Planet Pirates Omnibus Part 40

"I'm just testing to see if any of the ligatures were torn. No. All's well." Bringan waved a small diagnostic unit over her arm. "You were lucky you were wearing a tight sleeve. The swelling would have been much worse left unchecked."

"So I see," Lunzie said, eyeing the reddish wash along the skin of her arm which marked subcutaneous bleeding. It would soon surface as a fading rainbow of colours as the blood dispersed. She poked at the flesh with an experimental finger and, with curious detachment, felt it give. Bringan put the DU in his belt pouch and gave a deft twist to her arm. Lunzie heard the ulna and radius grate slightly as they settled into place.

"I'm going to put you in a non-confining brace to hold your bones steady. Won't interfere with movement and you can wash the arm, cautiously. Everything will be tender once the nerve block wears off." He flexed her fingers back and forth. "You should have normal range of motion in a few hours." Then he gave a snort of a chuckle and eyed her. "I should be telling you!"

She managed a weak, but grateful, smile. "Bringan, are we going to Ambrosia?"

The doctor raised surprised blond brows at her. "Oh, yes indeed we are. Myself, I can't wait to get back. Why, I intend to put in to settle here when I retire. I've never seen such a perfect planet."

"I mean, are we going soon?" She stressed the last word.

"That's what I meant." He gave her a searching look. "Zebara has told me nothing about you, or why you arrive looking like the survivor of a corridor war, but he logged you on FTL. So I can enjoy a few shrewd guesses, most of which include planet pirates." He winked at her. "Which gives the most excellent of reasons for burning tubes back there. The FSP needs witnesses on hand. Or maybe that's your role on our roster."

"I'll witness, believe you me, I'll witness," Lunzie said with all the fervour left in her depleted body.

Bringan chuckled as he gathered up his gear. "If we're delayed in any way, by any agency, I think Zebara would probably tank himself up and swim back shipless. He's allergic to the mention of pirates. And b.l.o.o.d.y piracy's turning epidemic. It seems to me that every time a real plum turns up in the last century, the pirates are there to wrest it away from the legitimate finders. With a sophisticated violence that makes alien creatures seem like housecats."

"Bringan," Lunzie asked again, tentatively, "what's Zebara like?"

"Do you mean, is he your usual prototype heavyworlder chauvinist? No. He's a good leader, and good friend. I've known him for thirty years. You'll appreciate his fair treatment, but watch out for the grin. That means trouble."

Lunzie c.o.c.ked an eyebrow at Bringan. "You mean the shark-face he puts on? I've already seen it."

"Ho, ho! I hope it wasn't meant for you!" The doctor bunched himself onto his feet. "There, you're in good shape. Come with me, and we'll see about a bunk for you. You need to rest and let those injuries start to heal."

"When do we cast off the ARCT-10 ARCT-10?" Lunzie asked. She followed Bringan, not too wobbly on her strengthless legs. Had the Ryxi received help before her lungs collapsed?

"As soon as Zebara is back on board."

On the way to that bunk, Lunzie got the briefest of introductions to the rest of the scout crew. Besides Flor, the Ship-born communications tech who doubled as historian, and Bringan, the xen.o.biologist, there were seven more. Dondara and Pollili, a mated pair, were heavyworlders from Diplo. Pollili was the telemetry officer, and Dondara was a geologist. Unlike most of their number who served for a few missions and then retired to their cold, bleak homeworlds, Pollili and Dondara had served with Zebara's Explorers Team for eight years, and had every intention of continuing in that posting. They spent one to two months a year in intensive exercise in the heavyworld environment aboard the ARCT-10 ARCT-10 to maintain their muscle tone. The other five EX Team members were human. Scarran, tan-skinned and nearsighted, was a systems technologist. Vir, offshoot of a golden-complected breed with heavily lidded eyes, was an environmental specialist who shared security duties with Dondara. Elessa, charming but not strictly pretty, held the double duties of synthesiser tech and botanist. Timmins was a chemist. Wendell, the pilot, had gone over to the to maintain their muscle tone. The other five EX Team members were human. Scarran, tan-skinned and nearsighted, was a systems technologist. Vir, offshoot of a golden-complected breed with heavily lidded eyes, was an environmental specialist who shared security duties with Dondara. Elessa, charming but not strictly pretty, held the double duties of synthesiser tech and botanist. Timmins was a chemist. Wendell, the pilot, had gone over to the ARCT-10 ARCT-10 with Zebara. with Zebara.

