Old Venus

Ruins

ELEANOR ARNASON

OF COURSE, THE STORY BEGAN IN A LOW DIVE IN VENUSPORT, in the slums up on the hillside above the harbor. The proper town was below them: grid streets with streetlights, solid, handsome concrete houses, and apartment blocks. The people in the apartments—middle-class and working folks with steady jobs—had their furniture volume-printed in one of the city’s big plants. The rich folks in their houses patronized custom printing shops, where they could get any kind of furniture in any style.

The rich man in his castle,

The poor man at his gate,

God printed out the both of them

And ordered their estate

Not that it mattered up on the hill. The people here scraped by without regular jobs that could be relied on. There were always layoffs, when construction was cut back or the equipment from Earth did not arrive. If there were God-given rules for their lives, they didn’t know them.

The bar Ash was in had beat-up, previously owned chairs and tables. A dehumidifier–heating unit glowed against one wall because it was winter, and the usual winter rains fell heavily outside. It wasn’t cold that was a problem. No place on Venus was really cold, except the tops of a few tall mountains. But the damp could get in your bones.

Ash sat in a corner, her back against a wall. On the table in front of her was a glass of beer and a tablet. She was playing solitaire on the tablet. The game occupied her mind just enough to keep out old memories but left her with attention for the bar. It could be dangerous on payday nights, when people were flush and drunk¸ or after big layoffs, when people were angry and spending their last money. Tonight it was mostly empty.

The guy who walked in—there was always someone walking in at the start of a story—did not belong. He was short and neatly dressed, with a fancy vest full of pockets; and his head was shaved, except for a few tufts of bright blue hair. It was the kind of haircut that required upkeep. Most people in Hillside didn’t bother.

He stopped at the bar and spoke to the bartender, who nodded toward Ash. The man bought a glass of wine, which was a mistake, as he would find when he tasted it, then walked over.

She had no chance of winning the current game and turned the tablet off.

“Hong Wu,” he said in introduction. “I’m an editor with National Geographic.”

“Yes?” She nodded toward the chair opposite. The man sat down, took a sip of his wine, and made a face. “You are Ash Weatherman.”

“Yes.”

“We want to do a story about the megafauna on Venus, and we want to hire you.”

“The story’s been done,” Ash said.

“We think another look at the megafauna is worth it. We did a thousand stories about wild animals in Africa, until they were gone. People could never get enough of elephants and lions. They still can’t. Look at zoos.”

She had grown up on National Geographic videos: all the lost wilderness of Earth, the charismatic megafauna of land and ocean. Most had been mammals, of course, and near relatives to humanity. Nothing on Venus was as closely related although pretty much everyone agreed that life on Venus had come from Earth, most likely via a meteorite that hit Earth a glancing blow, then landed on the inner planet, bringing Terran organisms scraped up in the first collision. Geologists thought they had found the crater on Earth and the final resting place on Venus. Both craters were eroded and filled in, not visible on the planetary surface. The great plain of Ishtar and something whacking big in Greenland.

There were people who thought it had happened twice, with the second meteorite bringing organisms from a later era; and they had found another pair of craters. But whatever had happened was long ago, and the organisms that came to Venus were single-celled. They had their own evolutionary history, which had ended in a different place, with no cute, furry mammals.

“The fauna here are certainly big enough,” she said out loud. “Though I don’t know how charismatic they are.” She tapped her tablet, and a new game of solitaire appeared. “What do you know about me?”

“You grew up in Hillside, graduated from high school here, and got a degree in the history of evolutionary theory at Venusport College. According to the police, you were involved with a student anarchist group but did nothing illegal.

“You worked in a printing plant while you were in college and after—until your photography began to sell. For the most part, you do advertising. Fashion, such as it is on Venus, furniture and real estate, and nature shots for the tourism industry. On the side, you do your own work, which is mostly images of the Venusian outback. That work is extraordinary. We have our own first-rate videographer and a thoughtful journalist, but we think it would be interesting to have a Venusian perspective.”

Interesting that they’d seen her photos. They had shown at a small gallery downtown: 3-D blowups on the walls and a machine in back to print copies with a signature: Ashley Weatherman, 2113. She’d made some money. People safe in Venusport liked to have the Venusian wilderness on their walls: cone-shaped flowers two meters tall, brilliant yellow or orange; amphibianoids that looked—more or less—like giant crocodiles; and little, rapid, bipedal reptiloids.

“You’re going to need someone to organize your safari,” Ash said. “Do you have anyone?”

“We thought we’d ask you.”

“Arkady Volkov. You’re going to want to go to Aphrodite Terra. That’s where the best megafauna are, and you won’t want to deal with any corporations. Most of Ishtar Terra is company land. Believe me, they protect it.”

Hong Wu nodded. “Rare-earth mining and time-share condos.”

“Arkady knows the territory,” Ash said. “I’ve worked with him before.”

Hong Wu nodded a second time. “We know. The police here say he’s reputable even though he comes from Petrograd.”

The last Soviet Socialist Republic, which remained here on Venus long after the collapse of the USSR, an enclave of out-of-date politics on the larger of the two Venusian continents. She liked Arkady, even though he was a Leninist. The heart hath its reasons that reason knoweth not. “Are you willing to hire him?”

“Yes,” Hong Wu said.

The rest of the conversation was details. Hong Wu left finally. Ash ordered another beer.

The bartender asked, “What was that about?”

“Work.”

“He looked like a petunia.”

“He is an employer, and we will be respectful.”

“Yes, ma’am.” The bartender grinned, showing metal teeth.

She finished the beer and walked home through winter rain, not hurrying. Her parka was waterproof, and the streets were covered with mud that had washed down from eroded hillsides. Half the streetlights were out. It would be easy to slip on the badly lit, uneven surface. She hated getting muddy. Even more, she hated looking vulnerable.

The buildings she passed were concrete and low: row houses for families and barracks for single workers. Graffiti crawled over them, most of it dark and slow moving. Here and there were tags written in more expensive spray that jittered and sparkled. “REVOLUTION NOW,” one said in glowing red letters. “F U, F U, F U,” another said in flashing yellow. The tags wouldn’t last downtown, where the ambiance cops would cover them, but here—

There were shanties and tents in the supposedly empty lots, mostly hidden by vegetation. You could see them if you knew how to look. Some folks did not like living in barracks, and some didn’t have the money to pay bed-rent.

She turned a corner next to a lot full of tall, feathery pseudograss. In daylight, it would have been deep green, edged with purple. Now it was as black as the graffiti on the nearest building. In the street ahead, a pack of piglike amphibianoids nosed around a Dumpster. Mostly not dangerous, in spite of their impressive tusks and claws. Ash paused. The matriarch of the pack eyed her for a moment, then grunted and lumbered away. The rest followed, leaving heaps of dung.

Her place was past the Dumpster: a two-floor row house. A light shone over the door, making it possible for her to see the land scorpion resting on the step. More than anything else, it looked like the ancient sea scorpions of Earth: broad, flat, segmented, and ugly. Instead of swimming paddles, it had many legs. This one was dull green and as long as her foot. Most likely it wasn’t venomous. The toxic species advertised the fact with bright colors. Nonetheless, she stepped on it firmly, hearing the crack of its exoskeleton breaking, then scraped her boot on the edge of the step.

She unlocked the door and yelled a greeting to the family on the first floor. Bangladeshi. The smell of their curries filled the house; and if she was lucky, they invited her to dinner. Tonight she was too late. Ash climbed the stairs and unlocked another door. Lights came on. Baby, her pet pterosaur, called, “Hungry.”

She pulled off her boots and put a stick of chow in Baby’s cage. The pterosaur dug in.

Of course, the animal was not a real pterosaur. Life on Earth and Venus had been evolving separately for hundreds of millions—maybe billions—of years. But it had skin wings stretched over finger bones, a big head, and a small, light body. Pale yellow fuzz covered it, except around its eyes, where its skin was bare and red. A crest of feathers adorned Baby’s head, down at present. When up, the feathers were long and narrow, looking like spines or stiff hairs; and they were bright, iridescent blue.

