The Jupiter Theft

Chapter 26

“Here’s all the food I could get together,” Liz Becque said apologetically. “And there’s about three gallons of drinking water in those cans and jugs. You couldn’t carry much more than that. You’ll have to depend on finding water along the way.”

Jameson examined the supplies spread out across the pokes that Liz had improvised from squares of sheeting. It included all the canned and packaged food that Klein had overlooked, and some pressed bars of a fish-and-wingbean pemmican that she’d made from the leftover supper rations.

“You may not get fed in the morning,” he warned. “Triad won’t be in any shape to get the zoo routine back to normal.”

“It’s all right. We’ll go hungry tomorrow. It’s the least we can do.”

Jameson began to tie up the bundles. He became aware of Omar Tuttle standing nearby, shuffling his big feet.

“I’m sorry, Tod,” Omar said. “I’d go with you, but I’d better stay and look after Liz. The baby could come any time.” He avoided meeting Jameson’s eyes.

“Okay,” Jameson said. “Don’t worry about it.” He went on tying up the bundles, and after awhile Omar went away.

He couldn’t blame Omar. He’d told them all himself that there was little chance of catching up with Klein before the alerted Cygnans intercepted him, or of doing anything useful if he did. Klein had a small army with him. Armed.

“Don’t go, then,” Beth Oliver had said reasonably. “Let the Cygnans catch them. You’ll only make things worse for us.”

Pierce had said: “All you’ll accomplish is to be brought back here anyway, and that’s if you’re lucky. Nobody shoots zoo animals. But you shoot mad dogs that are running around loose.”

Janet Lemieux had said: “We need you here, Tod, Captain Boyle’s going to need somebody to back him up. Otherwise the Chinese will control things. And you’re the only one who can talk to the Cygnans.”

What it all boiled down to was that everybody had an excuse for not going. Pierce, sheepishly displaying the arm broken during capture. Liz with her indisputable pregnancy. Omar, with his surrogate pregnancy. Janet, who was needed by Boyle and who soon would be needed by Liz…

But dammit, he could have used some help!

None of the Chinese, of course, would even consider going along. Chia had made herself unquestioned authority of the Chinese contingent for as long as she was aboard the Cygnan ship. Bring her back, and you’d committed an act of lèse majesté for which you’d suffer when she started running things again. And back here at the zoo, two factions were already shaping up: Captain Hsieh’s followers and the regrouped forces of Tu Juechen. Neither of the principals would willingly leave the field to the other, and none of the followers would desert the standard; it was important to be on the winning side early in the game.

For that matter, if Klein were brought back alive there could be a clash about constituted authority among the Americans. Klein carried the baton of the Reliability Board, and all of them, Jameson included, to some degree had been conditioned to its touch.

Except perhaps Ruiz.

Jameson looked across to where Ruiz was waiting for him. The old man was standing straight and tall, too proud to let anyone see him leaning against the wall. The bandage around his head was already askew where he had been fooling with it. His fierce hawklike profile was turned away. He’d bullied Janet into giving him the stimulants he’d need to keep him going.

“Medical supplies are short, Dr. Ruiz,” she had told him.

“Boyle and I are your only patients at the moment, and Boyle doesn’t need them.”

Janet had bit her lip. “You ought not to be doing anything strenuous. You certainly have a concussion, and you may even have a fracture under that cut scalp.”

In the end she’d given in. Then it had been Jameson’s turn.

“You’ll slow me up, Doctor,” he said bluntly.

“I’ll keep up with you. If I don’t, you can leave me behind. You’ll be no worse off.”

“How long do you think you can keep going on those things Janet gave you?”

“Long enough.”

“All right. I need all the help I can get. But you’ll kill yourself.”

“Commander,” Ruiz said, his eyes bright with speed, “that madman took Maybury with him because of me! Estúpido! I had to make speeches! Why didn’t I just go along quietly and try to slow him down?” He shook his head and immediately winced with pain.

So Ruiz was Jameson’s first recruit.