Everyone's specialties overlapped somewhat so the necessarily small crew of the scout had a measure of redundancy of talent in case of emergency. The little ship was compactly built but amazingly not cramped in its design. Hydroponic racks of edible plants were arrayed anywhere there was s.p.a.ce, and the extra light made the rooms seem more cheerful and inviting. Bringan explained the ship was capable of running on its own power indefinitely in sublight, or making a single warp jump between short sprints before recharging.

Ambrosia was a long jump out toward the edge of explored s.p.a.ce. The scout could never be certain of finding edible food on any planet it explored and its crew needed to be able to provide their own carbohydrates for the synthesisers.

Lunzie's bunk was in the same alcove as Elessa's. She lay on the padding with her arm strapped across her chest, staring at the bunkshelf above her. Bringan had ordered her to rest but she couldn't close her eyes. She was grateful to be safe but somehow it rankled her that her rescuer should prove to be a heavyworlder. Zebara seemed all right. She couldn't repress the suspicion that he might just be waiting until they got into deep s.p.a.ce to toss her out the airlock. That didn't compute - not with a mixed - species crew all of whom were impressively loyal to him.

Abruptly the last adrenaline that had been b.u.t.tressing her drained away. "Well, I ought to be truly grateful," she chided herself. "And he's got a very good press from his crew. That Quinada! I was getting used to heavyworlders when I had to run into someone like her! I suppose there's a bad chip in every board."

Still vaguely uneasy, Lunzie let herself drift off to sleep.

She awoke with a start to see Zebara staring down at her. It took her a moment to remember where she was.

"We're under way," he announced without preamble. "I've had you made an official member of my crew. No one else tried to pressure the little bosses to get on this cruise, so either your attackers have given up the job or ... there are nasty plans for all of us."

"You're so comforting," Lunzie remarked drolly, determined to modify her att.i.tude, at least toward a heavyworlder named Zebara. "How long have I been asleep?"

The heavyworld captain turned his palms upward. "How'd I know? We've been under way about five hours. Bringan told me to let you rest and I have, but now I need to talk to you. Do you feel strong enough?"

Lunzie tested her muscles and drew herself into a sitting position. Her arm was sore but she could move her fingers now. Bringan's cast held it immobile without putting pressure on the bruised muscles of her forearm. The rest of her body felt battered, but she already felt better for having had some rest.

"Talk? Yes, I'm up to talking."

"Come to my quarters. We can speak privately there."

"I was half expecting to be approached on the ARCT-10 ARCT-10," Zebara said, pouring two gla.s.ses of Sverulan brandy. His quarters were close to s.p.a.cious; that is to say, the room was eight paces wide by ten, instead of four. Zebara had a computer desk equipped with a device Lunzie recognized as a private memory storage. His records would not be accessible to anyone else on the ship or on the ship's communication network. "The exact location of Ambrosia is known only to myself and my crew and, regrettably, the administrators aboard the ARCT ARCT." He showed his teeth. "I trust my crew. I suspect there's an unpluggable leak aboard the ARCT ARCT."

"A leak leading right to the EEC Administration?" Lunzie was beginning to see the pieces of the minor puzzle which involved her coming together. The whole was part of a much larger puzzle.

"That's a gamble I have to take. If the pirates beat us back to Ambrosia, that means the information on Ambrosia's exact location is being transmitted to them right now. I want Fleet protection, yes, but I'm also interested in luring the pirates out into the open. They might just catch the spy within the Administration chambers this time." Zebara wrinkled his nose.