Some people—mostly middle-class—used the Latin names for the local life. But people on the hill called them after the Earth life they most resembled.

“Bored,” the animal said.

“We’re going into the outback,” Ash said. “Flying, Baby. Hunting. Food.”

“Fly!” Baby sang. “Hunt! Food!”

She scratched the pterosaur’s muzzle, which was full of needle teeth. The head crest rose, expanding into a brilliant, semicircular array.

Venus was surprising, she had learned in school. No one had expected flying animals as intelligent as birds. Famous words, repeated over and over—No one had expected.

She pulled a beer out of the electric cooler, sat down in the chair next to Baby’s cage, and unfolded her tablet. One tap brought up Arkady’s address. As usual, it was irritating. A glowing red star appeared on her screen. “You have reached the home of Arkady Volkov. He is out at present, making plans for a new revolution, but if you leave a message—”

“Cut it out, Arkady,” Ash said. “You are down at the local bar, getting pissed.”

The star was replaced by Arkady: a swarthy man with a thick, black beard and green eyes, surprisingly pale given his skin and hair. “Do not judge others by yourself, Ash. I am sitting at home with a modest glass of wine, trying—once again—to understand the first three chapters of Capital.”

“Why bother?”

“Education is always good. The ruling class denies it to workers because it’s dangerous to them. As a rule, one should always do what the ruling class finds dangerous.”

Easy for him to say, living in Petrograd, where his opinions were tolerated because a ruling class did not officially exist. Even there, most people found his ideas out-of-date. Oh, silly Arkady, he believes the old lies.

“Did you call to banter?” Arkady asked. “Or to argue politics? In which case I will find something offensive to say about anarchism.”

“Neither,” Ash said, and told him about the job.

He looked dubious. “I wasn’t planning to go out in the near future. There are things in Petrograd that need to be dealt with. Do these people pay well?”

Ash gave him the figure.

Arkady whistled. “Who are they?”

“National Geographic. They want to do a story on charismatic megafauna. I want to take them into a real wilderness, where they won’t run into surveyors or test plots or mines.”

“I will do it,” Arkady said, and lifted his glass of wine to her. “Capitalists have so much money. How many people?”

She gave details, as she had learned them from Hong Wu.

“Two vehicles,” Arkady said. “Ural trucks modified for passengers. Rifles. I can provide those. We’ll need two drivers and a cook, all of whom should be good with guns. That means we will have to hire the cook in Petrograd. Your cuisine is better, but your shooting is worse, and most of you do not know how to handle a Pecheneg.”

In theory, a rifle could take down anything on Venus, but only if the shot was well placed. There were times when the best thing to do was to rip the animal apart, and a Pecheneg could do that. Arkady was fond of them. They were solid and reliable, like the legendary AK-47 and the Ural 6420, the last version of the truck made before the USSR fell. It had been designed for use on Venus as well as in Siberia; and it could go through almost everything.

“I know someone here in Petrograd who does an excellent borscht—a man could live on borscht and bread—and can make more than adequate Central Asian food. She was in the police force and can both fire a Pecheneg and fieldstrip it.”

“It’s a deal, then,” said Ash.

—–—

She met the National Geographic team in the Venusport airport. The journalist was as expected: a tall, lean man in a jacket with many pockets. His dark eyes had a thousand-kilometer stare. The videographer was a surprise: a round sphere that rested on four spidery metal legs. Its head was atop a long, flexible neck—a cluster of lenses. “You are Ash Weatherman?” the machine asked in a pleasant contralto voice.

“Yes.”

“I am an Autonomous Leica. My model name is AL-26. My personal name is Margaret, in honor of the twentieth-century photographer Margaret Bourke White. You may call me Maggie.” It lifted one of its legs and extruded fingers. Ash shook the cool metal hand.

“And I am Jasper Khan,” the journalist said, holding out his hand, which was brown and muscular.

More shaking. This time the hand was warm.

“Baby,” said Baby.

“And this is Baby. Don’t try to shake. He nips.”

“A pseudorhamphorynchus,” Jasper said.

“Not pseudo,” Baby said.

“How large is his vocabulary?” Maggie asked.

“More than five hundred words. He keeps picking up new ones.”

Maggie bent its neck, peering into the cage. “Say cheese.”

“Not in vocabulary,” Baby replied, then opened his mouth wide, showing off his needle teeth.

“Excellent,” said Maggie. A bright light came on, and the Leica extended its—her—long neck farther, curling around the cage, recording Baby from all sides. The pterosaur did not look happy.

“You will be famous, Baby,” Ash said.

“Want food.”

The plane took off on time, rising steeply into the almost-always-present clouds. Ash had a window seat, useless after the clouds closed in. Baby was next to her on the aisle; and the National Geographic team was across the aisle.

Six hours to Aphrodite Terra. Ash fed a chow stick to Baby. The pterosaur held it in one clawed foot and gnawed. Ash felt her usual comfort in travel and in getting away from Venusport. Petrograd might be retrograde and delusional, the last remnant of a failed idea. But she liked Arkady, and nothing on the planet could beat a Ural 6420.

She dozed off as the plane flew south and rain streaked her window, then woke when the descent began. A holographic steward came by and warned them to fasten their seat belts. She had never unfastened hers, but she checked the one around Baby’s cage.

She looked out as the plane dropped below the clouds. Another grid city like Venusport, but smaller, with no tall buildings. A failure, slowly dying according to people on Earth and in Venusport. Cracked, gray runways crossed shaggy native grass.

They landed with a bump and rolled to a stop in front of the terminal. Ash undid her belt and Baby’s, then stood, feeling stiff.

Arkady was at the gate. On Earth there was security, which grew more intense as violence grew. Here on Venus, people were less desperate; and it was possible to wait at a gate with an AK-47 over one shoulder. It wasn’t the original version, of course, but a modern replica with some improvements, but not many. It remained as simple and indestructible as a stone ax and as easy to maintain. The best assault weapon ever made, Arkady said.

Baby opened his wings as far as he could in the cage. “Arky!” he cried.

The Russian grinned and waved.

Introductions followed. The two men were wary of each other, in spite of vigorous handshakes and broad smiles. Arkady was warmer toward the robot. “A pleasure,” he said, clasping the extruded fingers. “The Urals are waiting. We can head out at once.”

“Excellent,” the Autonomous Leica said.

They picked up the rest of their baggage at the carousel, then went into the rain. The Urals were across the drop-off-pick-up road. Two massive vehicles, each with four sets of wheels. The front truck had a box. The one in back was a flatbed, with a Pecheneg fastened to the bed. A tarp covered it, but Ash knew what it was.

Arkady escorted Maggie and Jasper to the flatbed, then pointed at the truck in front. Ash climbed into the backseat. The driver made a friendly, grunting sound.

“This is Boris,” Arkady said as he climbed in. “Irina and Alexandra are in the second truck.”

The trucks pulled out. Rain beat on the windshield, and wipers flashed back and forth. They bumped out of the airport and along rough, wet streets. Petrograd was around them: low, dreary-looking, concrete buildings, dimmed by the rain.

Arkady opened a thermos of tea and handed it back to Ash. She took a swallow. Hot and sweet.

“Do you want to show them anything special?” Arkady asked.

“They want charismatic megafauna and maybe something else. I keep wondering why they hired me. Do they want to write about Venusian culture as well?”

“The replica of America on Ishtar Terra, and the remains of the USSR on Aphrodite Terra,” said Arkady in a genial tone. “It might make a good story. At least they did not ask for mostly naked natives. We don’t have any, except in saunas and swimming pools.”

The city was not large. They were soon out of it and rolling through agricultural land: bright green fields of modified Earth crops. The rain let up though the cloud cover remained. By midafternoon, they reached the forest. The fields ended at a tall wire fence. Beyond were trees. Green, of course. Chlorophyll had evolved only once—on Earth—and been imported to Venus. But the native forest’s green always seemed richer, more intense and varied to her. Purple dotted the ragged foliage of the low bottlebrush trees. The foliage of the far taller lace-leaf trees was veined with yellow, though this was hard to see at a distance.

