Juanita Coulson - Children of the Stars 04 Read online

  He scratched his blond mop and decided the blip had to be space junk. There was plenty of that out there. Most of it was marked on the charts, but occasionally something slipped through the grids. This was probably a maverick. No one could identify her now. She’d have been a spectacular little flash in T-W 593’s atmosphere, then splattered herself on the surface or one of the seas.

  Why had it taken him so long to spot this? The thing had registered on the monitors days ago. Was his brain asleep when he’d run previous checks? Well, no matter. He had it logged at last. Dan closed the file and headed back to the skimmer.

  The terminator was well west of N’lac Valley. He flew home in deepening twilight. The complex’s lamps and a huge bonfire near the dud pits welcomed him. He touched down by the hangars and walked to the cook shack. To his relief, the debating club had adjourned. Most of the offworlders and a number of N’lacs were gathering by that bonfire. Praedar, Kat, and several others were finishing work at the painted wall. Dan went up there and gave Praedar the dupe of Varenka’s sales pitch, then peered around.

  Scaffolding, calibrators, charge-injected imagers, and tools cluttered the ramp and the apron in front of the newly revealed small dome. The pictures on the wall seemed to draw Dan’s hand like a magnet. He asked, “Is it okay to touch it?”

  “This part, but don’t rub it,” Kat said.

  Tentatively he made contact. The wall resembled stone, yet felt like metal or, rather, metalline. Strange stuff! An alloy? Tingly warmth spread up Dan’s arm. He fumbled for words. “Is there a... a power source here? A current of some kind?”

  “No, no power,” Kat said. “Our instruments would note it if there were. The effect is psychological.”

  Praedar, too, was caressing the wall. His expression was feral; his spidery hands probed carefully.

  Beautiful, sad pictures showed a star-roving race, reduced to this. Fate had locked the N’lacs in limbo. Could the same thing happen to humanity? Did Homo sapiens face the same mysterious dead end Chuss’ people had landed in? Lost, forgotten, waiting for xenoarchaeologists of the forty-first or forty-second century to dig up the fragments of their civilization...

  Dan recoiled. He told himself the N’lacs had simply been the unlucky victims of a cosmic catastrophe—disease, radiation, fatal gene mutations or some other one-in-a-trillion blow. Not anything likely to strike again at Terra.

  But what if... ?

  The spooky images were giving him disconcerting ideas. Maybe it was the result of rubbing elbows with all these scientists. That could twist an ordinary spacer’s view of the universe.

  Kat pressed his arm. “Yes, we feel it, too.” Startled, he stared down at her. “We wish we could go back in time and prevent their collapse,” she said. “But we can’t alter the past. We can only learn from it—or try to.” She gestured toward the bonfire. “I have to set up my equipment before Sleeg begins his tale-tell-ing. Are you going to join us there, Dan?”

  “What is it? A party?”

  “Not exactly.” Kat’s manner was solemn. “It’s an aftermath of finding the small dome. The N’lacs need a safety valve.”

  Praedar said, “They will remember what they were. We will know what we may become.” With that, the Whimed headed down the hill. So did Kat and the other scientists. After a moment, so did Dan.

  Brushwood fed green and purple-tinged flames. The strange colors didn’t detract from tempting food aromas rising from spits suspended over the fire. Dan eyed the food hungrily, but he hadn’t been part of today’s hunting teams, so he had to wait his turn. Once the nimrods took their shares, the rest dug in. Dan filled his bowl with roast lizard and crumbly bread and looked around for a place to sit. Sheila beckoned invitingly. He settled beside her and the blonde handed him a mug of “diggers’ brew.” That was a mild concoction fermented from native berries and grains, with enough spunk to make him happily mellow.

  It was a pleasant multispecies picnic, lacking only the Vahnajes’ presence to complete the scene. Each race had its own food favorites, mostly used as dessert or taste-topper for the simple fare. The mood was atavistic and oddly comforting. Terrans, felinoids, and procyonid—stepping back through the millennia to the dawn of their civilizations and joining the primitive N’lacs in this open-air meal. It didn’t matter if one were a famous scientist, a stony-broke indie pilot, or a descendant of those golden-eyed former masters of T-W 593. Here they were all people, well fed, content, and among friends.