"The spy might be too high up in the echelons to find, impossible to trace - above suspicion." As the Seti of Fomalhaut would a.s.suredly be. Hastily Lunzie took a sip of her drink and felt the warmth of the liquor in her belly. Zebara had splendid taste in intoxicants. She said slowly, "In the past the heavyworlders appear to have been the chief beneficiaries of this sort of piracy. Is it at all possible that the FSP will believe that YOU let them know where to find the planet?" Now the feral grin was aimed at her. Lunzie felt a chill trace the line of her spine. "Mind you," she added hastily, "I'm acting devil's advocate but if I can suspect collusion, others might certainly do so, if only to divert suspicion."

"A possible interpretation, I grant you. Let me say in my own defense I dislike the idea that my people are beholden in any way to ma.s.s murderers." He drained his gla.s.s and poured each of them a second tot deep enough to bathe in, Lunzie thought. He must have a truly spectacular tolerance. Nevertheless she took a deep draught of the brandy, to thaw her spine, of course.

"I feel obliged to explain that I thought for quite a few years that I had lost my daughter to pirates during the Phoenix incident," she said. "The first thing anyone knew, the legitimate colony was gone and heavyworlders had moved in. I harboured a very deep resentment that they were living on that bright and shiny new planet while I grieved for my daughter. It's affected my good judgment somewhat ever since." Lunzie swallowed. "I apologise for indulging myself with such a shockingly biased generalisation. It's the pirates I should hate, and I do."

Zebara smiled wryly. "I appreciate your candour and your explanation. Biased generalisations are not confined to your subgroup. I resent lightweights as a group for constantly putting my people in subordinate and inferior positions, where we're a.s.signed the worst of the picking, or have to work under light-weights in a mixed group. In my view, there has been no true equality in the distribution of colonisable planets. Many of us, especially groups from Diplo, felt that Phoenix should have been a.s.signed to us in the first place. One of our una.s.sailable skills is mine engineering and production. The gen in my community was that the heavy people who landed on Phoenix had paid significant bribes to a merchant broker who a.s.sured them that the planet was virgin and vacant. They were cheated," Zebara added heatedly. "They were promised transuranics, but the planet had been stripped before they got there. It was no more than a place to live, with little a struggling colony could use as barter in the galactic community."

"Then somebody made double profits out of Phoenix. Triple, if you count the goods and machinery that the original settlers brought with them." The brandy had relaxed Lunzie sufficiently so that she had no compunction about refilling her gla.s.s. "Do you know the Parchandri?"

Zebara waved a dismissive hand. "Profiteers, every last blinking one of them, and they've a wide family. Weaklings, most of the Parchandri, even by lightweight standards, but they're far too spineless to kill with the ferocity the pirates exhibit."

The Seti could be ruthless but Lunzie couldn't quite cast them in the role which, unfortunately, did fit heavyworlders. "Then who are they? Human renegades? Captain Aelock felt that they were based out of Alpha Centauri."

"Aelock's a canny man but I'd be surprised if the Centauris were actively involved. They've acquired too much veneer, too civilised, too cautious by half." An opinion with which Lunzie privately concurred. "Centauris think only of profit. Every person, every machine, is a cog in the credit machine."

Lunzie took a sip of the warm brown liquor and stared at her reflection in the depths of the gla.s.s. "A point well taken. My daughter's descendants all live on that world. I have never met such a pitiful load of stick-in-the-mud, bigoted, shortsighted mules in my life. I was appalled because my daughter herself had plenty of motivation. She's a real achiever. Not afraid to take chances ..."

"Like her mother," Zebara added. Lunzie looked up at the heavyworld captain in surprise. He was looking at her kindly, without a trace of sarcasm or condescension.

"Why, thank you. Captain. Only I fret that none of her children, bar one, are unhappy living in a technological slum, polluted and hemmed in by mediocrity and duplication."

"Complacency and ignorance," Zebara suggested, pouring more brandy. "A very good way to keep a large population so tractable the society lacks rebellion."

