The Wizard of Karres

CHAPTER 24

"I think we're probably done with the Agandar's pirates," said Captain Pausert, as they sat around the mess table in the Venture. "Their leader—his name turns out to be Juhta—confessed that Kleesp was the Agandar's lieutenant although he still refuses to explain why they've been chasing us so relentlessly. But what's worrying me is the fact that we haven't seen any more of the ISS. I mean, by now they should have talked their way out of prison on Tornam. Subradio should have carried the news ahead."

Goth yawned. She'd had a hard day practicing their roles in the latest thespian production, and some cage mucking-out, and bit of practice at their act. "The Sedmons said they'd done some covering of our tracks. Besides, Captain, the Venture is ready to fly again. We can run if they come looking."

"And all for the cost of some tinklewood fishing poles," said the Leewit. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself."

Captain Pausert was getting the measure of the littlest witch by now. "I kept one as a switch," he said, calmly. "You never know when you might need it."

"Huh," said the Leewit. "You and which army?" But it was quite cheerfully said. "So does anyone know where we're going next?"

"Yes. The Sedmons have set the itinerary along with Himbo. We're going to Yin Bauh. It's at least a place we should be safe from the ISS."

"I thought," said Goth, biting the end of a strand of her brown hair, "that Hulik said no place in the Empire was really safe from the ISS."

"Ah. But Yin Bauh isn't really part of the Empire, missy," said Vezzarn, looking very cheerful. "It's an independent principality. Within the Empire's borders, true enough—but the sultan doesn't like competition with his secret police, and has some pretty abrupt ways of making that clear."

"What do they do there, Vezzarn?" asked the Leewit, just an edge of greed in her voice. The witches didn't, strictly speaking, need gold dust. But the Leewit had enjoyed collecting it anyway. "Is it another mining world like the last one?"

"Yin Bauh? No." The old spacer laughed and pointed at the dishcleaning unit. "If you want to know what they do there, look on the base of half the cheap trade goods in the Galaxy. 'YB made.' "

The Leewit looked astounded. "I thought that stood for 'why be made?' You mean it's a planet?"

"It's a planet, all right. A tax haven, without the labor laws of most of the rest of the Empire. All the big companies have manufacturing plants there. It's a pretty grim sort of place, mind you. But it is nice and inconspicuously on our way to the Imperial Capital, eh, Captain?"

Pausert nodded. "So it is. And you girls should be nice and inconspicuously on your way to bath and bed. And remember to wash behind your ears," he said sternly to the Leewit.

She stuck her tongue out at him. "I'm going to talk the little vatch into putting baking soda in your bubble-bath."

"Don't have any, child," said Pausert with a grin. Bubble bath was a newly discovered chink in the Leewit antiwashing armor. Actually, Goth had privately told the captain, most of that was for show these days. But the Leewit liked to resist baths. She felt it was something she ought to do just as a matter of principle. The Mistress of the Universe shouldn't even be subjected to getting dirty in the first place.

Goth rolled her eyes, but her shoulders shook slightly as she led the Leewit off to that fate worse than death, hot water. "And don't you forget to wash behind your ears either, Captain," she called back sternly.

"I won't. Good night, girls."

* * *

Three days later, the lattice ship drifted her way downward to a landing on Yin Bauh. They were making a night-side landing and it was plain to see that this world was heavily populated.

"We going to get audiences?" wondered Goth, with all the scornful skepticism of a new-converted thespian. "This looks like the sort of planet full of holo-theaters and threedee parlors, with wall-to-wall vidscreens in every house."

Vezzarn snorted. "Not likely, missy. Those lights are either factories or dormitories. Mostly factories. The dormitory towns are the bleakest places you'll see this side of prison. I was here to look over the potential for a smuggling route, once, since it's an independent state and nice and free of official Imperial customs. The sultan's customs are worse, unfortunately. And it's a bad place for anything except murder—they don't worry about corpses much." He seemed to shudder a little. "Those dormitories are full of debt-prisoners whose prison contracts are sold off by various Imperial worlds. The people don't get paid much at all, other than production bonuses. But food and your bunk are free, and there's not much to spend money on. The poor beggars are mostly desperate enough for any kind of entertainment. Any showboat that's down on her luck comes here—it's not great money, but it's reliable."

"It seems a bit like robbery, taking it from them," said Hantis. "It's one of the things we Sprites find strange about you humans."

"It's in character for the Petey B, though," said the captain. "It's on our way, and there's nothing suspicious about us setting down here. Lattice ships aren't cheap to operate, and most of the showboats get into financial trouble sooner or later." He rubbed the back of his neck, wincing. "Still, reliable as it might be, Yin Bauh is a frightening place for a Showmaster. A threat of where he might end up, with the Petey B sold off and him still in debt."

The Leewit was horrified. "Ol' Himby belongs with the show! And the Petey B is going to go for ever and ever and ever. You couldn't let that happen to him, could you, Captain?"

