Homeward Bound Part 7

She also almost reminded him that he'd already fooled around in s.p.a.ce. At the last minute, she didn't. It wasn't so much that he would point out he hadn't been weightless then; the Lizards' ship had spun to give it artificial gravity. But she didn't want him thinking about Ka.s.squit, and about the days when he'd been young and h.o.r.n.y all the time, any more than he had to. Yes, keeping quiet seemed a very good idea.

Sam Yeager spent as much time as he could in the Admiral Peary Admiral Peary's control room. Part of that was because he couldn't get enough of looking at Home. Part of it was because the control room wasn't far from the revival room. He got the chance to say h.e.l.lo to some people he hadn't seen for more than fifty years. That was what the calendar insisted, anyway. To him, it seemed like days or weeks. It was a matter of years to them, but not anything like fifty.

And he enjoyed the company of Glen Johnson and Mickey Flynn-and, to a lesser degree, that of Walter Stone. Stone was too much the regulation officer for Sam to feel completely comfortable around him. Such men were often necessary. Yeager knew as much. But he wasn't one of them himself, and, as far as he was concerned, they were also often annoying. He gave no hint of that opinion any place where Stone could overhear him.

Johnson, now, Johnson was as much of a troublemaker as Sam was himself. The authorities had known as much, too. Yeager asked him, "Did you get the subtle hints that it would be a good idea for you to go into cold sleep if you wanted to have a chance to keep breathing?"

"Subtle hints?" The pilot considered. "Well, that depends on what you mean. Healey didn't quite say, 'You have been ordered to volunteer for this procedure.' He didn't quite say it, but he sure meant it. You, too, eh?"

"Oh, yes." Sam nodded. "They looked at me and they thought, Indianapolis. Indianapolis. I'm not sorry I'm a long way away." I'm not sorry I'm a long way away."

"I've been in Indianapolis," Flynn said. "They should have given you a medal."

Sam scowled and shook his head. Johnson said, "Not funny, Mickey."

"They were people there. Everybody back in the States thought I forgot about that or didn't care," Sam said. "What they wouldn't see was that the Lizards we blew up were people, too."

"That's it," Johnson agreed. "I was up there on patrol when we did that. I figured it was the Reds or the n.a.z.is, but it wasn't. The Lizards would have got their own back against them. They had to against us, too."

"We spent so much time and so much blood making the Race believe we were people, and deserved to be treated like people," Yeager said. "Then we didn't believe it about them. If that's not a two-way street, it doesn't work at all."

Before either of the pilots could say anything, alarms blared. They both forgot about Sam and swung back to the instrument panels. Equipment failure? Lizard attack? No and no. The urgent voice on the intercom said what it was: "Code blue! Code blue! Dr. Kaplan to the revival room! Dr. Garvey to the revival room! Dr. Kaplan! Dr. Garvey! Code blue! Code blue!"

"d.a.m.n," Glen Johnson said softly.

"Yeah." Yeager nodded. When the Lizards went into cold sleep, they were all but guaranteed to come out again when revival time rolled around. As often happened when humans adopted and adapted the Race's techniques, they made them work, but less efficiently. Sam often wondered how very lucky he was to have awakened here in orbit around Tau Ceti 2.

"Who's getting revived now?" the pilot asked.

"I haven't looked at the schedule for today," Sam answered. "Do you have a copy handy?"

"I ought to, somewhere." Johnson flipped through papers clipped together and held on a console by large rubber bands so they wouldn't float all over the place. He found the one he wanted and went down it with his finger. Suddenly, he stopped. "Oh, s.h.i.t," he muttered.

"Who, for G.o.d's sake?" Sam asked.

"It's the Doctor," Johnson said.

"Christ!" Sam exclaimed. People had been calling the diplomat the Doctor for years. He was a lucky Jew: his parents had got him out of n.a.z.i Germany in 1938, when he was fifteen. He'd been at Harvard when the Lizards came, and spent a hitch in the Army afterwards. When the fighting ended, he'd gone back to school and earned his doctorate in nineteenth-century international relations.