"But they've no s.p.a.ce, mental or physical, to grow in and they don't realise what they're missing. It even grieves me that they're so happy in their ignorance. But I got out of Alpha Centauri as fast as I could, and not just because my life was at risk. Trouble with moving around like that, I keep losing the people I love, one by one." Lunzie halted, appalled by her maundering. "I am sorry. It's this brandy. Or is it sodium pentothal? I certainly didn't intend to download my personal problems on you."

The captain shook his head. "It sounds to me as though you'd had no one to talk to for a long time. Mind you," he went on, musing aloud, "such unquestioning cogs can turn a huge and complex wheel. The pirates are not just one ship, nor even just a full squadron. The vessels have to be ordered, provisioned, staffed with specially trained personnel" - he ignored Lunzie's involuntary shudder at what would const.i.tute training - "and that means considerable administrative ability, not just privileged information."

Lunzie regarded him thoughtfully. He sounded as paranoid as she was, mistrusting everyone and everything. "It all gets so unsortably sordidly convoluted!" Her consonants were suffering from the brandy. "I'm not sure I can cope with all this."

Zebara chuckled. "I think you've been coping extremely well. Citizen Doctor Mespil. You're still alive!"

"A hundred and nine and a half years alive!" Oh, she was feeling the brandy. "But I'm learning. I'm learning. I'm especially learning," and she waggled an admonishing finger at him, "I'm gradually learning to accept each person as an individual, and not as just a representative of their subgroup or species. Each one is individual to his, her, itself and can't be lumped in with his, her or its peer group. My Discipline Master would be proud of me now, I think. I've learned the lesson he was doing his d.a.m.nedest to impart to me." She took the last swallow of Sverulan brandy and fixed her eyes on his impa.s.sive face. "So, Captain, we're on our way to Ambrosia. What do you think we'll find there?"

"All we may find is the kittisnakes chasing each other up trees. We will be ready for any surprises." The captain stood up and extended an arm to Lunzie as she struggled her way out of the deep armchair. "Can you get back to your bunk all right?"

"Captain Zebara, Mespils have been known for centuries to hold their liquor. Dam' fine brandy. Thank you. Captain, for that and the listening ear."

Chapter Thirteen.

The scout ship slowed to sublight speed and came out of its warp at the edge of the disk of a star system. Lunzie was strapped in the fourth seat on the bridge, watching as the stars spread out from a single point before them and filled the sky. Only a single yellow-white star hung directly ahead of the ship.

"There she is, Captain," Pilot Wendell said with deep satisfaction. "Ambrosia's star."

Zebara nodded solemnly and made a few notes in the electronic log. "Any energy traces in range?" the heavyworlder asked.

"No, sir."

"Is Ambrosia itself visible from this position?" Lunzie asked eagerly.

"No, Doctor, not yet. According to system calculations, she's around behind the sun. We'll drop below the plane of the ecliptic and come up on her. There's an asteroid belt we don't like to pa.s.s through if we can help it."

"Why do you call Ambrosia 'she'?"

Wendell smiled over his shoulder at her. "Because she's beautiful as a G.o.ddess. You'll see."

"Any traces?" Zebara asked again, as they began the upward sweep into the ecliptic toward a blue-white disk. "No, sir," Wendell repeated.

"Once we drop into atmosphere, we're vulnerable," Zebara reminded him. "Our sensors won't read as clearly. The pirates could get the drop on us."

"I know. Captain." The pilot looked nervous, but he turned up a helpless palm. "I don't have any readings that shouldn't be out there."

"Sir, why are we returning without military backup if you expect pirates to attack?" Lunzie asked, gently, hoping that the question wasn't out of line. "This scout has no defensive armament."

Zebara scowled. "I don't want anyone intruding on Ambrosia. It's our province," he said, waving an arm through the air to indicate the crew. "If we aren't here to back up our claim, someone else - someone who didn't spend years searching - Krims," Zebara said, banging a palm on the console. He pa.s.sed a hand across his forehead, wiping away imaginary moisture. "I should be enjoying this ride. I suppose I'm too protective of our discovery. See, Lunzie, there's the source of all our pain and pleasure. Ambrosia."

