Humanx - Cachalot Part 64

Now the ma.s.s of color drifted back toward them.

Cora held her fingers on the controls of the neu- rophon, her muscles locked. How much longer, she wondered frantically, could the instrument continue to generate projections of such magnitude? The particu- lar frequency she had hit upon produced only a slight tingle along her spine. The reaction in the CunsnuC was ten thousand times greater.

Again it fell away from them and they continued their unimpeded rise. Then there was pain in Cora's

267.

head, but it did not come from the neurophon. It was generated by the CunsnuC.

Her hands went to her temples and she fell over on her side. The neurophon, its controls locked, tumbled to the floor. It bounced hard on the metal but con- tinued to function. Mataroreva had barely thrown the console on automatic before that intense blast of men- tal agony overcame him.

Dimly, Merced perceived the critical gauge through the red haze that filled his brain. Fifty-one hundred meters. Five thousand. They were still rising.

Blood and thunder filled Cora's head and she rolled over and over on the deck. Every image of nightmare, every sliver of pain she had ever felt since childhood, came back to her in those awful moments. Rachael sobbed with the hurt.

They were so overcome that they did not immedi- ately realize the pain was not projected at them by the CunsnuC, but was instead the helpless broadcast of those great creatures' own torment.

One rose after them, a seething ma.s.s of antagonistic colors and thoughts. Millions of cilia drove it upward like a rolling moon as it strove to get above them, to force them back into the abyss. Its pain grew worse as it neared the craft, and those on board alternated red and yellow explosions with sharp-edged hallucina- tion in their minds.

"YOU . .. MUST . . . LEAVE.' ..." a great voice thun- dered in Cora's skull, barely perceptible above the ocean of pain. Her head was a bell and her brain the clapper bouncing off the bone.

She dragged herself to a port, saw the greatest of all the CunsnuC nearing them. "We can't help how we think!" she cried out, wondering if her mouth was echoing the workings of her mind. "You can't kill us all just to keep us from thinking!"

There was no reply.

They were at eighteen hundred meters and rising,

268 .

and the two minnows swimming near the light of the CunsnuC were adult catodons. They moved unafraid of the ma.s.s that dwarfed them, knowing somehow it could not hurt them. None of the toothed fears a plankton-eater, she thought, no matter its size or alien- ness.

A final, despairing mental shriek echoed through

her empty head, skidded like a needle along her bones. Then the last CunsnuC raced for the bottom ooze, turning into a distant red star that soon was

swallowed by the concealing fathoms ...

She blinked, wondering how long she had been out.

Merced leaned back in his chair, hopefully no more than unconscious. Sam lay draped over the console, breathing heavily. Hwoshien sat stiffly against the wall nearby, taking in long, deep breaths, rea.s.suring his body. He was smooth when inhaling, shuddered when he exhaled, but at least he was in control of himself.

Her eyes hunted for Rachael.

Her daughter lay on the floor, eyes staring blankly

at the roof. Painfully, Cora half slid, half fell, from the chair and crawled across the deck, pa.s.sing the now quiescent neurophon. Its energy pack was burned out. She was surprised to discover that it was her body that ached, not her mind. Faint echoes of that last ma.s.sive scream still fluttered around in her thoughts like dying b.u.t.terflies. But they no longer affected her.

"Rachael?" She put both hands on the girl's shoul- ders, shook her. The effort made her nauseous, and she had to stop and rest before trying again. "Ra- chael!" Muscles began to move under her fingers. The

engine was warming up.

Gradually the eyes focused, turned left. "Mother?

We were killing it. I could feel it dying."

"I know, Rachael." She cradled the girl's head in her arms. "We all could. We shared the pain it was feeling. But . . . rather it than us." She reached back with a hand, pulled the neurophon over. "They said

269.

they were delicate. They told us. All ma.s.s and no bite." She winced, and the hand went to her head.

"No, not no bite. An indirect one. I'm afraid your in- strument is burned out. It saved our lives. I'll buy you a new one. The best." She smiled. "And you can play and practice all you wish, and I'll support you to the best of my ability and bankroll."

"I don't know," the girl murmured. "So much hurt.

I don't know when I'll be able to play again. That pain will always be with me when I try to play."

"The memory of the pain, and it will fade," Cora corrected her.

"We'll work something out with them." It was Hwo- shien. His body had not moved, but his head turned to face them. "They have most of this world, most of the world-ocean to dwell in. We use only tiny, isolated patches of the surface. They're^just stubborn. We'll reach some kind of accommodation. They have no choice now." He unfolded his legs, stood easily.

"We don't need the catodon.s' help. Neurophonic projectors much larger than that one will keep these creatures under control, will disrupt their power over the baleens. If they insist on fighting, we can dispose of them. The killing of any intelligent alien life-form is prohibited, except when attacked and no alterna- tive is available. We'll give them that alternative. If they elect not to accept . . ." He shrugged meaning- fully.

"But surely you wouldn't? ..." Cora began.

"I have several thousand people dead, many mil- lion credits of property destroyed. We require a mi- nuscule portion of this world. They and the Cetacea are welcome to the rest. I have no sympathy where such all-encompa.s.sing greed is involved."

"I'm sure something can be arranged," Cora re- plied. "Mental shielding that will keep our thoughts from them, for example. If only they'd revealed them- selves and their problem to us earlier, peacefully.

270 CACHALOT.

They're unique, utterly unique, Hwoshien. The first intelligent invertebrates we've ever encountered, pos- sibly the most evolved of their line in the universe.

They must be studied and learned from. Not fought

with."

"That's only a last alternative I was outlining,"

Hwoshien reminded her, the very tone of his voice indicating that he was merely being businesslike, not bloodthirsty.

"Most coelenterates are primitive, and these crea- tures are at the opposite end of that scale. It's almost as if they've skipped an entire chapter of evolution.

Their physical and mental structures are incredibly complex. What do they think about down there in the eternal dark? What is there to stimulate the develop- ment of such advanced minds at such depths? I doubt they possess vision as we know it. Possibly hearing.

They are true colony creatures on a scale undreamed of. They must be dealt with peacefully so that they can be studied!"

"You can study them if you want to." Mataroreva was adjusting controls. "We're almost up. Me for the light."

"We will." Cora suddenly saw where her thoughts had been leading, and was not disappointed in them.

"/ will. We can be friends."

"Do you want to end up like poor Hazaribagh and his people? The CunsnuC were studying them," he shot back.

"Would you care?"