  The circle wasn’t rigid. Now and then children crept off into the bushes to relieve themselves. A few couples strolled away arm in arm, responding to another natural urge. Other off-worlders ran errands to the domes or the complex, then returned to the fire. Several times the Whimeds indulged in their custom of compulsive “huddling”-—embracing one another violently and growling in apparent fury, or ecstasy, then breaking apart. For the most part the crowd ate and digested, talked, and watched sparks sail into the night sky.

  After an hour or so, Sleeg started swaying rhythmically and chanting. His tribe chanted with him, a susurrating undercurrent. Kat, Rosenthal, and the expedition’s xenoethno students switched on recorders. They acted as if they’d been through this ritual many times but hoped to collect something brand new. Terrans, Whimeds, and Armilly hummed along with the N’lacs. The sense of community was very strong.

  “Kat,” Sheila whispered, “give handsome a transbutton so he can understand.” The brunette fished a miniature listen-plug from her equipment case and offered it to Dan. He inserted the button in his ear, picking up an English rendition of Sleeg’s story in midword.

  .. pened in the days of the many-fathers-ago. There! At the temple place—the big dome place where Sheila’s people dig when sun is high. Our many-fathers-ago build little dome there, when they came Home from slavery in the Evil Old Ones’ place...”

  Sheila nudged Dan, speaking softly. “Notice how Chuss anticipates what Sleeg’s going to say? He even helps the old boy whenever Sleeg forgets a phrase. The torch is being passed. Kat calls it oral history in action. The Vahnajes evolved a different form of prehistoric bonding. But for us and the Whimeds and Armilly, this is a graphic demonstration of how things were in our species’ early stages.”

  Dan murmured, “And Chuss will probably memorize the stories even faster than Sleeg did, won’t he, thanks to Joe’s work?” Hughes was sitting close by, and he grinned.

  “Right!” Sheila agreed. “Not bad, handsome.”

  “... Evil Old Ones came to us in the many long-agos,” Sleeg crooned. “They took us to their place. Their world. Bad bad place! We live there many long-longs.” He contorted his wizened face, waving his skinny arms for emphasis. The horror of N’lac captivity gripped the villagers. Young and old alike echoed the shaman, crying “Bad bad!”

  One scientist grumbled, “Have to clarify that in our presentations to the Assembly. Feo’s faction will insist that we heard the N’lac myths first and worked backward. They won’t believe we arrived at our theories independently...”

  “Then we’ll shove it down their throats,” Sheila said grimly. Sleeg’s tale crossed species lines, dragging Dan into the narrative. “Evil Old Ones lost their hands,” the elder—or the translation of the elder’s words—said. “Long-long-long-long time ago they lost hands. They take N’lacs and those like N’lacs to be their hands. We are their slave-hands...”

  Revulsion roiled Dan’s gut. Handless? That hinted that the Evil Old Ones were nonanthropomorphic—and slavers to boot. Of course, humanoids weren’t too clean on that last score. Yet the effect was different. Even egg-laying Ulisorians, with their float bladders and extra arms, and the trisexed, blue-skinned Ri-gotians were humanftfce. When humanoid enslaved humanoid, it was despicable, but familiar. What Sleeg was describing was a sickening perversion of natural order.

  “Evil Old Ones. No bones. Bones outside. Round. Tall. Tall tall!” Sleeg sketched in the air, drawing an upright, bulbous form encased in an exoskeleton.

  Dan’
s nausea grew. A bunch of insects! Big worms with lattice-shaped outer shells. Ugh!

  His reaction astonished him. He’d dealt with alien critters of all kinds since he was a toddler. Sleeg’s story shouldn’t disturb him this badly. It was hitting reflexes so deep Dan hadn’t been aware he possessed them. Maybe it was due to the diggers’ brew. He put the stuff aside. N’lac fairy tales and alcohol didn’t mix.

  “Evil Old Ones have demons with many arms. Demons find, hurt N’lacs.” Again, Sleeg drew pictures in the air. Chuss copied him, the apprentice tale-teller learning his trade. Their drawings involved another upright oblate, though a more angular shape than that of the Evil Old Ones. “Demons move like sand crawler. So!” Sleeg parodied a reptile’s serpentine waddle, and N’lac kids squealed.

  “Demons shiny,” Chuss added. “They machines. Like Kel-fee’s fly fly.”