He'd moved back and forth between universities and the government from that time on. Ever since Henry Cabot Lodge retired in the early 1970s, he'd been the U.S. amba.s.sador to the Race. With his formidably intelligent face and his slow, ponderous, Germanic way of speaking, he was one of the most recognizable men on Earth. He would have been a natural to head up the first American mission to Home.

Sam wondered when the Doctor had gone into cold sleep. Probably not till just before the Admiral Peary Admiral Peary took off. The two of them had met several times before Sam went under, and the Doctor had consulted him about the Race by telephone fairly regularly. Sam had looked forward to working with the diplomat here ever since spotting his name on the list. took off. The two of them had met several times before Sam went under, and the Doctor had consulted him about the Race by telephone fairly regularly. Sam had looked forward to working with the diplomat here ever since spotting his name on the list.

He had, yes. Now . . . Hoping against hope, he asked, "Have they ever managed to revive anybody they've called a code blue on?"

Glen Johnson shook his head. "Not that I remember."

"I didn't think so. I was hoping you'd tell me I was wrong."

He wondered if he ought to pull himself down the hatchway and see what was going on in the revival room. Regretfully, he decided that wasn't a good idea. Everybody in there would be desperately trying to resuscitate the Doctor. As soon as anyone noticed him rubbernecking, they'd all scream at him to get the h.e.l.l out of there.

"If the Doctor doesn't make it," Johnson said slowly, "who the h.e.l.l d.i.c.kers with the Lizards?"

"I haven't studied the whole pa.s.senger list," Sam said. "Besides, who knows how many people got important between the time when I went under and when the Admiral Peary Admiral Peary took off?" took off?"

"Yeah, same goes for me," the pilot said. "They put me in cold sleep after you, but before that I was as far away from everything that was happening on Earth as you could be if you weren't on a starship."

The only human-well, sort of human-on a starship before us was Ka.s.squit, Sam thought. He hadn't been surprised to find out she was here. It made sense for the Race to have their best experts on Big Uglies help deal with the wild ones. And who knew more about humans than somebody who biologically was one? Sam thought. He hadn't been surprised to find out she was here. It made sense for the Race to have their best experts on Big Uglies help deal with the wild ones. And who knew more about humans than somebody who biologically was one?

Dr. Blanchard came floating up into the control room. One look at her face told Sam all he needed to know. Back when he was a minor-league baseball player, he'd worn that same expression after grounding into a game-ending double play with the tying run at third. "I'm sorry," he said quietly.

"We did everything we knew how to do." Dr. Blanchard might have been trying to convince herself as well as Yeager. "We did everything we knew how to do, but his heart just wouldn't get going. Hard to revive a man if you can't give him a heartbeat."

"Cool him down again, then?" Sam asked. "Maybe they'll have better techniques when we get back to Earth." If we ever get back to Earth. If we ever get back to Earth.

"Kaplan and Garvey are doing that," Blanchard said. "I wouldn't bet the farm on it, though. If we can't revive him, he's probably been dead-dead in slow motion, but dead-for a long time."

"Dead in slow motion. There's a h.e.l.l of a phrase," Glen Johnson said. "Reminds me of my ex-wife." By the way Dr. Blanchard laughed, she might have had an ex-husband to be reminded of. But then Johnson's face clouded. "She's dead for real now. Everybody I knew back on Earth is probably dead now."

"I've got two grandsons," Sam said. "They were little boys when I went under. They're middle-aged now-h.e.l.l, if you're not talking about clock time, they're older than their dad and mom. I wonder if they remember me at all. Maybe a little."

"Most of the people here don't have a lot of ties back home," Blanchard said. "I've got cousins and nieces and nephews there, but n.o.body I was real close to. Some of them are bound to be around now. But when we get back again?" She spread her hands and shook her head. "Cold sleep's a funny business."

"The Lizards have a whole little subsociety, I guess you'd call it, of males and females who spend a lot of time in cold sleep," Sam said. "They keep one another company, because they're the only ones who know what it's like being cut off that way from the time they were hatched in. And they live longer than we do, and they've got faster starships, and their culture doesn't change as fast as ours."

"So you think we'll do the same?" Johnson asked.