The blue-white disk took on more definition as it swam toward them. Lunzie held her breath. Ambrosia did indeed look like the holos she had seen on Earth. Patterns of water-vapour clouds scudded across the surface. She could pick out four of the six small continents, hazy gray-green in the midst of the shimmering blue seas. A rakishly tilted icecap decorated the south pole of the planet. A swift-moving body separated itself from the cloud layer and disappeared around the planet's edge. The smallest moon, one of three. "The big satellite is behind the planet," Wendell explained. "It's a full moon on nightside this day. Look, there's the second little one, appearing on the left." A tiny jewel, ablaze with the star's light, peeked around Ambrosia's side.

"She is beautiful," Lunzie breathed, taking it all in. "Prepare for orbit and descent," Zebara ordered. "We'll set down. A ship this small is a sitting target in orbit. Planetside, we'll have a chance to run a few more experiments while we wait for backup."

"Aye, sir."

"Just after midday local time," Wendell had a.s.sured them as he set the scout down on a low plateau covered with thick, furry-leaved vegetation. EEC regulations required that an Evaluation Team locate at least five potential landing sites on a planet intended for colonisation. The astrogation chart showed no fewer than ten, one in the chief island of a major archipelago in the southern sea, one on each small continent and more on the larger ones.

As the hatchway opened, Lunzie could hear the scuttling and scurrying of tiny animals fleeing the noisy intrusion. A breeze of fresh, sweet air curled inside invitingly. With force-shield-belts on, Dondara and Vir did the perimeter search so that no indigenous life would be shut inside the protective shield when it was switched on. They gave the go-ahead, and Pollili activated the controls. A loud, shrill humming arose, and dropped almost immediately into a range inaudible to human ears.

If the view from s.p.a.ce was lovely, the surface of Ambrosia looked like an artist's rendition of the perfect planet. The air was crisp and fresh, with just a tantalising scent of exotic flora in the distance. The colours ranged from vivid primaries to delicate pastels and they all looked clean.

Lunzie stepped out of the shuttle into the rich sunlight of dayside. The sky was a pale blue and the c.u.mulus clouds were a pure, soft white. From the hilltop, the scout commanded a panoramic view of an ancient deciduous forest. The treetops were every shade of green imaginable, interspersed every so often with one whose foliage was a brilliant rose pink. Smaller saplings grew on the edge of the plateau, clinging at an absurd angle as if fearful to make the plunge.

Off to the left, an egg-shaped lake glistened in the sun. Lunzie could just pick out the silver ribbons of the two rivers which fed it. One wound down across the breast of the very hill she stood on. Lunzie rested in the sun close to the ship as the other crew members spread out nearby on the slope of the hill and took readings. Under her feet was a thick blue-green gra.s.soid whose stems had a circular cross section.

"More like reeds than gra.s.s, but it's the dominant cover plant," Elessa explained. "It doesn't grow to more than six inches in height, which is decent of it. We don't have to slog through thickets of the stuff, unlike other planets I could name. You have to push it over to sit on it or it sticks you full of holes. See that tree with the pink leaves? The fruit is edible, really succulent, but eat only the ones whose rinds have turned entirely brown. We got the tip from the local avians who wait in hordes for the fruit to ripen. The unripe ones give you a fierce bellyache. Oh, look. I don't have a sample of that flower." Carefully, she uprooted a tiny star-shaped flower with a forked tool from among the gra.s.soids and transferred it to a plastic vial. "They have a single deep taproot instead of a spread of small roots, which makes them easy to harvest. It's the stiff stem that keeps them upright, like the gra.s.soid. You could denude this whole hillside with a tweezers."

A hovering oval shadow suddenly covered Lunzie and the botanist where they knelt.

"You ought to see more than a single meadow, Doctor," Dondara scolded her from above, appearing from the rear of the ship in a two-man sled. "You're enjoying a rare privilege. Not twelve intelligent life-forms have seen this landscape before. Come on," he beckoned her into the sled. "I've got some readings to take. You can come with me."