Dmitri was his second. The young biologist had impulsively followed Ruiz’s example. He admired the old man. And perhaps he wanted to prove to Jameson that he was a man of action. Jameson hid his misgivings and thanked him.

Then Maggie had thrown her arms around him and announced that she was going too.

“I thought you were trying to talk me out of it, like Janet.”

“That was before I knew you were really going! You’re not going to leave me behind!”

“Good girl, but—”

“I won’t stay behind with all those sheep!” she said fiercely.

That hadn’t endeared her to the others. But Jameson had to admire her independent spirit. He felt a little ashamed of himself. He’d been one of the sheep himself, for too long. It was Maggie’s example, with her rebellious heritage from the New England Secessionists, that had opened his eyes and given him the resolve to resist the Kleins and the authority they represented.

He finished tying up the bundles and handed them out, giving the lightest one to Ruiz. “Just a moment,” he said. “I just want to say good-bye to Boyle.”

Boyle was breathing deeply and rhythmically. He looked somehow shrunken between the two blankets. There was a makeshift screen around him: sheets hung from ropes that were strung between the abstract branches of the iron trees.

“He doesn’t know you’re here,” Janet said. “I put him under.”

“When are you going to operate?”

“Soon. I’m boiling the instruments now. I’ll have to make do with what was in the medical bag.” She laughed uneasily. “I’ve never performed an amputation before. In fact, I haven’t practiced medicine since my internship. Just administrative psychiatry. Qing-yi’s going to help me. Did you know that she was a chijiao yisheng—what they call a barefoot doctor—in Kweichow Province before she qualified for the space program? She doesn’t have a medical degree, but she’s performed more operations than I have.”

“Is he going to be all right?”

“He’ll be fine. He has the constitution of an ox. And lots of willpower; he’ll make himself a crutch and be hopping around in no time. Maybe some day…” She hesitated. “The Cygnans must know about regeneration—you saw that assistant. If we can get a dialogue going with them … Tod, won’t you stay?”

“Chances are, I’ll be back before you know it. If not…” He shrugged. “Look, you can’t depend on one man with absolute pitch. We humans are ingenious creatures. It can be done with computer-generated sound and translating interfaces. There are some good electronics people here, and if you can actively enlist the Cygnan’s interest … Do it for the captain, Janet. And for your children.”

He turned toward Boyle. “So long, Skipper,” he said. “Good luck.”

Incredibly, from some iron resource of will, Boyle’s eyes flicked open. Jameson sensed that he was fighting the drug. “Good luck, boy,” he whispered. “It’s up to you.” His eyes closed, and he was breathing deeply again.

“He didn’t know what he was saying,” Janet said.

“Yes he did,” said Jameson, and walked away quickly. Ruiz, Dmitri, and Maggie picked up their bundles when they saw him coming. Jameson shouldered his own parcel, slipping one arm through the loop at the knot, and moved past the clustered people at the gate without looking at their faces.

A dozen yards past the thick bars, he paused to look back. They were already pushing at the gate, sliding it shut. It fell into place with a solid thunk. The animals had locked themselves back in their cage.

“Wait a minute,” Dmitri called.

“Come on!” Jameson said. “There isn’t time for you to stop and look at specimens.”

“They’re trying to attract our attention,” Dmitri said.

Ruiz looked at the cage behind the wire mesh barrier. “He’s right,” he said. “Those creatures are intelligent.”

Jameson turned around and went up to the barrier for a closer look. It was the cage that held the feathery humanoids. The pixieish little creatures were swarming frantically over the bars, making urgent gestures with their delicate four-fingered hands.

“They’re cute,” Maggie said.

“They’re carnivores,” Dmitri said. “Look at those little pointed teeth.”

“Like a kitten’s!” Maggie responded indignantly.

“We’re carnivores too,” Ruiz said. “Gives us something in common with them.”

Jameson looked the creatures over. They were fluffy and flamingo-pink, with huge round violet eyes that gave them an astonished expression, like a tarsier. They had button noses and dainty underslung jaws that, head on, gave them an appealingly chinless appearance, like pink teddy bears. They sported tufted tails, which they kept winding around their waists or necks like feather boas.