  The shaman considered his apprentice’s comment, then waggled his jaw, the N’lac form of nodding. The tribe gazed worriedly at Dan. He hoped they weren’t lumping him in the same category as Sleeg’s many-limbed demons and Evil Old Ones.

  Chuss said, “Round. Not pointy like Kelfee fly fly.” The N’lacs sighed collectively, smiling.

  “That lets you off the hook,” Sheila whispered.

  He shook his head. “Were these things they’re talking about real?”

  Kat put in, “In all probability, yes. Most legends are based on past events, often on a violent clash of cultures. This situation certainly qualifies.”

  “What situation? There wasn’t anything about a triggering cause in your library vids,” Dan said, aggrieved. The scientists looked amused. He went on irritably. “Okay. It’s a professional secret why there’s a gap in N’lac history. Two thousand Terran years ago to the five hundred years ago you pegged that small dome at. But right now I’m interested in how that ties in with Sleeg’s tale. Were these demons servo robots? Chuss said they were shiny. That implies metal, to me.”

  “To us, too,” Sheila admitted.

  “And it’s no secret,” Kat said, on the defensive. “It’s just that we prefer to keep those particular hypotheses in secure files, for the time being, until they’re positively confirmed.”

  Dr. Chen and Praedar were sitting together across the big circle. They listened to the exchange with a conspiratorial manner, aged Oriental and enigmatic Whimed. Their all-knowing attitude bothered Dan, underlining his novice, outsider status.

  Sheila said, “Sometimes the N’lacs make models or sand pictures of the Evil Old Ones and demons. The latter sure look like robots. Mechanical eggs on stilts. God knows how they were manufactured.”

  “Or if they were,” Dan said skeptically. “Maybe Dr. Getz is right, and these are just scare stories.”

  “Arguable,” Kat retorted. “Bill’s not an expert in xenoeth.” “But he is in his field,” Sheila said, scowling at her friend. Then she wriggled seductively and squeezed Dan’s thigh. Her lips tickled his earlobe as she murmured, “I’ll bet I know one of your fields of expertise. How about a moonlight stroll later?”

  His hormones roused. “Daddy warned me about you Kruger 60 women. Spacers say because you settlers are polygamous, you’re supersexy.”

  “We are.” Sheila winked. “Hey, if your fathers and mothers were frozen in a stasis ship for years and thawed out and told to populate a planet, they’d pass on interesting reproductive ideas to you, too. Care to find out the straight dope about us Kruger fems?”

  Dan grinned. “Sounds exciting.”

  “Then when Sleeg finishes, we’ll..

  “Here!” Dr. Getz shoved his way between Dan and Sheila and plunked down a box full of his effigy specimens. “You and Rosie hand these out to the N’lacs for their ritual, Whitcomb. And be sure to collect ’em all, when they’re through. I have something to do at the refuse pile. Olmsted, make certain I get copies of the N’lacs’ attempts to mold their own effigies,” he said imperiously, and hurried up the trail to the domes.

  Sheila got to her feet, running after him. “Bill, wait! I want to ask you about that..

  Dan was irked. Did he have a date or not? Kruger 60 women might be hot, but this one was threatening to be a tease. Didn’t Sheila care if she nudged a man’s hormones and left him up and nowhere? Hell of a note.

  Sour and disappointed, he watched Rosenthal pass around the box. Each N’lac adult and adolescent took one of the effigies. After a few minutes, Dan began to forget his annoyance with Sheila, fascinated by the N’lacs’ actions. As Sleeg continued to chant, his people dabbled small amounts of water onto loose dirt and molded the soil, copying Getz’s specimens crudely.

  . Evil Old Ones had many people to be their hands. Many N’lacs and not-N’lacs. No one get away. Only our many-fathers-ago escaped.” The elder thrust his webbed hands into the air, ticking off a few dozen beings on his clubbed fingers. “They ran to the Below. Came through the Big Dark, where the People cannot see or hear or feel. The Big Dark is many-many-many far aways and it is many-many stranges. Dark! DARK! The People came from Below to here. Back to Home..

  The N’lacs responded, “Up from Below. Home! Shree!"

  “And when we came here, we made the holy things, the magic things...”

