinjak supplied the one he thought the biped might be waiting to hear. "Those thranx who are suspicious of and wish no contact with your kind inveigh against it because they are frightened of your unpredictability."

  Lee frowned uncertainly. "Not our proclivity to violence?"

  "No. Recognizing that aggressiveness is not an uncommon characteristic among sentient species, we are not unsettled to find it among your kind. Our ancestors fought one another as ruthlessly as did yours. And we have been dealing with the feints and depredations of the far more belligerent AAnn for more than two hundred and fifty of your years. But the actions of the AAnn are more or less predictable. Those of your kind are not." Now he looked up from his work. "At least, the formula for mutual understanding is still in the developmental stage."

  Kneeling down alongside the insectoid, Lee was caught up in a pervasive scent of gardenia. "Look, I want to apologize for my friends. You have to understand that every human, here and on all our worlds, is intensely frustrated at our inability to identify the people or peoples who were responsible for the horror that happened here."

  Glistening compound eyes considered the flexible, enigmatic alien face. Reldmuurtinjak could not decipher what might be hidden there, but he did detect the concern in the mammal's voice. "We are frustrated too, but it does not lead us to make groundless accusations."

  An embarrassed Lee looked away. "It's a human thing. In the absence of someone to blame, blame anyone. I'm afraid that's not going to change until we find out what happened here."

  "Then relations between us are likely to be poisoned for some time." The thranx's voice was soft as always, the tone cool and uninflected. "Because my people have found nothing any more conclusive here than have yours."

  This time they were silent in tandem for a while before Lee spoke again. "It does strike some of us as peculiar that among the known sentient species capable of rendering assistance only the AAnn have declined to send research teams here to help with the search for leads."

  "/Kil!!ck/, that does not surprise us. The AAnn are a treacherous and dangerous people. They will kill when it is to their advantage and retreat in a confusion of apologies when strongly confronted. That is what makes dealing with them so infuriating. One moment they will be happy to trade keenly but fairly, the next they will ambush and destroy. If caught out, they are masters of repentance. In the absence of surety one must always be on guard against them."

  Lee considered thoughtfully. "You're not the first to hint that the AAnn might be responsible for this. Until the puzzle is solved, everyone is suspect. Even apostate humans."

  That startled the thranx researcher. "You would suspect your own kind of such an atrocity?"

  "Such things have happened in the past. In the First and Second Dark Ages."

  "But why? What possible motivation could there be?"

  As his legs began to cramp, Lee settled himself into a more comfortable seated position. "You spoke of the xenophobes among your own kind who don't want to have more than the most minimal contact with us. Ours are more zealous than yours. There are fanatics who'll do anything to keep our respective species from growing closer together." With a sweep of one arm he gestured at the devastation that surrounded them. "It's not out of the realm of possibility that they might resort to measures as extreme as this so they could blame the result on the thranx, or on nonhumans in general."

  "Then you have motivation." Although he spoke the words, the possibility that the scenario the human had just described might actually have taken place remained barely conceivable to Reldmuurtinjak.

  "Motivation, yes, but seemingly insupportable means of acting on it." Lee shifted his backside against the hard floor. "Though powerful, with many undeclared supporters, it's hard to envision how the xenophobes could have mustered sufficient military-style strength to carry out such a devastating assault on another world - much less erase any and all evidence of their participation. What happened to the Amazon hive was one thing. Obliterating the population of an entire colony is something else again. If such was actually the case it would answer one question, though."

  "Which one?" Reldmuurtinjak executed a gesture of ongoing confusion. "There are so many."

  Lee was not sophisticated enough to catch the delicate hint of humor. "How the invaders were able to achieve such complete surprise. Battalions of arriving fellow humans, even heavily armed fellow humans, would not be questioned. Not until it was too late. They could have spread themselves throughout the colony before attacking simultaneously at multiple points in response to some prearranged signal. Evidence of their perfidy could have been gathered up and destroyed after the fact." His tone was flat. "As I said, in the absence of the guilty, everyone is suspect. Even ourselves."

  "I am glad to know that we are not alone." The thranx had a well-developed sense of sarcasm. "Better your people should look to the AAnn, press them on their absence from the collective effort to unearth explanations, and watch the skies of your other colonies."

  "Everyone from New Riviera to Cachalot is on alert," Lee assured the bug. "Every arriving ship has to undergo checks and quarantine that would have been unthinkable just a couple of years ago. It's a monumental inconvenience, but most people understand the need."

  "Inconvenience is better than genocide." Examining a torn length of the familiar white human writing material, Reldmuurtinjak patiently set it in one of the three piles that were rising slowly beside him. "What have you heard from the central coordinating authority? Is there any news?"

  Leaning back against a melted mass of plastic that had once been a storage locker, Lee sighed resignedly. They were all tired from their fruitless researches. Arriving in orbit around Treetrunk, everyone had been flush with energy and enthusiasm, each man and woman in his complement certain they would be the one to find the key that would unlock the mystery of the colony's destruction. As the days wore on and became weeks, then months, nascent eagerness gave way to uncertainty, then to resignation, and lastly to a kind of professional ennui. No one expected the next building, the next box, the next electronic file, to provide anything more informative than the routine details of everyday life leading up to the disaster. He wondered if the thranx ran a similar gauntlet of discouraging emotion. If so, they did not show it - at least, not in any fashion a watching, wondering human could decipher.

  "
No," he replied. "Not a thing. I heard that a Quillp team working east of Chagos Downs thought they'd stumbled onto the wreckage of a downed nonhuman shuttle, but it turned out to be a privately registered aircraft. Strictly suborbital. Hundred percent human design and manufacture." In response to the unasked corollary he added, "No evidence of arms or armament was found in its vicinity, so it must have been local."

  Reldmuurtinjak was intrigued. "Among my kind individuals do not have access to their own shuttlecraft. There are private suborbital vehicles capable of very high-speed flight, but nothing that is competent for extraatmospheric travel. No individual entity smaller than a hive operates its own flights into orbit."

  "In that we are different," Lee explained. "Among my kind large nongovernmental organizations engaged in trade and commerce often operate their own vessels, which are naturally equipped with proprietary shuttles. There are also certain very wealthy individuals who have access to privately owned and operated ships, even starships, together with their associated shuttlecraft. It's not common, but it's not unheard of, either. That's the most likely explanation for what the Quillp found. Remember what I told you earlier about the - possibility of fanatic human xenophobes mounting their own attack on the settlements. The first step in plotting something like that would be to obtain adequate untraceable interstellar transportation. That means acquiring not only starships, but also unused or unregistered landing capability."

  Reldmuurtinjak indicated that he understood. "Nothing else, then?"

  Lee shook his head regretfully. "Only rumors that the money and resolve to keep our work here going is drying up.

  There are people on Earth and the colonies who want to concentrate the relevant research resources elsewhere."

  "As in finding a species to blame for what took place."

  Lee did not dispute the thranx's observation. How could he, when he had alluded to as much himself? "I'm afraid so."