Reminding herself of her drink-taken vow to trust individuals of any subgroup, Lunzie levered herself to her feet and climbed in after him. Elessa looked up as she went by and seemed about to say something to her, but changed her mind. Lunzie looked questioningly at the botanist but the girl shot her a "What can I tell you?" expression. Lunzie had confided her distrust to the botanist during the long flight here and Elessa only reiterated the statement that Zebara and those on the scout were truly in a cla.s.s all their own.

The medic wondered as she and Dondara pa.s.sed through the force-shield and flew over the meadow. The terrain was dramatically different less than half a mile from the gra.s.sy landing site. Beyond the breast of the k.n.o.bby hill which bounded the lake on its other side, the land began to change. The foliage was thinner here, reduced from lush forestry to a thin cover of marsh plants. Water flowed over worn shelves of rock, stained with red-brown iron oxide and tumbled into teeming pools. Nodules of pyrite in the rock faces glittered under the midday sun. Lunzie caught the occasional gleam of a marine creature in the shallow pools near a broad sweep of rapids that swept and foamed around ma.s.sive boulders. In the distance, more forest covered the bases of rough, bare mountain peaks.

"Quite a division here; this could be another world entirely," Lunzie announced, delighted, twisting around in her seat to get the best view.

Dondara activated his force-belt and signalled to her to do the same as he set the sled down.

"This is a different continental plate from the landing site," Dondara explained, splashing through a pool.

Lunzie skirted it to follow him. He pointed out geological features which supported his theory, including an upthrust face of sedimentary rock that was a rust-streaked gray which contrasted with the sparkling granite of the hilly expanse of the continent. With unexpected courtesy, he helped her up onto a well-worn boulder peeked with small pools.

"This was once a piece with the landma.s.s across the ocean northeast of here, got slid over a spreading centre over a few million years. This plate is more brittle. But it's got its own interesting life-forms. Come here." He gestured her over to a tubular hollow in the rock.

Lunzie peered at the hole. It was so smooth that it could have been drilled by a laser. "What's down there?"

"A very shy sort of warm-water crustacean. It'll only come out when the sky is overcast. If you stand over the hole, it'll think it is cloudy." Curious, Lunzie leaned down. "Look closely and be patient."

Dondara moved back and sat down on a dry shelf nearby. "You've got to turn off your force-belt, or it won't come out. The frequency annoys them."

As soon as she had deactivated the belt, she could see movement deep in the hollow. Lunzie knelt closer and spread her shadow over the opening. She heard a soft clattering noise, a distant but distinct rattle of porcelain. Suddenly, she was. .h.i.t in the face by a fountaining stream of warm water. Lunzie jumped back, sputtering. The water played down the front of her tunic and then ceased.

"What on Earth was that?" she demanded, wiping her face.

Dondara roared with laughter, making the stones ring. He rolled back and forth on his stone perch, banging a hand against the rock in his merriment.

"Just a shy Ambrosian stone crab!" he chortled, enjoying the look on her face. "They do that every time something blocks their lair. Ambrosia has baptised you! You're one of us now, Lunzie!" Once she recovered from the surprise, Lunzie realised that she had fallen for one of the oldest jokes in the database. She joined in Dondara's laughter.

"How many of the others did you sting with your 'shy rock crustacean'?" she asked suspiciously.

The heavyworlder was pleased. "Everyone but Zebara. He smelled vermin, and refused to come close enough." Dondara grinned. "You're not mad?"

"Why? But you can be sure I won't get caught a second time. Here on Ambrosia or anywhere else," Lunzie promised him. She was also obscurely pleased that she had been set up. She'd pa.s.sed a subtle test. She was also soaking and the air was chilly, weak lightweight that she was. She flicked some of the excess off her hands and shirt.

"You really got a dose. Must have roused the granddaddy. If I don't offend your lightweight sensibilities, you better get yourself back to the scout. Take the sled." She was beginning to feel that such solicitude was only to be expected from one of Zebara's crew. "I've got to take some temperature readings in the hot springs upstream. The exercise will do me good. I've got my communicator." With a hearty wave, the big humanoid waded off upstream.