The Great Hydration

CHAPTER TEN

“Why did you help us, stranger?”

Northrop smiled lopsidedly. “I guess I have a natural sympathy with the losing side.”

Hrityu stared unmoving. Northrop realized he had probably said something incomprehensible in Tenacity culture.

Now that the fight was over he was shaken by the carnage he had caused. A dozen bodies which had fallen to his DE beamer were tumbled on the sand. The weapon killed by administering an all-body shock lethal to almost any type of organism. For that reason it was the standard weapon used on aliens whose physical properties were unknown.

It could also be set on a wider angle, though in that case its dreadful efficacy was reduced. Northrop wondered what a narrowbeam or bullet would do to a dehydrate. Probably pass right through with little damage, unless it chanced to break a bone. In that sense, he admitted, the DE beamer was similar in principle to the whirling blades thrown by the native flingers.

Except that it wasn’t nearly as messy.

Overcoming his puzzlement, Hrityu stepped to Northrop and offered his wrist. “I owe you my life. I am Hrityu, of the Analane.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t save your friend.”

Hrityu continued to stand with his wrist proffered. “I am Hrityu of the Analane,” he repeated.

Northrop realized he had encountered a social ritual. He extended his own hand and felt dry, blue skin grasp his wrist. He grasped the others wrist in return.

“I am Roncie, er, of the Earthmen.”

The Analane released his wrist and stepped back in surprise. “Earthmen? Your tribe lives underground, like the Sawune?”

“Er, number. Well, sometimes.”

The green dehydrate in the boat-like vehicle came walking towards them. Northrop noted his large head-crest and the fan-like growth running down his back.

He cast quick glances over him, the Analane, and the dead bodies strewn on the sand. Four distinct species were represented, but there were definite similarities among them. All were naked except for metal ornaments in the form of bangles and medallions. When a Tenacity dehydrate walked abroad it seemed he needed nothing but metal adornments and his weapons.

While in the brig Northrop had dipped extensively into Karl Krabbe’s private library. It turned out that Krabbe was an aficionado of prespaceflight writer Edgar Rice Burroughs, who had written colourful adventure stories set on the planet Mars. Burroughs’ Mars—or Barsoom, as its fictional inhabitants called it—had also been the stage for a warrior culture where men of different races carried nothing but weapons and ornaments. The comparison struck Northrop forcibly.

Karvass slowed his approach, distrustful of this strange being. In place of a head crest his pate was covered with a moss-like growth. He did not know what to make of it. Hrityu strove to reassure him, beckoning him closer and prevailing on him to extend his wrist.

“I am Karvass of the Artaxa.”

“Er, I am Roncie of the Earthmen.”

Karvass’s facial membranes wrinkled in puzzlement at this, but Hrityu said nothing. Roncie spoke again.

“Do you wish to bury your friend’s body?” he asked politely.

“Bury?” This time Hrityu was puzzled. “A Gaminte patrol will collect all the bodies eventually. Their sniffer animals can smell corpses from fifty langs.”

Of course, Northrop thought. Corpses were valuable biological material. They might even contain traces of water.

It was hot standing under Tenacity’s small bright sun. Northrop invited the dehydrates into his tent. They were reluctant to enter, associating such structures with the pavilions of the Tlixix, but at length, staring about them in wonderment at the furnishings and communicator equipment, they sat with him and talked.

Once within the tent, the first thing Northrop noticed about his guests was the absence of any smell. Alien creatures usually gave off an odour of some kind. The dryness of the atmosphere, and their peculiar physiology, was responsible, he decided.

They were guarded when he asked them why they were being hunted. He, of course, did not know that the black Gamintes were a police force acting for the Tlixix, the masters of the planet.

“Why did you help us?” Hrityu responded, repeating his earlier question. “Do you not fear the retribution of the Tlixix?”

“The Tlixix?” Northrop laughed at the mention of the lobsters, though he did not know how the translator would render a laughing noise. “No, I don’t fear them. They don’t rule my kind.”

Hrityu and Karvass looked at one another in astonishment. Hrityu’s bewilderment increased. He recalled again the strange scene in the Pavilion of Audience.

Could it be that these green men with moss for head crests were also in revolt against the Tlixix? Or—extraordinary thought!—could they hail from the ancient time of the Tlixix themselves, in view of their tolerance of water?

He didn’t know what the truth was, but the stranger’s words brought out anew the indignation he felt. “The green enemies you saw belong to the tribe of the Crome,” he said in a rush, “and they have announced a war of extermination against my tribe, the Analane, a war to which the Tlixix have given consent! It is on a mission to save our tribe that I and my dear friend Kurwer were travelling, in company with Karvass of the Artaxa, who has promised us help.”

The list of names and tribes came at Northrop in a barely intelligible babble. Such a patchwork of wars and quarrels was to be expected he supposed.