And they had stacked a little pile of artifacts against the bars for demonstration purposes. A pair of little felt boots, too short for their feet until you noticed the four holes for toes to protrude through and rest on the projecting sole. A filigreed cup that could not have held anything, and seemed to have no purpose except to be beautiful. A miniature rake that was obviously a grooming comb.

“They had those ready to show us,” Ruiz said. “They were waiting.”

As if on cue, the two elfin beings went through a swift and well-organized pantomime. They became Klein murdering Tetrachord, and Triad streaking for the safety of the human compound. Then they took turns becoming Jameson and his three companions emerging, imitating posture and body language with amazing accuracy despite the differences in body structure. Finally, with unmistakable gestures, they begged to be taken along.

Jameson looked sorrowfully at the sheet of clear, almost invisible glass that sealed off the cage, between mesh and bars. There was no telling what kind of atmosphere the creatures breathed.

Feeling clumsy by comparison, he made a series of gestures to tell them that it would be fatal for them to breathe the Cygnan air.

The fuzzy little beings gestured back, more urgently, pantomiming the idea that they could breathe outside the glass case.

“What do you think?” Jameson said.

“They’re bright,” Ruiz said. “Bright and quick. They want out, and they seem to know what they’re doing. I feel sorry for them. Too bad we can’t help them.”

Jameson made up his mind. “I have a hunch they’ll be useful,” he said. “They’ve been prisoners of the Cygnans a lot longer than we have. They may know a thing or two.”

Ruiz was doing arithmetic in his head. He nodded agreement. “They’ve been on this ship a minimum of ten years subjective time, even assuming that the Cygnans picked them up on their last stop. And that their last stop was during the mid-twentieth century, when Cygnus X-1 was discovered—and the Cygnans would have been detected as well, if Cyg X-1 weren’t masking the final leg of their approach.”

Dmitri was looking worriedly at the extra gate and the glass. “The security precautions are extraordinary,” he said. “The Cygnans must consider them to be dangerous beasts.”

“They’re intelligent beings,” Jameson said, “who wear shoes and who while away the time while they’re locked up by carving ornamental cups.”

He pried at the wire mesh with his bare hands. The mesh was a warning, not a barrier, and it was intended for the one-third-g strength of Cygnans, not human muscles. With Ruiz and Dmitri helping him, he was able to tear an opening wide enough to squeeze through.

The glass was unbreakable. After a moment’s examination of its perimeter, Jameson found the round opening of a Cygnan keyhole. He fished in his pocket for the cylindrical key he’d taken from one of Triad’s pouches.

“Tod!” Maggie said quickly, “that glass is there for a reason. What if they’re not oxygen breathers? You’ll kill them.”

“It’s their decision,” Jameson said. “They say no.”

He pushed the cylinder into the hole. It twanged and jumped back into his hand. The glass panel slid aside.

They all held their breath, half expecting the smell of ammonia or methane. The two feathery humanoids regarded them gravely through the bars, unharmed. Jameson took a cautious sniff. There was a spicy smell, like cloves or cinnamon, but the cage seemed to contain the basic Cygnan atmosphere. There wasn’t even a pressure differential.

Why had they been glassed in?

“Germs,” Maggie said suddenly.

“Too late to worry about that now,” Jameson said. He found the lock, and the bars retreated into overhead sockets.

Before he knew it, two gossamer sprites were crowding round him, looking up at him with enormous violet eyes and jabbering at him in squeaky voices. They were no taller than twelve-year-olds. The spicy scent was stronger and rather nice.

“They’re thanking you,” Maggie said.

Up close, the rosy plumage turned out to be a silky nap of cobweb-fine hairs, that split and branched at the tips, like dandelion down. There was an almost irresistible impulse to plunge your hands into it and feel the softness. It was the down that fluffed them out to give an illusion of even moderate bulk. Underneath there was nothing to them—just a pliant, willowy frame with hardly any flesh on it. Wherever the fairy silk rippled and parted in response to stray air currents, they were all skin and fine bones and tendon. On Earth they wouldn’t have weighed more than fifty pounds apiece.