The trucks stopped. Arkady climbed down and opened the gate, then closed it after the trucks were through, climbed back into the cab, and flipped on the radio. “Large herbivores can break through the fence and do sometimes,” he told the truck in back. “Fortunately for us, they do not like the taste of Terran vegetation, though they can metabolize it. Unfortunately for us, the only way for them to learn they don’t like our food is to try it.”

“Ah,” said Jasper.

“I got images of your opening the gate,” Maggie said. “Bright green fields, dark green trees and you with your AK-47. Very nice.”

The trucks drove on. The road was two muddy ruts now, edged by an understory of frilly plants. The air coming in her partly open window smelled of Venus: rain, mud, and the native vegetation.

Animals began to appear: pterosaurs, flapping in the trees, and small reptiloid bipeds in the understory. Now and then, Ash saw a solitary flower, cone-shaped and two meters tall. Most were a vivid orange-yellow. The small flying bugs that pollinated them were not visible at a distance, but she knew they were there in clouds. Now and then Maggie asked for a stop. Ash had her camera out and did some shooting, but the thing she really wanted to capture—the robot—was invisible, except for the lens head, pushed out a window at the end of Maggie’s long, long neck.

Midway through the afternoon, they came to a river. A small herd of amphibianoids rested on the far shore. They were larger than the street pigs in Venusport, maybe five meters long, their sprawling bodies red and slippery-looking. Their flat heads had bulbous eyes on top—not at the back of the head, where eyes usually were, even on Venus, but in front, close to the nostrils and above the mouths full of sharp teeth.

Maggie climbed out her window onto the flat bed of the second truck. She braced herself there, next to the Pecheneg, and recorded as the trucks forded the river. The water came up to the trucks’ windows, and the riverbed was rocky, but the trucks kept moving, rocking and jolting. Nothing could beat a Ural!

“A gutsy robot,” Arkady said.

Alexandra answered over the radio. “She has four sets of fingers dug into the truck bed, right into the wood. A good thing. I don’t want to fish her out of the river.”

Ash aimed her camera at the amphibianoids as the animals bellowed and slid into the river, vanishing among waves. Maggie was more interesting, but she still couldn’t get a good view.

The trucks climbed the now-empty bank and rolled onto the road. The Leica climbed back into the cab. “Not mega, but very nice,” Maggie said over the radio.

An hour or so later, they reached the first lodge, a massive concrete building set against a low cliff. Vines hung down the cliff, and pterosaurs—a small species covered with white down—fluttered among the vines.

There was a front yard, protected by a tall fence. Once again, Arkady climbed down and opened the gate. The trucks rolled in. Arkady locked the gate behind them. Boris shut down their truck and grabbed an AK-47, climbing down to join Arkady. They looked around the yard, which was full of low vegetation, mashed in places by previous safaris. Nothing big could hide here, but there were always land scorpions.

An AK-47 seemed excessive to Ash. Good boots and stomping worked just as well. But the citizens of Petrograd loved their guns; and there was no question that the experience of crushing a land scorpion, especially a big one, was unpleasant.

Finally, Boris unlocked the lodge’s door, which was metal and so heavy it could be called armored, and went in. She knew what he was doing: turning on the generator, the lights—ah, there they were, shining out the open door—the air, the temp control, the fence.

Baby shifted in his cage. “Want out. Hunt. Eat.”

“Soon.”

“Pterosaur chow is crap,” Baby added.

She reached a finger through the cage’s bars and rubbed his head. His large eyes closed, and he looked happy.

Boris came out and waved.

“All clear,” Arkady called. “The fence is electric and on now. Stay away from it.”

Ash opened the cage. Baby crawled out and rested for a moment in the open window. Then he flapped out, rising rapidly. The small pterosaurs in the vines shrieked. She felt the brief doubt she always felt when she let Baby go. Would he return?

“Did it escape?” Jason asked over the radio.

“He’s going hunting.” Ash climbed down. The air was damp and hot. By the time she reached the lodge, her shirt was wet.

“I want all the food inside,” Arkady said. “Also all the weapons and any personal belongings you want to preserve. The fence will keep most things out, but it’s not one hundred percent secure.”

She put the cage down and went back to help unload the trucks. Irina was a broad, boxlike woman, as solid and useful as a Ural. Alexandra was surprisingly slim and elegant, the chef who’d been a cop and could fieldstrip a Pecheneg. She moved like a dancer, and Ash felt a terrible envy. Did women ever stop feeling envy?

Maggie recorded them as they worked, while Jason took notes on a tablet. Ash felt mildly irritated by this. Couldn’t he help with the boxes? But he was a paying customer and an employee of a famous news source.

Once they were all inside, Boris shut the door, bringing down a heavy bar.

“Bathrooms are down the hall,” Arkady said. “Paying customers go first. Dinner will be in an hour.”

“An hour and a half,” Alexandra said.

“I am corrected.”

When she got back from her shower, Ash noticed that the virtual windows were on, showing the yard, lit now by spotlights. Beyond the fence was the dark forest. A hologram fire burned in the fireplace. Wine and a cheese plate were on a table in front of the fire.

She poured a glass, then went to help Alexandra and Irina with dinner. It was sautéed vegetables and fish from the Petrograd fishponds.

They ate around the fireplace.

“Someone has been here,” Boris said, as they ate.

“It must have been another safari,” Arkady said mildly. “They all have the access code.”

“I checked. No safaris have been this way since the last time we were here, and the security system has recorded nothing. But I know how I arrange canned goods. They are no longer in alphabetic order. I think it’s the CIA.”

“What?” asked Jason, and pulled his tablet out.

“There is a CIA post in the forest,” Arkady said. “They spy on Petrograd, though we’re barely surviving and no danger to the American colony or anyone. We ignore them because we don’t have the resources to confront them. But they are present—and not far from here. Boris might be right. They could have tinkered with the security system. I don’t know who else could have.”

“Why do you hang on if you are barely surviving?” Jason asked. “The USSR fell, in part because it exhausted itself trying to settle Venus. All the republics have become capitalist states, but you remain here, stubbornly Soviet.”

“Not all change is good,” Boris said. “And there is more to life than selfishness.”

“Surely you would do better if you had the assistance of the American colony on Ishtar.”

Arkady said, “The capitalists on Earth are investing in what interests them, which is not the lives of ordinary people. We in Petrograd are a dream that has failed, or so we are told. Ishtar Terra is a—what can I call it?—a vacation spot, a rare-earth mine, and a place for the rich to flee to if they finally decide that Earth is uninhabitable.”

“Life in Ishtar Terra is more comfortable than life here,” Jason pointed out.

“We survive.”

“Be honest, Arkady,” said the boxlike woman, Irina. “People get tired of shortages and go to Ishtar Terra. It’s a slow but continual drain. In the end, Petrograd will fail.”

“We don’t know that,” Boris put in. “Even our setbacks are not entirely bad. Our food shortages have brought our rates of heart disease and diabetes down; and our fuel shortages mean we walk more, which is healthy.”

Irina did not look convinced. Nor did Jason Khan, though Ash could not be sure. He was an oddly opaque man. Maybe she would find out what he was thinking when the article finally came out. At present, the Leica was easier to understand.

“There,” said Arkady. “You said you wanted charismatic fauna.” He pointed at one of the virtual windows.

A flock of bipeds moved along the fence, illuminated by the spotlights. They were slender and covered with bright blue down, except for their chests, which were orange-red.

“The Americans call them robins,” Arkady said. “Notice that they are following the fence, but not touching it. They know it’s dangerous, if we are here, and the spotlights tell them we are here. If this were Earth in the Triassic, those little fellows would be the ancestors of the dinosaurs. But this isn’t Earth. We don’t know what they will become. They’re bright, and they have hands capable of some manipulation. Maybe they will become us in time.”