“If the Tlixix are against you, your position is dire,” he commented.

Karvass’s membranes were dilating in alarm as Hrityu appeared to be exposing the secret of the gathering alliance, but the Analane would not be stopped. “Not any more! The tyranny of the Tlixix will come to an end! We shall survive!”

Not knowing anything of local politics, Northrop received this announcement without surprise. A feeling of pity for the dehydrates assailed him, mingled with an undercurrent of guilt. The struggles of the desert tribes did not matter. The dehydrates would probably all perish when water came back to Tenacity.

He felt almost tempted to reveal what was going to happen, and maybe provoke the dehydrates into a general revolt in an attempt to prevent it. But he did not dare to do that. Krabbe and Bouche would have the legal right to kill him.

Suddenly Hrityu and Karvass became fidgety and uncomfortable. Northrop could guess why. The water vapour given off by his body was affecting them.

He rose, opened the flap of the tent, and gestured to the outside. Thankfully the dehydrates followed his suggestion, though they had no real idea what was causing them discomfort.

Northrop hesitated. He glanced over to the men at the drilling rig. They were not looking his way. He retreated to the other side of the tent so that they could not see him.

“I hope you manage the rest of your journey without being attacked again,” he said. “If not—perhaps this will help.”

He knew he was being far too impulsive, but he took out the DE beamer and showed it to Hrityu. “This is the weapon I used on your enemies. All you do is aim this square part here, and press this stud.” He demonstrated, flexing his finger without taking it past the safety guard. “This ring here widens the angle so you can take out more warriors, but it’s weaker then and doesn’t always kill.”

He pressed the gun into the astonished Analane’s hands. “Hide it somewhere so my friends don’t see I’ve given it to you. Good luck. Maybe it will help defend your tribe, too. There are just under two hundred shots left in it.”

He didn’t know whether the translator was conveying everything he was saying, but he waved the dehydrates away, anxious not to get himself in trouble. Slowly they walked to their vehicles and boarded them. Inner wheels began to revolve. The prow of the desert boat began to glide through the sand.

Without looking back, Hrityu and Karvass departed.

On being conducted into the giant hydrorium Castaneda was overcome by astonishment mixed with nervousness. It was impressive, seriously impressive, to see so grandiose an artificial environment on so arid and poverty-stricken a world. If human beings had built it, of course, it would be a routine piece of engineering. But the lobsters had kept this going in adverse circumstances for a very long time. He doubted if his own species would have been able to do that. Something would have gone wrong sooner or later, perhaps of a social character. The delicate balance of a closed biological system would have collapsed.

Yes, the lobsters. That was what frightened him. They were capable. But they had the partners in their grasp, and might not realize what a catastrophe it would be for them if they did Krabbe and Bouche any harm.

As usual, the partners had breezed in apparently oblivious of any danger to themselves. It was one of their many qualities which Castaneda admired. But he wished he didn’t have to follow them into the spider’s parlour.

Being in the presence of the lobsters was scary, too. For all their alienness they exuded a familiar air of menace—the menace of a master race accustomed to command. The partners would have had a tougher job being taken seriously, Boris Bouche commented, if it hadn’t been for their trick of swallowing water. That had set them apart from the dehydrates.

Krabbe and Bouche greeted Castaneda cheerily, almost drunkenly, draping a translator band around his neck on the instant. Castaneda was given no time for mental adjustment. He launched himself into his presentation before Tlixix leaders and scientists who reared over him in their rank-smelling pool. Then the scientists questioned him closely and at length. They were the repositories of all the knowledge of their race. They had their own map of pre-dehydration Tenacity, and compared it in detail with the one Castaneda had drawn up. His description of the faultlines fascinated them. It was the first explanation they had ever heard of how Tenacity lost its water. They cast their four milky-white eyes on the locations of the proposed drilling. They grew more and more excited.

The translation package was elegant. Using some deft algorithm, it managed to give a representation of the lobsters’ hoary character, giving them voices that mostly were hoarsely ferocious but sometimes condescendingly gentle—just the sort of tones masters would develop for dealing with their slaves.

It took hours, but in the end they seemed convinced. Krabbe and Bouche took over again, together with Shelley, the lawyer. The Tlixix scientists remained, but now it was mainly the top lobsters who did the talking.

This time it was Castaneda’s turn to be fascinated. He always was, every time he had been present when the partners came to the crunch in a negotiation. Piece by piece, they were buying a planet.

But there was one more thing. The Tlixix still wanted to see the big ship in orbit. That was their guarantee that they weren’t being conned. And, they made it clear, they did not want either Krabbe or Bouche personally to be their guide. The partners were to stay on Tenacity pending the outcome of the project.

And so, once Shelley had drawn up the final contract, Castaneda found himself lofting Enterprise-ward in the lighter, in company with the lawyer and a high-ranking Tlixix, filling the cabin with the tang of seaweed.