  Dan frowned. Magic? Like those mud models they were making now? How many generations of N’lacs had sat by similar bonfires, inspired by their tale-tellers, molding little shapes? The scene was poignant—dull-witted humanoids, earnestly attempting to duplicate the objects of their ancestors.

  “The effigies,” he asked Kat. “How old are they?”

  “Difficult to say. Glass resists precise dating.”

  “... magic things made world go,” Sleeg told his people. “Made sun come into our houses. Made wind come in. Made the warm. Made the cool. Made the water..

  Hair raised on Dan’s nape. The old e.t. was talking technology. Light. Air circulation. Heating and cooling systems. Automated water-supply systems. The words sounded eerie, considering the source.

  Rosie had left Getz’s box sitting an arm’s length away. Dan peeked inside and took out several specimens that were lying in the bottom. Getz was so proprietary about his collection that this was Dan’s first opportunity to get a close look at the things. He studied the glass, hollow-cored, brachiate forms. Then he chuckled and began fitting pieces together. Some were difficult to match up. Others worked fine. By trial and error, he quickly assembled a fair-size unit.

  Sleeg’s tale-telling stuttered to a stop. The N’lacs quit chanting. Startled, Dan realized all the villagers were staring at him. Chuss scuttled around the firepit and hunkered directly in front of the pilot. The boy’s big eyes locked on the glass objects Dan was holding.

  By now the scientists were staring, too. Conversation faltered. Kat turned her scanner in Chuss’s direction.

  It was an unfortunate moment for Dr. Getz and Sheila to return from the domes. Getz froze, then stabbed an accusing finger. “Rosie! How dare you let him tamper with my specimens?”

  Sheila hurried around the circle and knelt beside Dan. “I thought you had better sense. You know how touchy Bill is. What did you think you were ...”

  Sleeg howled. The cry shocked the offworlders to silence. The N’lacs erupted, babbling. An incoherent storm blasted Dan’s ear. He’d almost forgotten he was wearing the transbutton.

  The shaman bellowed, “Magic! Shree! Like the many-fathers-ago magic! They did so. My grandfather’s grandfather’s grandfather told it so. Kelfee knows the magic!”

  Praedar was moving along the edge of the fire, a stalking hunter—and Dan was his prey.

  Getz leaned over the pilot and shook his fists. “You bastard! I knew you’d be trouble!”

  Dan scrambled to his feet. “Just hold it. You’re the one who’s been pulling funny stuff. Now I know why you hide these things.” He thrust the glass units under Getz’s nose. “So no one can see that they’re nothing but fluidics elements.”

  All the scientists talked at once, some siding with Getz, others intrigu
ed by what Dan had said, asking colleagues if they knew anything about it.

  “Give me that!” Getz lunged, grabbing and shouting curses. Dan fended him off easily. Angered, he defiantly demonstrated his discovery, twisting the glass pieces apart and putting them back together again. “See? Flange to flange to insert. A Schmitt trigger here. A fluid amplifier on this end. NOR gates. AND gates. Even a flip-flop or two. No big mystery. Some of the elements are pretty badly made. The makers must have used lousy molds. The rest, though, are fine connectors . .

  “They’re effigies'.” Getz roared. “Of course they interface, you cretin! The poorly made ones are a degenerate form, more recent artifacts. The better ones were constructed during the initial stages of the ritualization, centuries ago. The objects you are holding—and without my authorization—are rare, early finds. I lend them to the N’lacs solely for their quaint little ceremony, as a favor to naive xenoeths like Olmsted. Don’t be deceived by the natives’ reactions. This isn’t the first time they’ve been excited by the effigies. They did the same thing when I showed them how these could be either mutability fetishes representing a single being or joined to comprise a symbolic communal...”

  “Jettison that out that waste tubes,” Dan cut in rudely. “You can’t see the truth when it’s right in front of you. Look, Channel here. Shunt here. This unit is obviously a power linkage, probably to a pump of some sort. So forget that stuff about ‘mutability fetishes’ or ‘symbolic communal’ garbage ...”

  Getz swung. Dan ducked. The blow missed him by a good half meter.

  He cocked a fist, then thought better of it. He couldn’t hit this thick-headed old scientist, even if Getz was picking a fight. Sure, Dan had the advantage of youth and weight, and he could wallop the shorter man with no problem. Then what? He’d be pegged as a bully. What a no-win mess this was!