A second kind of animal joined the bipeds at the fence. Ten meters long or more, its body was hairless and black. It had a gait like a crocodile’s high walk, and its lifted head was long and reptilian, the mouth full of ragged teeth. The bipeds ran off. The animal nosed the fence once and drew back with a roar.

“You see,” Arkady said. “Not so bright. It doesn’t have to be. It’s big and nasty. If this were Earth in the Triassic, it would represent the past, a species that will vanish, unable to compete. But this is not Earth.”

Something pale flew into the spotlights. Baby, Ash realized. The pterosaur flapped low above the pseudosuchus, taunting it. The animal roared and reared up on its hind legs, snapping at Baby and almost getting him. The pterosaur flapped up and over the fence, landing on one of the Urals. The pseudosuchus dropped down on all fours. Most likely Ash was reading in, but it looked frustrated. Baby looked frightened. The little fool. She’d have a talk with him.

“They are descended from bipeds,” Arkady said. “As a result, their hind legs are longer and stronger than their front legs, and they can—as you see—rear up. They also move more quickly than you would suspect.”

“I got it,” Maggie said. “But the image won’t be as good as I could have gotten outside.”

“Go out,” Boris said. “This fence is strong enough to hold.”

Ash went out with the Nat Geo people. Of course, the pseudosuchus saw—or maybe smelled—them as soon as they went outside. It slammed into the fence and roared, then reared up, grasping the fence with its forepaws and shaking it. That must hurt. More roaring, while Maggie recorded, using a light so brilliant that Ash could see the glitter of the animal’s scales. Ash got a lovely image of the robot and the monster. Light hit from different angles, cast by the lodge’s spots and Maggie, creating areas of glare and shadow. Even in color, the image looked black-and-white.

Baby flapped to her, settling on her shoulder.

“Idiot,” she said.

“Poop on you,” Baby replied.

The fence bowed under the animal’s weight. Behind them, Arkady said, “I’m not going to turn the current up. That is a protected species.”

“Come in,” Ash told Jason.

“The fence is supposed to hold.”

“Most likely it will,” Arkady said in a comfortable tone. “But if it doesn’t—”

They piled back inside, and Arkady barred the door. Baby flew to his cage, opened the door and climbed in, pulling the door shut. Ash heard the lock click. The pterosaur huddled, looking thoroughly frightened.

“You shouldn’t tease the monsters,” Ash said.

“Poop! Poop!” Baby replied, and pooped on the floor of his cage.

She would have to clean that up, but not now. Let Baby get over being afraid.

She glanced at one of the virtual windows. The pseudosuchus was back on all fours, looking thoroughly pissed off. After a moment or two, it moved off. It was clear from the way it moved that its forefeet were injured.

“Not bright,” Arkady said. “But a top predator. They do not need to be bright, as the history of America has shown.”

“I’d like help in the kitchen,” Alexandra put in.

Ash gathered glasses and followed Alexandra out of the room. The kitchen had a dishwasher from Venusport. Everything went in. Alexandra set the controls and turned the machine on.

“What is Venusport like?” Irina asked.

“Unjust,” Ash replied. “Run from Earth for the benefit of mining companies and tourists and the rich.”

“That sounds like a manifesto, not a report,” Alexandra said. “What is life like for you? Do you have enough to eat? Can you buy glittery toys?”

Ash hesitated, then answered. “I have enough to eat. I can buy some toys. Hell, I make most of my living producing images of glittery toys.”

“We see broadcasts from Ishtar Terra,” Irina said. “Life there looks more attractive than life in Petrograd.”

“Are you thinking of bailing out?” Ash asked.

“Maybe,” Alexandra said. “I would like glittery toys.”

Irina shook her head. “I don’t think so. I have family and a lover, who is like Arkady. She believes in Petrograd.”

Once the counters were wiped down, Ash went back into the living room. Jason and Arkady were lounging in chairs by the fire. Maggie had retracted her legs and neck and head, becoming a large, featureless, silver ball in front of the hologram flames. Red light played over her surface.

Baby was sitting on top of his cage, eating a stick of chow.

“You found nothing to eat?” Ash asked.

“Caught small pterosaur. Ate it. Still hungry.”

She settled in a chair. There was a new bottle on the table, surrounded by fresh glasses. One of Petrograd’s scary brandies. Ash poured and tasted. This one was raspberry. It burned in her mouth and down her throat, ending as a warm glow in her gut. “Where’s Boris?” she asked.

“Looking around the lodge. He’s still worried about his canned goods.”

“He really arranged them alphabetically?”

Arkady nodded. “He is both compulsive and paranoid. But an excellent safari driver and a good drinking companion. A man as obsessed as he is needs ways to relax. He never drinks while driving, in case you are wondering.”

Ash eased back in her chair, feeling content. Brandy, a fire, Baby chewing on chow, the prospect of charismatic megafauna and gigantic flowers. Life was good.

Jason had his tablet out, his fingers dancing over the screen. She still didn’t know what he was reporting on. Venusian wildlife? Petrograd? The American colony? Whichever it was, the pay was good, and she got a break from the glittery toys that Irina and Alexandra envied.

She should not judge them. She had the toys, or at least the toy makers, as clients. It was easy for her to feel indifferent to them.

Boris came into the room, holding a land scorpion, one hand behind the animal’s head, the other on its tail. It was alive and twisting in his grip, trying to find a way to bite him or pinch him with its large front claws.

“Shit,” said Arkady. “How did that get in?”

“I told you someone had been here.” Boris stopped and displayed the creature to them. Jason looked horrified. Maggie, who must have been listening, extruded her head and neck. In a smooth motion, she rose on her legs, and the cluster of lenses she had instead of a face turned toward Boris.

The scorpion was about half a meter long, wide, flat, shiny, dark purple, and still twisting in Boris’s grip. The mouth, with mandibles and fangs, was in continuous motion. Ash felt a little queasy. Damn! The things were ugly! She was pretty certain this species was poisonous. Arkady would know.

“Get me a pair of shears,” Boris said.

Ash went to the kitchen, where Irina and Alexandra were still talking. “We have a problem. I need shears.”

Alexandra found them. Ash took them to Boris.

He knelt carefully and placed the animal on the floor, holding it with one hand. With the other hand, he took the shears and cut the scorpion’s head off, then stood quickly. The many-legged body thrashed around, and the head jittered on the floor, its mandibles still opening and closing.

“It was under the bed in the room that Jason picked as his bedroom,” Boris said.

“What is it?” Jason asked in a tone of terror.

“One of the many species of land scorpion,” Arkady said. “Many have poisonous bites. This species would not kill you, but it would make you sick.”

Boris took one of the glasses on the table and used it to scoop the head up. “The body is not toxic. The fangs and the venom glands are in the head. Keep the rest as a souvenir, if you want.”

“I have dramatic images,” Maggie said. “That is sufficient. Our viewers will be horrified and disgusted.”

“How did it get in?” Arkady asked again.

“I want to take a closer look at the head,” Boris said, and went into the kitchen.

Alexandra and Irina were in the living room by now, watching the twisting, scrabbling, headless body with interest.

“Edible?” Baby asked.

“Wait,” said Ash.

“Hungry,” Baby complained.

“Have another stick of chow.”

“Not tasty.”

“Life is hard,” Ash told him.

“Do not understand.”

“Eat your chow.”

The scorpion’s body was slowing down though it still thrashed.

“I hate drama,” Alexandra said.

“That is why you are a chef now, rather than a cop,” Arkady told her.

“Yes, but it doesn’t explain why I work for you.”

“Money,” Arkady said.

Boris came back, carrying the scorpion’s head on a cutting board. He set the board on the table and Maggie leaned down to record it. He’d cut the head open. Some kind of dark matter, the brain most likely, was inside. In the middle of it was a tiny silver bead. Barely visible silver wires radiated out from it.

“Most likely it is a nano machine,” Boris said. “It was injected into the circulatory system and migrated to the brain, then built itself. The animal has become an organic robot. It was planted on us as a spy.”

