Uplift - Startide Rising Part 45

"Gillian? Is that-t you?"

"Yes, Hikahi. Thank G.o.d! Are you all right? And Creideiki's still at the relay?"

"We are both quite well, Life-Cleaner. From what the fen on the bridge tell usss, you don't seem to need us there at all!"

"They're d.a.m.ned patron-sucking liars! And I wouldn't trade a one of them away for my left arm. Listen, we're missing five crewfen. You should be warned, two are atavistic and highly dangerous."

The line hissed for a long moment. Then, "All are accounted for, Gillian," came the reply at last. "Four of them are dead."

Gillian covered her eyes. "Dear Lord ..."

"Keepiru is with usss," Hikahi answered her unasked question.

"Poor Akki," Gillian sighed.

"Send word to Calafia that he did his duty. Keepiru says he was defiant and sentient till the end."

Gillian did not like the implication of Hikahi's message. "Hikahi, you're in command now. We need you back here now. I am this instant officially handing over ..."

"Don't, Gillian," the fluting voice interrupted. "Please. Not yet-t. There are still things to be done with the skiff. Those on the island must be recovered, and the Kiqui volunteers."

"I'm not sure we'll have time, Hikahi." The words were bitter as she spoke them. She thought of bright, ever self-deprecating Dennie Sudman, of the erudite Sah'ot, and Toshio, so very young and n.o.ble.

"Has T-Tom called? Is there an emergency?"

"Neither, yet. But ..."

"Then what-t?"

She couldn't explain. She tried in Trinary.

What a piercing sound I hear- The peal of bugles, engines rising- The tears of love abandoned- Soon, so very soon -- *

There was a long silence from the skiff. Then, it was not Hikahi's voice, but Creideiki's, that answered. In his repet.i.tious, simply-phrased Trinary, there was something Gillian could only catch a hint of, something deep and a little eerie.

Sounds, All Sounds Answer Something Answer Something : Acts, All Acts Make Sounds Make Sounds : But Duty, All Duty Calls Silently Calls Silently : Gillian didn't breathe as she listened to Creideiki's last note fall away. Her spine was chilled.

"'Bye, Gillian," Hikahi said. "You do what you have to. We'll be back as quick-kly as we can. But don't wait for usss."

"Hikahi!" Gillian reached for the comm link, but the carrier wave cut off before she could say another word.

95 ::: Toshio "Both airlocks are bolted from the inside," Toshio panted when he returned to the hiding place. "Looks like we try it your way."

Charles Dart nodded, and led him to the impulse thrusters at the stern of the small s.p.a.cecraft.

Twice they had hidden themselves by climbing tall trees as the patrolling Stenos pa.s.sed below. It seemed not to occur to the mad fen to look above for their quarry. But Toshio knew they'd be deadly if they ever caught him and Charlie in the open.

Charlie removed the rear cover to the maintenance bay between the engines. "I got in by crawling between the feedlines, over there, until I reached the access plate in that bulkhead." He pointed. Toshio peered into the maze of pipes.

He looked back at Dart, amazed. "No wonder n.o.body expected a stowaway. Is this how you got into the armory, as well? By climbing through ducts where no human could fit?"

The planetologist nodded. "I guess you can't go in with me. That means I gotta get the little critters out by myself, right?"

Toshio nodded. "I think they're in the aft hold. Here's the voder."

He handed over the translator. It looked like a large medallion hanging from a neck-chain. All neo-chimps knew about voders, since they generally had trouble talking until the age of three. Charlie slipped it over his head. He started to climb into the small opening, but stopped and looked sidelong at the middie.

"Say Toshio. Imagine this was one of those 20th-century 'zoo' ships, and those are a bunch of pre-sentient chimps in the hold of a clipper ship or whatever they used back then-on their way from Africa to some laboratory or circus. Would you have snuck in to rescue them?"

Toshio shrugged. "I don't honestly know, Charlie. I'd like to think I would've. But I really don't know what I'd've done."

The neo-chimp met the human's eyes for a long instant, then he grunted. "Okay, you guard the rear."

He took a boost from Toshio and squirmed into the mechanical maze. Toshio squatted beneath the thruster tubes and listened to the forest. While Charlie struggled to get the inner access plate off, he made what felt like a terrible racket. Then it stopped.

Toshio slid into the forest to make a cautious circuit of the immediate area.

From crashing sounds up in the direction of the Kiqui village, he guessed the Stenos were amusing themselves with a destructive spree. He hoped none of the little natives had come back yet to witness, or worse, be caught in the violence.

He returned to the longboat and looked at his watch. Seventeen minutes until the bomb went off. They were cutting it close.

He reached into the maintenance area and spent a few minutes twiddling with some of the valves, spoiling their settings. Of course, Takkata-Jim didn't need the thrusters at all. If he was, indeed, refueled, he could take off on gravities. Leaving the access panel loose would decrease the boat's aerodynamic stability, but even that effect would be slight. Longboats like these were built rugged.

He stopped and listened. The rampage through the forest was heading this way again. The fen were on their way back.

"Hurry up, Charlie!" He fingered the grip of his holstered needler, not certain he could aim well enough to hit the vulnerable patches where the dolphins were unprotected by the metal-sided spiders.

"Come on!"

There came a series of small, wet, slapping sounds from within the cavity. Intermittent squeaks echoed from the narrow confines, and then he saw a pair of widely splayed, green-finned hands.