"You bet I do," Sam said. "You ever see Joe DiMaggio play?"

"Sure." The pilot nodded. "In Cleveland. I may even have seen you you once or twice. I used to go to bush-league games now and then." once or twice. I used to go to bush-league games now and then."

"Thanks a lot," Yeager said without rancor. "Forget about me. Remember DiMaggio. Suppose we come back in 2070-something and you start going on about Joltin' Joe. Who's going to know what you're talking about, or if you're talking through your hat? n.o.body except a guy who's spent a lot of years on ice."

"I never saw DiMaggio play," said Melanie Blanchard, who looked to be in her mid-forties. "He retired about the time I was born." never saw DiMaggio play," said Melanie Blanchard, who looked to be in her mid-forties. "He retired about the time I was born."

"You at least know about him, though," Sam said. "By the time we get home, he'll be ancient history." They went on talking about it, none of them getting too excited. It hurt less than talking about losing the Doctor would have.

The next three revivals went well, which helped make people feel better about things. Then Sam got summoned to the commandant's quarters. He hadn't had much to do with Lieutenant General Healey, and hadn't wanted much to do with him, either. Healey was Army through and through, even more so than Stone. Sam wasn't, and doubted very much whether the commandant approved of him.

Approve or not, General Healey was polite enough, waving Sam to a chair and waiting till he'd buckled himself in. He owned a round bulldog face and eyebrows that seemed to have a life of their own. They twitched now: twitched unhappily, if Sam was any judge. The commandant said, "We have communicated our unfortunate failure to revive the Doctor to the Race."

"Yes, sir." Sam nodded. "Unfortunate is right, but you had to do it."

"Their response was . . . unexpected." Healey looked unhappier yet.

"Yes, sir," Sam repeated; that was always safe. "Do you need my advice about whatever it was they said?"

"In a manner of speaking, but only in a manner of speaking," Healey replied. "They were disturbed to learn they would not be negotiating with the Doctor. Everything they had heard about him from Earth was favorable."

"I can see how it would have been," Sam said.

"There is one other person aboard this ship about whom they said the same thing," Healey went on, each word seeming to taste worse than the one before. "In the Doctor's absence, they insist that we negotiate through you, you, Colonel." Colonel."

"Me?" Sam yelped. "I'm no striped-pants diplomat. I'm a behind-the-scenes kind of guy."

"Not any more, you're not," Lieutenant General Healey said grimly. "They don't want anything to do with anybody else. We're in no position to make demands here, unfortunately. They are. As of now, Colonel, the fate of mankind may well ride on your your shoulders. Congratulations, if that's the word I want." shoulders. Congratulations, if that's the word I want."

"Jesus Christ!" Sam said. And that wasn't half of what they'd say back in the USA more than ten years from now when speed-of-light radio told them what had happened. The fate of mankind on The fate of mankind on my my shoulders? shoulders? He wished he'd never heard of science fiction in his life. He wished he'd never heard of science fiction in his life.

"Is this the Tosevite ship Admiral Peary Admiral Peary? Do you read me, Admiral Peary Admiral Peary?" The shuttlecraft pilot on the other end of the line made a mess of the U.S. starship's name. Glen Johnson didn't suppose he could have expected anything different.

"That is correct, Shuttlecraft Pilot," he answered in the language of the Race. "I have you on radar. Your trajectory matches the course reported to me. You may proceed to docking. Our docking collar is produced to match those manufactured by the Race."

"Of course it is," Mickey Flynn interjected in English. "We stole the design from them."

"Hush," Johnson said, also in English. "It's useful to have parts that fit together no matter who made 'em. That's why most railroads have the same gauge."

"I am proceeding." The shuttlecraft pilot sounded dubious. "I hope you have the same high standards as the Race."

Humanity didn't. Johnson knew it. He was d.a.m.ned if he'd admit as much here. He said, "We crossed the s.p.a.ce between the star Tosev and your sun. We have arrived safely. That must say something about our capabilities."

"Something, yes," the shuttlecraft pilot replied. "It may well also say something about your foolhardiness."