Touched by her faith—most unusual, that, coming from the Leewit—the captain smiled. "I'll do my best." Privately he suspected the Petey B's debts might easily be enough to give the Sedmons pause. And he didn't see them coming to the Petey B's rescue, anyway, in the event the showboat fell on hard times. Over the centuries, the Daals of Uldune had been famous for many things—a very long list of things, in fact, including most capital crimes. But neither altruism nor generosity had ever been on the list once.

* * *

The setup on an expensive piece of wasteland hired from the sultan's factor didn't even draw the four reporters that Altim Four had.

"Where is everybody?"

"They work long shifts here. And you have to get a pass to travel anywhere outside your official place of residence and work."

"So how do they get to know we're here, Mannicholo?"

The chameleon man stopped hauling on the banner rope for a moment. His colors rippled. "Word gets through the dormitory towns like lightning, the sultan's rules be damned. That's why the sultan's satraps don't let ships set down too close to the last spot a showboat visited. It'll be a year or so since these people have had anything more than a game of cards to entertain them. When the next shift ends we'll have 'em in droves. We only sell cheap tickets when we come here. Himbo says it's too close to the bone to exploit these poor devils."

"At least it'll be short shows," said Timblay grumpily. "All we'll get out of this place is refueling money, you watch and see."

"Maybe so," said the chameleon man tersely. "But at least we'll give them something to forget about this dump for a while."

"Dump" was certainly the right word. The place was an industrial garbage heap. The air burned in the captain's lungs. The sky was a brown color, and the rows of factory chimneys belched out more of it. He was glad they wouldn't be staying.

Sure enough, that evening was a full house. It was also one of the most depressing crowds that Pausert had ever seen. There was a beaten look about the people buying the one-price special-offer tickets.

It even infected the actors. The first scene of A Midsummer Night's Dream was, Pausert thought, completely flat. But the audience still drank it up as if it were the honeydew of paradise.

Never had Helena's "How happy some o'er other some can be!" seemed more appropriate.

Cravan was backstage, snapping like an irate turtle. "They paid to be lifted up from this misery—not have you join them! Now, scene change is coming. You"—he pointed—"Bottom, Snug, Flute, Quince, Snout and Starveling. You go out there and give the punters the show of their lives."

So Pausert, AKA Bottom the passionately pursued . . . did. So did his fellow actors. The audience loved it.

Well, most of them loved it. But there were some people sitting in the front row who didn't seem to be enjoying anything. That worried Pausert. Pausert, the new thespian, because members of an audience who don't enjoy the show are always worrisome. Pausert, the captain entrusted with a vital mission, was a lot more worried.

So, as he changed costumes in the dressing room, Pausert wasn't surprised at all when Silver-eyes showed up and echoed his own anxieties.

I think there's more trouble, Big Real Thing, squeaked the little vatch inside his head. There are some strange dream things here—or maybe real things. It's hard to tell. They're like not-things. Like those tiny bits of klatha stuff you feed me, except different.

That was confusing, although . . .

Now that he thought about it, it struck Pausert that "not things" was a fairly accurate description of the oddly impassive bunch of people sitting in the front of the house tonight.

They are waiting back at your ship, too.

That was another unpleasant report.

Like the ones in the front rows out there?

The vatch disappeared briefly, before returning to the dressing rooms. Yes. But there are more than that at the ship. And some more still at the edge of the lattice. Digging.

Digging what? Well, whatever they were up to, it would be no good. He didn't need Pul's Nanite-sniffing nose to tell him the Nanite-infected ISS had almost certainly caught up with them. Thoughtfully, Pausert sucked his teeth.

You feel like some mischief, Silver-eyes?

I always feel like mischief. I'm like the littlest witch.

That was true enough. The vatch had grown but it was still barely a hand-sized creature. Obviously the thing's mental age was still preteen, even if it could think. The Leewit certainly could, whenever she chose to, and Goth's ability to think was sometimes downright scary.

Mischief's fun! What do you want me to do to them? I'm still little, though. I can't do big stuff yet.

Pausert went over to the store cupboard in the props section. He found some of the luminous virulent yellow-green paint they'd used for the posters a few days earlier. Here. He pointed. Can you put a big splash of this on all of the "not-things"? Maybe on the back of their heads or something.

Sure! Big fun! The little vatch vanished. Pausert went off in hasty search of the others. He still had a few minutes before he was due onstage again, and that would be the last show for the night.

The captain was willing to bet that whatever the Nanites had planned was supposed to happen after the punters had gone . . . one couldn't exactly say "home," but back to their miserable bunks. Both Vezzarn and Hulik had assured him that the sultan did not take kindly to the ISS sticking its nose into his territory, so Pausert had thought them safe enough here. But the Nanite-infected agents apparently ignored the conventional bounds.