They were followed by the head of a rather distressed looking Kiqui. The aboriginal scuttled through the inner panel and crept through the maze of pipes until it leapt into Toshio's arms.

Toshio had to peel the frightened creature loose and put it down in order to reach for the next one. The little Kiqui were making a fearful racket, squeaking dolefully.

Finally all four were out. Toshio peered inside and saw Charles Dart trying to replace the inner panel.

"Never mind that!" Toshio hissed.

"I gotta! Takkata-Jim'll notice the change in air pressure on his panel! It's only luck he hasn't yet!"

"Come on! They're ..." He heard the whine of waldo motors and crushed vegetation. "They're here! I'm going to draw them away from you. Good luck, Charlie!"

"Wait!"

Toshio crawled a few meters into the shrubbery so they would not guess where he came from. Then, from a crouch start, he ran.

# There! There!

# Whaler!

# Iki-netman!

# Tuna follower!

# There! Kill! There! # The Stenos squawked from very close nearby. Toshio dove behind an oli-nut tree as bolts of blue death sizzled overhead. The Kiqui screamed and scattered into the forest.

Toshio rolled to his feet and ran, trying to keep the tree between him and his pursuers.

He heard sounds to the left and right as the fen moved quickly to surround him. His drysuit slowed him down as he tried to reach the sh.o.r.e cliffs before the circle was closed.

96 ::: Tom Orley He spent a while listening to the radio, but, although he recognized a few species-types in the voices, so much of the traffic was inter-computer that there was little to be learned that way.

All right, he told himself. Let's work out the proper phrasing. This had better be good.

97 ::: The Skiff .

Dennie stumbled over the words she had so carefully prepared. She tried to rephrase her arguments, but Hikahi stopped her.

"Dr. Sudman. You needn't persissst! Our next stop is the island anyway. We'll pick up Toshio if he hasn't left already. And perhaps we'll deal with Takkata-Jim, as well. We'll be on our way as soon as Creideiki finishes."

Dennie exhaled all of her remaining tension. It was out of her hands, then. The professionals would take care of things. She might as well relax.

"How long. . ?"

Hikahi tossed her head. "Creideiki doesn't expect to do any better this time than la.s.sst. It shouldn't take long. Why don't you and Sah'ot go and rest in the meantime?"

Dennie nodded and turned to find some s.p.a.ce to stretch out in the tiny hold.

Sah'ot swam alongside.

"Say, Dennie, as long as we're going to try to relax, want to trade backrubs?"

Dennie laughed. "Sure, Sah'ot. Just don't get carried away, okay?"

Creideiki tried to reason with them one more time.

: We Are Desperate : As You Once Were : We Offer Hope To Little Unfinished Ones On This Very World : Hope To Grow Unbent : : Our Enemies Will Harm You, As Well, In Time : : Help Us : The static pulsed and throbbed in response. It carried a partly psychic feeling of closedness, of pressure and molten heat. It was a claustrophilic song, in praise of rough hard stone and flowing metal.

CEASE -.

PEACE +.

RELEASE!! -.

ISOLATION +.

Silence fell suddenly with a squeal of tortured machinery. The old robot which had so long hung two kilometers down the narrow drill-tree shaft had been destroyed.

Creideiki clicked a familiar phrase in Trinary.

It is, that is -- *

He was tempted to enter the Dream again. But there was, on this level of reality, no time for such things.

This level of reality was where duty lay, for the moment. Later, perhaps. Later he would visit Nukapai again. Perhaps she would show him the untellable things that she heard through the vague avenues of prescience.

He headed back to the airlock of the tiny s.p.a.ceship. Hikahi, seeing him approach, started warming up the engines.

98 ::: Tom Orley " ... a small group of dolphins spotted a few hundred paktaars north of this location! They were moving north quite rapidly. They may have come this way to see what all the fighting was about. Hurry! Now is the time to strike!"

Tom clicked off the receiver. His head hurt from the concentration it took to speak Galactic Ten rapidly. Not that he expected the Brothers of the Night to believe his was the voice of one of their missing scouts. That didn't matter to his plan. All he wanted to do was stir up their interest before the final jab.

He switched frequency and pursed his lips in preparation to speaking Galactic Twelve.

Actually, this was fun! It distracted him from his exhaustion and hunger and satisfied his aesthetic sense, even if it did mean everyone and his client would be down here shortly, all looking for him.

" . . Paha warriors! Paha-ab-Kleppko -ab-p.u.b.er ab-Soro ab-Hul! Inform the Soro fleet-mistress we have news!"

Tom chuckled as he thought of a pun that could only be phrased in Galactic Twelve and which, nevertheless, he was sure the Soro would never get.

99 ::: Gillian Something was making the fleets shift all of a sudden. Small squadrons raveled off the battered fleets and joined tiny groups from Kithrup's moons, all heading toward the planet. As they merged, the groups swirled about and tiny explosions took the place of individual lights.

What in the world was going on? Whatever it was, Gillian felt a glimmer of opportunity.

"Dr. Ba.s.sskin! Gillian!" Tsh't's voice came over the commspeaker. "We're getting radio traffic from the planet's surface again. It'sss from a single transmitter, but it keeps putting out stuff in different Galactic languages! Yet I ssswear they all sound like one voice!"

She leaned forward and touched a switch. "I'm on my way up, Tsh't. Please call half of the off-duty shift to stations. We'll let the others rest a while longer." She switched off the unit.