They bounded ahead like mischievous children, then stopped and looked back to see if the humans were following. Jameson grinned and picked up his bundle.

“Nocturnal species,” Dmitri said. “Notice the eyes? And it gets cold at night where they come from. The divaricated follicles of their coats provide good insulation, with a layer of trapped air next to the skin. I wouldn’t be surprised if the tips open and close to regulate temperature—much more efficient than the erectile follicles of terrestrial mammals.”

“They look so human!” Maggie squealed. “Like little elves!”

“Only superficially,” Dmitri said, watching the two beings scamper ahead of them. “See those butterfly hips? And the articulation of the shoulder joints? And they’re not mammals.”

“Even so,’ Jameson said, “their resemblance to people is amazing. A coincidence…”

“Not amazing,” Dmitri said. “And no coincidence. There’s a limited number of efficient forms available to quadrupeds who become bipeds. The Cygnans must have collected thousands of life forms. They probably lumped their handful of humanoids together.”

He nodded toward the cage they were passing. The squat green troll within, with its knee-length beard and arms hanging to the ground, was obviously not intelligent. As it caught sight of them, the top of its head lifted like a lid and emitted a bellow; then it scampered away, upright but on all fours.

They were out of the Hall of Bipeds and beside the towering glass cliff that contained the Jovians. Maggie gasped, and Dmitri lagged behind like a small boy.

There was a vast churning within the cloudy liquid, and one of the enormous pancake shapes came hurtling toward them to flatten its quarter acre of surface against the glass. The floor beneath their feet shook with the impact.

“One crack in the glass and it would be all over—for them and for us,” Ruiz said. “If the liquid hydrogen didn’t instantly freeze us solid, the explosion when a creature that size depressurized would blow us to bits.”

“Let’s get out of here,” Maggie said nervously.

The Jovian, its scalloped outer mantle curled around the shaft of its hundred-foot harpoon, was hammering on the glass with the butt.

“It’s angry,” Jameson said. “I don’t blame it. It can’t imagine how it ended up in this—goldfish bowl.”

“This goldfish bowl is all there is in the universe for them now,” Ruiz said gruffly. “I wonder if it thinks we’re responsible.”

Dmitri was staring entranced at the living mountain of flesh. “No skeleton—very sensible for a creature that lives at a pressure of a hundred thousand atmospheres. And the ratio of surface area to volume—”

Jameson pushed him along and got him, still talking, out of the mammoth aquarium. The two humanoids waited impatiently for them ahead. They seemed to know where they were going. They threaded their way among the empty cages and drained tanks of the empty exhibition hall toward the warehouse section that Jameson had intended to head for. Had they been to the zookeepers’ living quarters too?

They set up a shrill chattering, and Jameson hurried to catch up. He stopped when he saw what they were excited about.

A dead Cygnan lay sprawled in a pool of orange blood next to the tank it had been caulking. The back end of its body was a glistening hash. It must have been trying to run away when the stream of explosive splinters caught it.

Some of Klein’s handiwork.

“When the Cygnans find this corpse, they’ll be hunting us down like vermin,” Jameson said.

“That’s what we are, aren’t we?” Ruiz said. “Rats in the walls.”

The door to Tetrachord and Triad’s quarters had been blown open. Jameson sniffed the air.

“They must have had plastic explosive,” Jameson said.

“They did,” Dmitri said. “I heard Gifford say that Klein had it molded to look like the soles of his boots.”

“Those heavy boots that were so out of place in space,” Jameson said. “Nobody ever thought to question them.”

“How could you?” Maggie said. “I mean, something like that is too far out.”

The cramped interior of the zookeepers’ apartment had been torn apart. Objects had been swept off the spoon-shaped shelves and trampled underfoot. The graduated set of miniature resting perches had been wantonly smashed. Jameson recognized their special poignance now. Nursery furniture.