Ash felt queasy. She had no trouble with ordinary robots, such as Maggie, who was recording the split-open head. But the idea of taking a living being and turning it into a robot bothered her. Even cockroaches, which had come to Venus with humans, deserved their own lives. The technology used to enslave bugs could be modified for other animals or humans, though that was illegal, of course.

“How did you know to look for it?” Arkady asked Boris.

“I looked at the security recordings. It was there though only in glimpses. I don’t think there are any more.”

“My images are excellent,” Maggie said. “This will add drama to our story.”

“Is it the CIA?” asked Jason.

“I believe so,” Boris answered. “We live in their shadow.”

“Well, if Boris thinks there are no more, we can enjoy the rest of the evening,” Arkady put in.

“Can Baby eat the body?” Ash asked.

“No,” said Boris. “We don’t know what else might be in it. I’ll toss it in the garbage.”

“Sorry,” Baby said.

Boris carried the head and body out. Ash drank more raspberry brandy.

“We grow the raspberries in greenhouses, along with other fruit,” Arkady said. “Our crops may fail but we always have brandy.”

Nothing more happened that evening or night. Ash slept badly, waking from time to time to listen for the rustling sound of a scorpion. She turned on the lights once but saw nothing except Baby sleeping in his cage.

The next morning, they drove on. The rain stopped, and rays of sunlight broke through the cloud cover, lighting patches of the forest. There were lots of cone-shaped flowers. A group of large herbivores fed on one. Similar animals on Ishtar Terra were called forest cattle though they didn’t seem especially cowlike to her, being larger than any cow she had ever seen, even in images from Earth, and green. A crest of hair went along their backs, and their large mouths had four big tusks. There were half a dozen of them around the bright red flower, ripping into it. Petals coated their muzzles and dripped from their mouths like blood.

Boris braked.

“Look to the right,” Arkady said to the radio. “More megafauna.”

“I would not call them charismatic,” Jason replied over the radio.

“They are two meters high at the shoulder, and they can be dangerous,” Arkady said. “If you don’t believe so, I can let you off here.”

“No,” said Maggie. “I need Jason.”

The trucks moved on. Ash had been on this route before, a loop that went from fortified lodge to fortified lodge, till it returned to Petrograd and dinner at one of several luxury hotels. A hospitality firm based in Venusport had built them and ran them, making sure that the tourists had a reliably luxurious experience.

“This is National Geographic,” she said to Arkady. “Can’t you show them something different?”

“We are thinking about that. But not today.”

She set down her camera and drank tea. As usual, it was strong and sweet. She felt tired because of a bad night’s sleep but mostly good. Baby was next to her in his cage, hunched up, his eyes closed. Was there anything cuter than a sleeping pterosaur?

There were more pterosaurs flapping in the trees, and bipeds scurrying through the undergrowth. Early in the afternoon, the clouds broke apart, and rays of sunlight slanted into the forest. A herd of forest cattle—twenty or more—crossed the track in front of them, forcing them to stop and wait till the loutish herbivores finally moved on. But they saw no large predators.

“Apex predators are always rare,” Arkady said when Jason complained. “And this is not Earth in the Jurassic.”

They reached the next lodge late in the afternoon. It was a concrete pillbox, surrounded by a high fence. Alexandra and Irina did the check this time, stepping on several small land scorpions. There was something lonely about the two women, stalking through knee-high vegetation. They both carried rifles but used them only for poking among the leaves. Beyond the fence was the forest, darkening as daylight faded and denser clouds moved in. Ash took photos, as did Maggie.

They went inside finally and Boris did another search. “My cans are in order,” he announced. “And I have found no scorpions.”

They unloaded the trucks and Alexandra made dinner. This time it was a pilaf and a mixture of spinach and chickpeas.

“Home food,” said Arkady happily.

Heavy rain began to fall outside. Ash watched it through one of the virtual windows. It shone like a silver curtain in the lodge’s spotlights. The low plants around the lodge bent under the weight of water, and a gusty wind made them flutter. Arkady got out plum brandy this time.

Jason looked unhappy. Maggie recorded the lodge’s interior, and Ash took shots of the Leica, head tilted and lenses shining in the false firelight. She had the impression that Maggie was perfectly content, in spite of the lack of drama.

“Want outside,” Baby said.

“The weather is bad,” Ash replied.

The pterosaur hunched down, looking as unhappy as Jason.

Of course, the journalist wanted something exciting to happen. Ash was content to sit by the false fire and drink fruit brandy. What she liked about the outback was its strangeness, its inhumanity. Was that the right word? Being in a place without imported plants and animals, where people didn’t fit in though they had made roads—a few, at least—and built lodges. Maybe what she liked about Arkady was his line of work. This was his turf. As much as anyone, he knew Aphrodite Terra.

In some ways, Venus was lucky. Earth did not have the resources to really settle the planet. The USSR had destroyed itself trying to win the Venus Race. The US had largely given up, in part because it no longer had a rival and in part because the problems on Earth kept getting worse. Venus provided some raw materials—not many; the shipping costs were ridiculous—and it was a tourist destination. Some people retired to the gated communities near Venusport. Others bought beachside condos against the time that Earth was no longer habitable. But most of the planet remained empty of humanity.

The next day, they moved on. The ground was rising and getting stonier, and the trees were all short, with big, drooping leaves. Small animals moved in the branches and the undergrowth. Midway through the afternoon, their truck turned off the rutted track into forest, mashing low plants and avoiding trees. The second truck followed.

“What?” asked Ash.

“We are going to show National Geographic a good time,” Arkady said. “As you asked us to.”

“And make a point,” Boris added.

“Do you mind telling me what?” Ash asked.

“In good time,” Arkady replied. “I’m tired of Jason’s complaining about our fauna. It reminds me of other safaris I have led, full of rich tourists who want dinosaurs. I tell them that Venusian fauna is similar to fauna on Earth, but not identical, and we are not in the Jurassic. I’ve had the bastards ask for money back because we couldn’t show them an allosaurus. I wanted to feed them to a pseudosuchus, which might not impress them but could certainly eat them.”

Arkady was usually even-tempered, but he sounded angry now. Well, she got angry at some of her work. The fashion shoots could be fairly awful.

They crunched through more undergrowth. There were rocks here, making the driving chancy: outcroppings of a creamy yellow stone.

“Limestone,” Arkady said. “This used to be underwater. There ought to be good fossils, though Jason does not strike me as a fossil man.”

“I’m not one,” Boris said, guiding the truck between two good-sized chunks of stone. A pair of pterosaurs rested on top of one. They were big, with impressive crests.

“Stop!” said Ash.

Boris did. She photographed the animals, which looked damn fine, their crests like orange sails.

“Don’t like,” Baby muttered. Of course not. These guys were big enough to eat him. They would if given the chance. The pterosaurs were not cannibals, but they happily ate related species, as humans once ate monkeys when there were monkeys in the wild.

They went on, coming finally to another track, this one much less used than the one they had been following. Boris turned onto it.

“I don’t remember this,” Ash said.

“It’s good country,” Arkady said. “Interesting. But the damn, gutless executive committee has decided the area is off-limits.”

“Are you breaking rules?” Ash asked.

“Yes. This is the perfect time to explore, with a National Geographic videographer along.”

“And with the CIA putting poisonous spies in our lodge,” Boris growled.

Ash had a bad feeling. But Arkady ran the most reputable tours on the continent.

They bumped among more outcropping of cream-yellow rock.

“This looks right,” Boris said, glancing at his GPS, which was in Cyrillic. Ash could not read it.

“For what?” she asked.

“An impact crater,” said Arkady. “Or something else.”

Boris hit the brakes.

Next to the road was a low wall made of yellow limestone. It curved gently, apparently part of a huge circle. The section in front of them had been dug out. Heaps of dirt lay in front of it. Off to either side, the soil had not been excavated, and the wall was a mound, covered with low plants and vines.