So there, Johnson thought. Johnson thought. Had Had he been crazy to come aboard the he been crazy to come aboard the Admiral Peary Admiral Peary? Maybe not, but it sure hadn't hurt. He watched the shuttlecraft's approach, first on the radar screen and then with the Mark One eyeball. After a little while, he keyed the radio again. "You can fly that thing, I will say. I have flown in-atmosphere aircraft and craft not too different from that one. I know what I am talking about."

"I thank you for the compliment," the shuttlecraft pilot replied. "If I were not capable, would they have chosen me for this mission?"

"I don't know. You never can tell," Johnson said, but in English and without transmitting the words. Flynn let out what sounded suspiciously like a snort.

The pilot docked with the shuttlecraft. To Johnson's relief, the docking collar worked exactly the way it was supposed to. He went down to the corridor outside the air lock to say good-bye to the Yeagers and the others who were going down to the surface of Home.

"I'm jealous," he told Sam Yeager once more. "If I could take one gee's worth of gravity after going without for so long . . ."

"A likely story," Yeager said. "No girls to chase down there, and the weather's always hot. You'd do better staying here."

Lights on the wall showed that the outer airlock door was opening and the shuttlecraft pilot was moving his ship into the lock. The Race had wanted to inspect people's baggage before they went down to the surface of Home. Sam Yeager had said no. The Lizards didn't seem worried about weapons, at least not in the usual sense of the word. They were worried about ginger.

Just how worried they were, Johnson discovered when Karen Yeager, who was looking through the window set into the inner airlock door, squeaked in surprise. "It's not a Lizard!" she exclaimed. "It's a Rabotev."

That set everybody pushing off toward the window, trying to get a first look at one of the other two races in the Empire. Johnson's weightlessness-weakened muscles were at a disadvantage there, but he eventually got a turn. The Rabotev-what amazing news!-looked like the pictures the Lizards had brought to Earth.

It was a little taller, a little skinnier, a little straighter than a Lizard. Its scales were bigger and looked thicker than a Lizard's. They were a gray close to black, not a greenish brown. On its chest, the Rabotev wore a shuttlecraft pilot's body paint. Its hands were strange. They had four digits each; the outer two were both set at an angle from the middle two, and could both work as thumbs. Two digits on its feet pointed forward, two to the rear.

The Rabotev's head was a little more erect on its neck than a Lizard's, less so than a man's. It had its eyes mounted atop short, muscular stalks, not in eye turrets. They moved all the time; sometimes, it seemed, independently of each other. Johnson wondered if the shuttlecraft pilot had a snail somewhere way up his-her?-family tree. The Rabotev's snout was shorter than a Lizard's. When the alien opened its-that did seem the safest p.r.o.noun, in the absence of visible evidence one way or the other-mouth, it displayed a lot of sharp, yellow-orange teeth.

Sam Yeager said what Johnson had already thought: "They probably don't have to worry about getting this one high on ginger. Odds are it doesn't do anything for him."

"Would you let him in, Colonel Johnson?" Karen Yeager asked. "This is a first contact, in a way."

"Okay," Johnson said, and opened the inner airlock door. "I greet you," he called to the Rabotev in the language of the Race. "I am the pilot with whom you were speaking on the radio." He gave his name.

"I am Raatiil," the Rabotev said, p.r.o.nouncing each vowel separately. "And I greet you." He sounded like a Lizard; try as Johnson would, he couldn't detect any distinctive accent, the way he could when a human spoke the Lizards' language. "You are the first Tosevites I have ever seen." His eyestalks wiggled. They weren't long enough to tie in knots, which was probably a good thing.

"You are the first Rabotev any Tosevite has ever seen in person," Sam Yeager said. "We recognize you, of course, from pictures, but none of your kind has come to Tosev 3."

"Some are on the way now, I believe, in cold sleep," Raatiil said.

Johnson wondered if the Race hadn't used Rabotevs and Hallessi in the conquest fleet because it feared they might be unreliable. He doubted he would get a straight answer if he asked the question that way. Instead, he inquired, "What do you think of the Race?"