The Moog was still where he’d left it, but it had been hammered into junk. “The son of a bitch!” Jameson flared. “He didn’t want anyone talking to the Cygnans after he was gone!”

He searched the litter. The cupboard that had held the little arsenal of neural weapons was empty. Klein’s party was armed to the teeth now.

“If we do catch up with Klein, what do you expect to do?” Ruiz asked tartly.

“We’ll worry about that when we catch him,” Jameson said and kept on looking.

He found what he wanted among the litter on the floor. Klein had overlooked it, or hadn’t realized what it was.

One of the two-pronged electric prods the Cygnans had herded him with.

“It doesn’t have any reach,” Maggie said. “It’s no better than a knife or a club. You can’t get near someone with a gun.”

“It’s better than nothing,” Jameson said, sticking the implement in the waistband of his shorts.

He poked his head out the other door to make sure there were no Cygnans in the warehouse section, then led his troops outside. The two little humanoids scampered along beside them, their silky fur bouncing.

He knew the worst even before he reached the stacks of looted human artifacts. Why had he ever led Klein here?

The junkpile had been thoroughly picked over for anything useful. Spacesuits, of course—enough to outfit Klein’s whole party. The ones that hadn’t been taken were slashed, faceplates smashed, hoses pulled out.

Maggie held up a slashed suit, tears running down her face. “Why? Why didn’t they leave the rest of us a chance? Just a chance!”

“They don’t want us to have a chance,” Ruiz said, his face grim. “The people they left behind are a complication in their plans. I’ll tell you what I think. I think the first missile they intend to fire will be targeted for this pod.”

“No!” Jameson cried. “Not even Klein or Chia would do a thing like that! Disable the spine of the ship, they said! They wouldn’t slaughter their own people!”

“Types like that always start with their own people,” Ruiz said.

Dmitri was rummaging in the piles of goods. He came up with a fire ax that had been overlooked and stuck it in his belt. Maggie collected a bottle of alcohol and some cotton and, after she had explained their use, then said: “Don’t look shocked. I come from a family of rebs.” Ruiz found a kitchen knife and tied it to the end of a fiberglass pole that had been part of a stretcher. Jameson armed himself with an eighteen-inch crescent wrench and then, in the same tool locker, found a six-pound maul and an assortment of chisels. After some thought he tied a nylon cord around the handle of the maul and stuffed a coil of twenty or thirty feet of line inside his shirt.

“Something’s moving!” Maggie cried. “Over there!”

Jameson whipped around and saw a tiny glittering thing emerge from a pile of castoff clothing and begin to climb the slanting wall. Before he could do anything there was a blur of pink motion as one of the diminutive humanoids streaked for the thing. It trapped it in a dainty four-fingered hand and presented it to Jameson.

Jameson looked it over and immediately smashed it beneath his heel.

“What … was it?” Dmitri said.

“Piece of electronics,” Jameson said. “One of Klein’s motile probes. Pinhead lens, rice-grain mike, little magnetized ball-bearing wheels, trailing a spider-thread antenna. It must have been activated by our movements or body heat. Klein’s watching his rear.”

“So now he knows we’re after him,” Ruiz mused.

“Probably. I don’t know what the range of a thing like that is.”

“How do we find them?”

“Good question. He’s got those miniature probes to scout out a safe route for him. Wish we had the same. Or at least a bloodhound. Now, which direction did he go in?”

He looked around the expanse of floor, frowning.

“What’s got into them?” Maggie said.

The two humanoids were behaving oddly. They were prowling the area on all fours—not on hands and knees, as people would have done, but bent double in an impossible arch, walking on the tips of their toes and the backs of their little hands, with their fingers curled up. The position seemed entirely natural for them. They moved with a supple, spidery grace, their faces casting back and forth a half inch from the floor.

Dmitri watched them intently as they worked in widening circles, then turned to Jameson.

“I think you’ve got your bloodhounds,” he said.