“I wasn’t expecting the excavation,” Arkady said. “I suppose we have the CIA to thank.”

“Who built this?” Ash asked.

“Not us,” Arkady replied. “And not the CIA. It shows up in early satellite surveys, along with three other circles, all in this area and all arranged in a broad arc. One circle is broken, only half there. The rest are complete. None has been investigated. In theory, they are impact craters from a body that broke apart before it hit.

“Remember that our colony was run from Earth. The apparatchiks in Moscow said exploration could wait. This wasn’t a scientific settlement. It was military and economic. By the time we were ready to look around, the CIA was in the area. The government decided to leave them alone. We didn’t have the power to confront the Americans.”

They all climbed out and walked to the wall. It looked to be made of the same stone as the outcroppings. But it was a single piece, as far as Ash could tell, and the surface was slick. Ash ran her hand along it. As smooth as glass. When she pulled her hand away, she saw blood. The edge of the wall was knife-sharp.

“Here,” said Arkady, and handed her a red handkerchief.

“What’s that for?” Ash asked. “The revolution?”

“At the moment, it’s for your hand. Use it.”

Ash wrapped the handkerchief around the bleeding fingers. Maggie was recording her, she noticed.

The wall—the part aboveground at least—was more than a meter high, too tall to sit on comfortably, if one was human, and too tall to step over comfortably.

“Amazing,” Jason said. “If humans did not build this, then it is proof of intelligent life on Venus.”

“There isn’t any,” Ash put in. “The brightest things on the planet are animals like Baby. He’s bright, but he doesn’t build walls.”

“It can’t possibly be natural,” Jason said.

“I agree,” Arkady replied. “I also agree with Ash. I do not think this was built by anything native to Venus.”

Maggie was panning, making a record of the entire length of the wall.

In back of them, a voice asked, “Who the hell are you?”

Ash turned, as did the others. A soldier in full body armor stood in the road between the two trucks. He was carrying a terrifying-looking, very-high-tech rifle. Ash saw that first, then she noticed that he was standing above the road, his boots not touching the surface.

“You are a hologram,” Boris said.

“Yes. But there are gun emplacements all around you. Take a look.”

Ash did. Red lights, sighting lasers, shone on top of neighboring rocks. As far as she could tell, they were aimed at her.

“If you doubt me, I can melt something,” the hologram said. “Your robot.”

“She is autonomous,” Jason replied quickly. “A citizen of the United States and an employee of National Geographic.”

“Shit,” said the hologram. “Stay put. I have to consult. If you move, the guns will fire.” The soldier vanished.

“Are you still recording?” Jason asked Maggie.

“Yes, and I’m uploading my images to the nearest comsat. This place is about to become famous.”

“That will make life uncomfortable for the CIA,” said Arkady in a tone of satisfaction.

“And the useless Petrograd executive committee,” Boris added.

“And for us,” Ash put in. “You have just pissed off the most dangerous organization in the solar system.”

The hologram reappeared. “I have backup coming. Stay where you are. I’ve been informed that your robot is emitting radio signals. Stop that!”

“Very well,” Maggie said. She didn’t add that it was too late.

They waited, staying where they were, even though a fine rain began to fall. Inside the truck cab, Baby squawked for food.

“Later,” Ash called.

“Hungry!”

At last, a car appeared, bumping down the track. It stopped, and a pair of men climbed out, dressed entirely in black, with shiny black boots. They wore computer glasses with opaque lenses and dark, thick frames.

“Who are you?” one asked.

“Arkady Volkov Wildlife Tours,” Arkady said.

“National Geographic,” Jason added.

“Ashley Weatherman Fashion Art,” Ash put in.

“Shit,” the man said, then added, “Follow us, and don’t try anything funny. There are guns in the forest. Any trouble, and they will melt your trucks.”

They climbed into the trucks. Arkady handed Ash a first-aid kit, and she sprayed a bandage on her fingers. The antiseptic in it made the cuts sting. Venusian microbes did not usually infect humans, but there were Earth microbes spreading across the planet, and some of them were nasty.

The car turned and went back the way it had come. The trucks followed. As they began to move, Ash looked back. The hologram soldier was still in the middle of the road, rifle in hand, watching. Then the second truck rolled through him, and he was gone.

“I apologize,” Arkady said. “I thought we could look at one crater and get out safely, with a few images that might—I hoped—endanger the CIA’s control of this region.”

“Were you expecting to find an alien artifact?” Ash asked.

“The longer we looked at the craters the more suspicious they have looked,” Boris said. “We were looking at the CIA, of course. We would not have examined the satellite images so closely otherwise.”

Ash leaned back and drank more tea. Next to her, Baby gnawed on a chow stick. Of course she was worried, but she couldn’t imagine the CIA taking out National Geographic. Even monsters had their limits.

The rain grew heavier. Looking out, Ash saw a group of fire scorpions resting on a tree trunk, sheltered by foliage. They weren’t large, but their exoskeletons were bright red, a warning of serious poison.

“I don’t think I will draw Maggie’s attention to them,” Arkady said. “The CIA might not want us on the radio. A pity. They look handsome, and they are very poisonous. Tourists always enjoy deadly animals.”

A half hour later, they reached a cliff made of the same yellow stone as the outcroppings. It rose above the forest, running as far as she could see in both directions. The road ended in front of it. The car stopped, and they stopped as well. Everyone climbed down.

“Leave the rifles in the trucks,” one of the men said. “And you can leave that thing too.” He waved at Baby in his cage.

“He gets lonely,” Ash said.

One man went ahead of them, opening a door in the cliff face. It looked human-made, but Ash was less sure of the opening it closed. Rectangular, very tall and narrow, it didn’t look like the kind of doorway humans would cut. They filed through, followed by the second man, who closed the door and locked it. Inside was a corridor, as tall and narrow and rectangular as the opening. Lights were stuck along the walls. These were clearly human. As for the corridor itself—the stone was polished and as slick as glass. There were fossils in it. Ash made out shells, gleaming behind the glossy surface, as well as long things that might be worms or crinoids, though this world did not have crinoids. If she’d had another life to live, she would have been a biologist or paleontologist, though she had a low tolerance for the finicky work required of both. Maybe it was a better idea to shoot fashion models and megafauna.

Baby muttered in his cage.

The corridor ended in another narrow doorway, this one without a door. Beyond it was a rectangular room with polished-stone walls. Like the hall, it was narrow and tall. It contained a table and chairs, all 3-D-printed. Ash recognized the style. Human Office Modern.

“Okay,” said one of the men. He took off his glasses, showing pale blue eyes with dark, puffy skin below them. “What is this about? We have a deal with the executive committee of the Petrograd Soviet.” He looked at the other man, who still wore glasses. “Mike, get coffee, will you?”

“Sure,” Mike answered. “Don’t say anything exciting till I get back.” The voice was contralto.

Ash took another look. Mike was either a woman or an FTM, though it was well hidden by the boxy suit and heavy-rimmed computer glasses. Not that it mattered. A female CIA agent was as dangerous as a male.

Mike left, and they sat down. Arkady and Boris looked grim. Irina and Alexandra looked worried. The Nat Geo journalist had an expression that combined fear and excitement. Maggie’s gleaming lens face revealed nothing.

“Who built this?” Arkady asked.

“We don’t know,” the man replied. “We found it.”

“Are there artifacts?” Arkady asked.

“Aside from the circles and these tunnels? Nothing we have found.”

“This is a site of systemwide historical importance,” Boris said. “Evidence that someone, not human, was on Venus before we came. You sat in it, keeping the people of Petrograd—and the scientists on Venus and Earth—from investigating. Not to mention the tourists we could have brought in, improving our economy.”

“It meant we didn’t have to set up camp in the forest,” the man said. “It’s dry in here, and there’s a lot less animal life—or was, till recently. Believe me, this place isn’t interesting. Just corridors and rooms, going a long way back into the cliff. All empty, except for the debris left by animals. Bones and dry leaves and dried-out feces.”