"They took us out of barbarism," the shuttlecraft pilot said simply. "They gave us the freedom of the stars. They cured diseases on our home planet. We are never hungry any more, the way we used to be. And the spirits of Emperors past watch over those of our folk, the same as they watch over those of the Race." The Rabotev's eyestalks set its large green eyes staring at its own feet for a moment.

Raatiil sounded altogether sincere. If it was, there went any chance of even thinking about raising rebellions in the subject species. Johnson had always figured that chance was pretty slim. The Lizards had held the Empire together for a long long time. time.

Jonathan Yeager asked, "What did your people used to reverence before the Race came to your planet?"

Raatiil opened and closed both hands. That must have been the Rabotev's equivalent of a shrug, for the alien answered, "These days, only scholars know. What difference does it make? Those other things could not have been as strong as the spirits of Emperors past, or we would have learned to fly between the stars and brought the Race into our empire instead of the other way round."

Was that what the Lizards had been teaching ever since they conquered what humans called Epsilon Eridani 2? Or had the Rabotevs come up with it themselves, to explain why they'd lost and the Lizards had won? After all these thousands of years, did anyone still remember how the story had got started?

"May I ask a question without causing offense?" Sam Yeager said. "As I told you, I am ignorant of your kind."

Raatiil made the affirmative gesture. With the Rabotev's two-thumbed hand, it looked odd, but it was understandable. "Ask," the shuttlecraft pilot said.

"I thank you," Yeager replied. "Are you male or female?"

"They predicted you would ask me this," Raatiil said. "As it happens, I am a male. The sand in which my egg was incubated was warm. But, except during mating season, it matters not at all to us. I am told it is different with you Tosevites, and I see this is so."

In English, Johnson said, "They've been studying up on us."

"Well, good," Jonathan Yeager replied in the same language. "I hope that means they take us seriously."

"Oh, they take us seriously, all right," Sam Yeager said. "We're here, so they have to take us seriously. Whether we can get anywhere when we talk to them-well, that's liable to be a different story."

The Rabotev's eyestalks kept swinging toward whoever was talking. Does he understand English? Does he understand English? Johnson wondered. Johnson wondered. Or is he just surprised to hear any language that isn't the Race's? Or is he just surprised to hear any language that isn't the Race's? The Race was nothing if not thoroughgoing. Signals from Earth had been coming Home for almost eighty years now. The Race was nothing if not thoroughgoing. Signals from Earth had been coming Home for almost eighty years now. Could Could the Lizards have taught some of the folk of the Empire the human tongue? No doubt about it. the Lizards have taught some of the folk of the Empire the human tongue? No doubt about it.

Easiest way to find out might be to grab the bull by the horns. "Do you speak English, Shuttlecraft Pilot?" Johnson asked, in that language.

Raatiil froze for a moment. Surprise? Evidently, for after that freeze he made the affirmative gesture again. "I have learned it," he answered, also in English. "Do you understand when I speak?"

"Yes. You speak well," Johnson said. That Raatiil could be understood at all meant he spoke well, but Johnson had known plenty of Lizards who were worse. Still in an experimental mood, he told that to the Rabotev.

He got back another shrug-equivalent. "Some males and females are better than others at learning strange things," Raatiil said.

So much for that, Johnson thought. He'd been curious to see whether Raatiil enjoyed getting praise for doing something better than members of the Race. If he did, he didn't show it. Maybe that meant there really wasn't any friction among the different species in the Empire. Maybe it only meant Raatiil was too well trained to show much. Johnson thought. He'd been curious to see whether Raatiil enjoyed getting praise for doing something better than members of the Race. If he did, he didn't show it. Maybe that meant there really wasn't any friction among the different species in the Empire. Maybe it only meant Raatiil was too well trained to show much.

Sam Yeager caught Johnson's eye and nodded slightly. Johnson nodded back. Sure as h.e.l.l, Sam had known what he was up to. No flies on him, no indeed. Everybody on the ship had been gloomy because the Doctor didn't make it. Johnson was sorry they couldn't revive the Doctor, too. He didn't think the diplomacy would suffer on that account, though. It might even go better. The Doctor was clever, but he'd always liked to show off just how clever he was. Sam Yeager was more likely to do what needed doing and not make any kind of fuss about it.