He found the Leewit first. Or rather she found him. She'd just come backstage. "We got troubles, Captain," she said quietly. "Vezzarn sent me to tell you. The Petey B's engine room is in a shambles. Old Vezzarn found one of the engineers unconscious, the drive control boxes trashed, and whole lot of other stuff busted."

Someone intended to make sure the Petey B didn't do a hasty retreat, obviously. Pausert winced. "There are also a bunch of them waiting for us at the Venture, and some in the audience. And they're digging at the perimeter struts for some reason. I've got the little vatch tagging them with some of that lime-green luminous paint."

The Leewit grinned. That was the kind of trick she adored.

"See if you can get the others together here," the captain said. "I'm due onstage in a minute. Where's Vezzarn?"

"Reporting the incident to Himbo. He's coming down here next." The littlest witch shivered. The captain gave her brief squeeze. "The show's got to go on. But stay here, backstage."

The curtain call was enthusiastic. But Pausert noticed that the "not things" had already left.

A few minutes later, as the factory workers streamed hastily into the night to get a few hours sleep before returning to work, Pausert came backstage and unobtrusively joined the rest of Venture's crew and the Sedmons.

"I think we need to head for the Thunderbird," said one of the Sedmons. "She's well enough armored and armed to hold off a fairly serious assault."

"We could flee in her too, if need be," said the other Sedmon. "It'd be crowded, but we could manage."

Himbo Petey arrived on the scene then, looking grim. "I need to talk to you about—"

Something exploded.

The lattice pole the captain was leaning against shivered. One of the main lattice legs caved in with the terrible sound of shredding synthasilk; the stage canted sideways, spilling screaming people and terrified animals.

In a flash, Pausert understood why the Nanites had been digging. The entire exercise was designed to cause maximum chaos and send the Venture's crew scurrying for shelter in their ship. The Sedmons were right.

"Come on. To the Thunderbird!" he yelled.

He had to yell. With the destruction of one of her main struts, the old Petey B's structure was under terrific stress. Things were breaking loose, and falling everywhere. Some of the power-cables snapped, plunging the tented area into darkness except for showers of sparks and cascading and exploding lights. And the din produced by the people and animals was even worse than that produced by the inanimate objects.

In a tight-knit bunch, they left the chaos of the dressing rooms and headed out.

The first thing that Pausert saw was that the vatch had exceeded its mandate. The bunch of people shooting at them should not have been able to fire anything at all, since their heads had been doused in luminous lime-green paint. The vatchlet must have raided the Petey B's main store, not just the little props-room cupboard.

But the Nanites, it seemed, didn't need human eyes to see well enough to shoot. A blaster bolt seared above them, hitting another strut, bringing down a large banner.

"They're between us and the Thunderbird," said Hulik, drawing her own elegant little blaster from an outfit that Pausert would have thought couldn't hide a toothpick. She started returning the fire.

Another paint-head tried a flanking shot. His paint-soaked blaster exploded, just as the Leewit gave a shattering whistle. Whether it was the paint or the whistle that caused that was a matter for later academic discussion.

Goth narrowed her eyes and looked intently at a surviving speaker-bank above another group of painted heads. It began, slowly, to totter, as an already off-balance pile will when an extra wedge is teleported under its base. Moments later, tumbling tons of electronic speakers were hurtling down on the painted heads.

Another group found they'd made a mistake with their target. Timblay folded neatly, avoiding the blaster fire with a contortionist's skill, and started shooting back with a Blythe rifle.

"Keep going towards the Thunderbird," said Sedmon. "The other Sedmons are controlling her computer system remotely. They activated blaster tracking. Whatever you do, Hulik, don't fire again."

Blaster tracking meant that the Thunderbird's weapons systems responded with automatic ship-fire to any active weapon in the vicinity. Pausert could only hope that the Petey B's own defenses didn't get manned. He had a feeling there wouldn't be much left of the old showboat if the Thunderbird really cut loose.

A trio of painted heads appeared from behind a tumble of flats. Pul bit one of them as the captain cold-cocked another. A flying paint-pot materialized in the face of the third attacker and did for him.

In the background, the Thunderbird's guns vaporized steel and a Nanite-carrier. The Nanites didn't seem to have realized yet that firing immediately made them a target. It suddenly occurred to Pausert that while the Nanites were clearly able to think, the diffuse form of their intelligence made them relatively slow witted.

They had no sense of macrocosmic scale, clearly enough! The Nanites themselves were micrometers in size, and didn't seem to be able to gauge proportions properly in their human hosts. Mannicholo and Master Himbo came charging through, mounted on pair of fanderbags—and several of the Nanite-carriers raced up to stop them. With the pancake-flat results you'd expect.

The tide had turned. Still, the Nanites kept shooting—and being vaporized almost instantly by the Thunderbird's deadly guns every time they did. They seemed incapable of learning the lesson.

* * *

Within minutes, it was no longer a case of retreating to the Thunderbird. It was a case of mopping up.

But as the sun came up over Yin Bauh district 323, one thing was plain.

When the next shift came off-duty, there would be no show.