Mike came back with a tray, carafe, and coffee cups. He or she poured coffee. There was a slight chill in the room, and it was pleasant to hold the warm cup and sip the hot coffee. Ash’s cut fingers still stung a little.

“The question is, what will we do with you?” the first man said.

“National Geographic will be concerned if we vanish,” Jason said. He sounded anxious.

“Accidents happen in the outback,” Mike said in his or her high voice.

“I was recording and uploading my images, until your hologram told me to stop,” Maggie put in. “The material went to the nearest comsat, which belongs—I believe—to Petrograd. I assume the comsat sent it on to our office in Venusport. The message was encrypted to prevent piracy. But our office can decode it. They will have done so by now.”

“They know about the circle,” Jason added. “And the robot you put in the lodge.”

“What robot?” the man asked.

“The bug. The scorpion. It had wires.”

Mike was leaning against a wall, cup in hand. The nameless man looked over, frowning.

“Not ours,” Mike said. “Petrograd must be spying on itself.”

Baby stirred in his cage. Ash reached a finger to scratch him and—in the same movement—undid the lock on the door. No one seemed to notice except Baby, who looked interested and alert.

She wondered about ventilation and ways to escape, looked around and saw a rectangle cut in the stone of one wall just below the ceiling. It was long and narrow with vertical bars made of the same stone as the wall. As she watched, a pair of antennae poked out between two of the bars. The animal followed. A scorpion, of course. The pale gray body suggested it was a cave scorpion, as did the lack of obvious eyes.

She watched as its front legs scrabbled to get a grip on the slick stone. It failed and fell, landing with an audible “tock.” The nameless man spun in his chair, then was up and stamping the scorpion over and over. It wasn’t even that big, Ash thought. No more than twenty centimeters.

The man remained bent over for several moments. “Oh God, I hate them.”

“They are carrion eaters,” Arkady said. “Living off the debris of pterosaur colonies that nest on cliffs and in shallow caves. Their bite does little harm to humans.”

“I hate them,” the man repeated.

“He has a phobia,” Mike said. “Cave scorpions don’t bother me.”

The nameless agent straightened up. “The tunnels connect with caves. The damn things have discovered they can live off us. They’re all over.”

“But hardly a serious problem,” Arkady said.

“We also have fire scorpions,” Mike put in.

The nameless agent twitched at the name. Mike smiled slightly. Ash had the impression he enjoyed his colleague’s fear.

“That is a problem,” Boris said. “But you shouldn’t have them. They live in the forest, not in caves.”

“They’ve bred with the cave scorpions,” the nameless man said. His voice sounded constricted, as if fear had robbed him of breath.

“They can’t have,” Arkady said. “They are different species, living in different environments.”

The two men exchanged glances and were silent.

After a moment, Boris said harshly, “You were not satisfied with robot scorpions. You have played with DNA and created a new species in violation of numerous laws.”

“Not the laws on Earth,” Mike said.

“You are on Venus,” Boris pointed out. “And in Petrograd.”

“I don’t think we need to talk about this.”

“Yes, we do,” Arkady replied. “And not just here. You are in very serious violation of several treaties. Venus and Earth need to know about this.”

The nameless agent pulled out a handgun, aiming it at Arkady. The gun was shaking. Ash could see that clearly. The gun, the shaking hand, the room, the other people were all unnaturally sharp and clear.

“Go,” she said to Baby. The pterosaur was out in a moment, flapping onto the agent’s head and clawing. The gun went off with a loud—very loud—sound. Arkady dove at the man, taking him down. The gun spun across the floor, away from Arkady and the nameless agent.

“Stop that,” Mike said.

Ash looked toward him. His coffee cup lay on the yellow floor, in the middle of a brown pool of coffee, and he had a gun out, pointing it at Arkady.

Never mix with the CIA. But it was too late for that warning.

“No,” said Alexandra. Ash was trying not to move, but she could see the ex-cop from the corner of her eye. The woman had a gun, held steadily and pointed at Mike. This was ridiculous.

“Get the damn animal off Brian,” Mike said.

The nameless agent was on the floor, Arkady lying across him, and Baby still on his head, biting and clawing.

“Stop,” Ash called. “You can stop now, Baby.”

The pterosaur flapped back to his cage, settling on top and folding his downy wings.

“This is stupid,” Mike said. “I’m not going to shoot anyone in here, and I hope to God this lovely lady is not going to shoot me. You guys look like idiots on the floor. Get up.”

The two men did. Arkady looked rumpled, which was his usual condition. Blood ran down the face of the nameless agent. He wiped it with one hand, making a smear.

“We’re pulling out,” Mike added. “Petrograd knows this.”

“Why?” asked Boris.

“Why do they know? We told them.”

“Why are you pulling out?”

“The scorpions. The things are deadly, and Brian’s right. They’re all over.”

“Am I right?” Boris said. “Did you create them?”

Mike was silent.

“They must have wanted something that could live in sewers and the crawl spaces of buildings,” Arkady put in. “And that was toxic. It sounds like a weapon that could be used against Petrograd.”

“They are telling us too much,” Boris said. “They must be planning to kill us.”

“Not while I hold this gun,” Alexandra said.

“We’re pulling out, as I told you,” Mike said. “And there is no proof that we made the scorpions or intended to use them for anything. You Soviets are way too paranoid.”

“How many people are left here?” Arkady asked.

“Dozens,” said the agent named Brian.

“Don’t be a fool. We saw no one coming in, and no one has responded to the sound of gunfire. Either you are alone, or your colleagues are not close.”

“Three,” Mike answered. “They’re in the back rooms, destroying the equipment. When they’re done, we’ll take the last VTL.”

Boris pulled a roll of duct tape from his vest. He tossed it to Arkady. “Tape them up.”

“No,” said Brian. “What if more scorpions come?”

“Too bad,” Boris said.

The man bolted for the room’s doorway. Baby flapped onto him, clawing and shrieking, “Bad! Bad!”

Brian stumbled. Boxlike Irina grabbed his arm and pulled him around, then drove a fist into the man’s midsection. He bent over, coughing, and collapsed onto his knees. Fortunately, because Ash hated vomit, he did not throw up.

“That’s some punch,” Mike said in his or her pleasant voice.

“She used to be a stevedore,” Arkady said. “Now I will tape you up, and you will hope that none of your new, mutant scorpions arrive.”

“I’m not phobic,” Mike replied. “And I’m not going to shoot it out with you. We don’t know what these walls are made of, but you can’t scratch them. Anything that hits them is going to bounce off.” He put his gun on the table. “We’ve been lucky so far. The last ricochet didn’t hit anyone. I think the bullet went out the door. There’s no reason to think we’ll be lucky a second time.”

Arkady and Irina taped the two men while Alexandra kept her gun leveled.

“Are you recording?” Arkady asked after they were done.

“Yes,” Maggie said. “But I’m having trouble with my radio signal here. As soon as we are outside, I will send the photos to Venusport.”

Arkady set a knife on the table next to Mike’s gun. “It will cut the tape,” he said to Mike. “Even if your comrades don’t come looking for you, you’ll be able to get free.”

“That may be a mistake,” Boris said.

Arkady nodded. “We all make them. Let’s get out of here.”

They left the room and retraced their way through the mazelike stone corridors. No one appeared though they did encounter a scorpion, crawling over the floor. It was dirty pink with tiny eyes, thirty centimeters long and the ugliest land scorpion Ash had ever seen. Boris stepped on it hard, crushing its exoskeleton. The many legs kept scrabbling, and the mandibles twitched back and forth, but the animal’s body could not move. It was broken. “This is why we wear tall boots,” he said.

They found the trucks where they had left them. Rain still fell heavily.

“I can send the recordings now,” Maggie said.

“Do it,” Jason said. “I am going to write an exposé that will rip those guys apart. They were ready to kill us.”

They ran for the trucks, climbed in, and pulled out, going along the track away from the ruins.

Ash could feel her heart beating rapidly. Her mouth was dry, and she was shaking. Fear fighting with amazement. She had been inside ruins built by aliens, and she had escaped from the CIA. What a day!

Baby was in his cage, shivering and repeating “bad, bad” over and over in a quiet voice.

“Okay,” Ash said after her heart slowed down. “What was that about?”

Arkady leaned forward and checked the truck radio, which was off. “We knew the CIA was here and that they had some kind of agreement with the Petrograd executive committee. We knew about the circles. And we had this.” He handed her a tablet. On the screen was a piece of sculpture, deeply worn and barely recognizable as a person. It had two arms and two legs, all long and thin, the legs together and the arms folded across the chest. The person’s torso was short and wide, its neck long and narrow, its head wedge-shaped.

“This might be expressive distortion,” Arkady said. “Or it might be an alien. It is only ten centimeters long. It was found in the outback in the early days of settlement, and it ended in the Petrograd Museum. The curators thought it was fake. It remained in the collection but was never investigated.”

“We learned about it and put it together with the circles,” Boris said. “Do you have any idea how much money Petrograd could make from tourism if we had authentic alien ruins?”

“Who are you?” Ash asked.

“People who want to embarrass the executive committee,” Arkady said. “Can you imagine what Lenin would have said about that collection of petty bureaucrats? Now National Geographic will publish its exclusive. With luck, there will be a huge stink. The Petrograd Soviet will decide to remove the executive committee, and the CIA will be so embarrassed that it will leave Aphrodite Terra.”

“That’s too much to hope,” Boris growled.

“Maybe,” Arkady replied. “In any case, we couldn’t pass up the chance. The entire solar system pays attention to the National Geographic.”

“What about the bug in the lodge?” Ash asked. “Mike said it wasn’t one of theirs.”

“It was CIA, but they didn’t put it in the lodge. Some of our farm workers found it crawling in the fields, heading toward Petrograd, and sent for the police. They captured it. I brought it with us,” Boris said. “We wanted Nat Geo to see what we had to put up with. Poisonous robot spies! They are a crime against nature and peaceful coexistence!”

The truck was bumping over the rough road, among dripping trees, while rain beat on the windows. Looking back, she saw the other truck, dim in the rain.

“I feel as if everything has been fake,” she told the two men. “You set up the robot scorpion and you set up discovering the circle.”

Arkady said, “The circles are real, and they are not impact craters, though we don’t know what they are. Ball courts? Fishponds? Temples?

“And the tunnels are real. We didn’t know about them, but now they will be famous.”

Boris added, “Those idiots on the executive committee were so afraid that they let the CIA camp on a site of systemwide historical importance. We have been slowly dying when we could have made a fortune from tourism. Why would anyone go to Venusport when they can come here and see alien ruins?” He was silent for a moment, then added, “We’ll have to get rid of their damn pink scorpions. That won’t be easy. And then take a serious look. Who knows what may be in the caves and circles? More statues like the one in the museum? Maybe even a skeleton?”

“Who are you guys?” Ash asked.

Arkady laughed. “I am myself. Arkady Volkov of Volkov Tours. Boris is a part-time employee.”

“What else does he do?”

“I’m an analyst for the political police,” Boris replied. “But my hours have been cut because of the Soviet’s cash flow problems—which we would not have if we had more tourists.”

“Or if the executive committee stopped listening to American economists,” Arkady added.

“I don’t want a lecture on economics,” Boris said. “I needed a second job. Arkady gave me one.”

“And Irina and Alexandra?” Ash asked.

“Ordinary working people,” Arkady said.

“Could the CIA really have been stupid enough to create a new kind of scorpion?” Ash asked.

“Remember that no one has ever gone broke by underestimating the intelligence of Americans,” Arkady said.

“This seems way too Byzantine,” Ash added.

Boris gave a rasping laugh. “Arkady’s ancestors came from some damn place in Central Asia. But I am Russian, and Russians are the heirs of Byzantium.”

They made it back to the pillbox lodge at nightfall. Arkady and Boris checked the parking space with flashlights and called all clear. They went in through the rain.

Arkady turned on the fire, as the rest of them pulled off their wet jackets and hung them up to dry.

“I’ll start dinner,” Alexandra told them. “Irina, will you help?”

The ex-cop and the ex-stevedore went into the kitchen. Ash sat down in front of the fire, Baby’s cage on the floor next to her. Baby climbed on top of the cage. “Hungry.”

She found a piece of chow and gave it to him.

“Hunt,” he said.

“Not now.”

Jason and Maggie joined her, the journalist settling into a chair, the Leica standing on her four silver legs, her long neck stretched out, head turning as she made another recording.

“I think we can call the trip successful,” Jason said. “We have discovered the first evidence of intelligent aliens, and I have a dramatic story about fighting the CIA.”

“I suspect the CIA part of the story will vanish,” Arkady said. “But you will have the alien ruins.”

“I’ll fight for the entire story,” Jason said. “It’s outrageous that we were threatened by our own government.”

“We’ll go back to Petrograd,” Arkady said. “I will show you a piece of sculpture at the museum, and you might be interested in talking to the Soviet’s executive committee. Ask them what they were thinking to let the CIA perch in the most important piece of archeology in the solar system. God knows what kind of damage they might have done! War—overt or covert—is not good for art or history.”

Boris set a bottle of fruit brandy on the table, along with four glasses. “I’ll go back. I have worked as an exterminator. I want to know what’s in the tunnels and the caves, aside from vermin; and I will enjoy getting rid of those damn pink scorpions.”

After dinner, in her bedroom, Ash considered the journey. She was a little buzzed from alcohol and shaky from adrenaline. But nothing was happening now. She could finally think.

The circles and tunnels could not have been faked. She was less certain about the figurine. It didn’t have the glassy surface of the stone in the circle and the tunnels; and even if the government in Moscow hadn’t been interested in science, it would have been interested in an alien figurine. That had to have some kind of propaganda value. Unless they were afraid of it. Would fear have made them put it in a museum and forget it?

It would be easy to fake something as small as the figurine. Arkady said it was in the Petrograd Museum, but he could have brought it with him, planning to plant it near the circle for Jason to find. That and the toxic scorpion in the lodge would have given National Geographic its big story. With luck, the story would have forced the CIA out and brought down the executive committee.

She could imagine Arkady learning who the client was and hurriedly putting together an elaborate con. Never trust a Leninist entirely. And she could imagine him as completely honest. As far as she knew, he always had been.

Well, if the figurine was fake, that would be discovered, probably quickly.

But the ruins had to be real. She lay there, her light still on, considering the possibility that humanity was not alone. Where were the aliens now? In the solar system? Or had they moved on? And what difference would knowledge of them make to Earth, shambling toward destruction? Or to Venus, tied to Earth and maybe unable to survive on its own? Ash had no idea. But the world—the two worlds—had suddenly become more interesting and full of possibility.

“Turn light off,” said Baby, hunched in his cage. “Sleep.”

THE END

Note: Our Venus rotates backward compared to most planets in the solar system, and its day is longer than its year. The current theory is it was dinged by something big early in the development of the system. The ding turned it backward and slowed its rotation. In my alternative history, this ding did not happen. My Venus rotates forward and has a day about as long as that of Earth or Mars. This rotation gives it a magnetic field, which our Venus does not have. The field prevents—at least in part—the development of the planet’s current toxic greenhouse atmosphere. In addition, there was a ding that didn’t happen in our history, at least as far as we know. A body—possibly two—hit Earth after life had developed there, then went on to hit Venus, depositing Earth microbes. As a result, my Venus has blue-green algae, and this over time gave it an atmosphere comparable to Earth. The similarity of Venusian life to life on Earth is due to the shared genetic history.

The history of Earth is the same as in our time line, until Soviet probes discover that Venus is habitable. Then a serious space race begins. The cost of the race helps to destroy the Soviet Union and helps to distract the United States from dealing with global warming.

As you may have noticed, the Pecheneg machine gun was never used. Chekhov was wrong. You can put a gun on the wall in the first act and never use it.