Starborn and Godsons

by Larry Niven

  “I can understand why you would defend him,” Skypes said, voice flat as beaten metal. “After all, he threw the prosecution for you.”

  Major Stype’s smile was as thin as the knife in her belt.

  Before Cadzie could curse and make things worse, she said, “You will have your time, Cadmann Sikes, to prove yourself worthy of your name.”

  ♦ ChaptEr 36 ♦

  trial

  Air in the courtroom was tight, hot, despite the fact that the crowd was now smaller than it had been for the inquest. Supervised by armed Godsons, the crowd outside swelled the courtyard. Captain Arnold Tolliver, captain of Messenger, acted as chief prosecutor.

  Cadzie fought to keep his temper. An outburst would solve nothing, and make many things worse. “I searched the tunnels, and near to the room we call the cathedral I found the corpses of his tame grendels.”

  Prosecutor Tolliver nodded. “And you claim that they were dead when you entered.”

  “They were dead, yes.”

  A mild murmur in the courtroom. The barrister pounced. “The autopsy suggests that the cause of death for Aaron was electrocution, with wounds similar to those produced by what you call a grendel gun. Is that accurate?”

  “I have no idea. I still haven’t examined that corpse,” Cadzie answered.

  “Do you have an explanation for this?”

  “No,” he admitted. “I do not.”

  Three hours later, the testimony was still underway. Big Shaka, the size and color of a black cricket, was coiled in the hot seat. “We have never captured a cthulhu, but have built up a fairly complete hologram model of the creatures.”

  “And what do you conclude from this?” Barrister Tolliver asked.

  “We’re thinking these structures—” His pointer coasted over several puckered nodules at the tips of their tentacles. “Are electrogenerative.”

  “Meaning?”

  Shaka seemed annoyed. “We think they’ll deliver a shock. We know that the creatures we call cthulhus had some connection to the grendels. Possibly co-evolved, possibly were involved in their development more directly. It is reasonable to assume that they had some sort of defense against them.”

  “I see.” That possibility didn’t seem to have occurred to him. “How could these stunners kill grendels?”

  Big Shaka assumed a professorial demeanor. “In a manner similar to the grendel guns: prompt them to dump their speed, creating an overload of their nervous systems, shutting down their frontal lobes and in essence cooking them in their own heat.”

  The barrister’s eyebrows beetled. “May I understand. You are saying that these creatures might well be able to generate a force similar enough to the grendel gun to have the same general effects, and be indistinguishable?”

  “It is possible, yes.”

  “What would be required to determine this?”

  Shaka paused, not liking his own answer. “Capturing a live cthulhu, I think. Yes, that would do it.”

  The crowd’s reactions were not pleasant.

  The afternoon ground on into the evening, and one testimony blended into another, until two days later an end was called to proceedings. The Godsons’ judge instructed Cadzie to stand. “Cadmann Sikes, you have been convicted of deliberate murder in the death of Aaron Tragon. Do you have anything to say before sentence is passed?”

  “Yes,” he said. “That this is a travesty. You have no right to judge me.”

  The judge didn’t lunge at the bait. “The right to judge has always been conflated with the power, and so it is today. You are sentenced to cold sleep until such time as the capture of a live cthulhu can be undertaken, or a cure for your aberration is found.”

  ♦ ChaptEr 37 ♦

  hindsight

  Dusk came to Sylvia’s house on Mucking Great Mountain.

  Joanie piloted the skeeter down near the little graveyard where Mary Ann and Cadmann were buried. Carrying a fruit basket, she stepped down, a bit of reluctance in her face and gait.

  Sylvia, walking a little straighter than she usually did, a little lighter as if drawing on some inner wellspring, greeted her adopted daughter.

  “Hi, Sylvia. Hope I’m not late.”

  “No I think you’re right on time.”

  Hugs and cheek-pecks were exchanged. They went in. Little Shaka was seated at the long, hand-carved ironwood table. And Carlos. Joanie felt increasingly ill at ease.

  “Anything I can do to help?” she asked.

  “You can help me carry the food outside. It’s going to be a good evening.”

  “Sure.”

  Quickly they were sitting outside at another of Carlos’ handmade tables.

  They were quiet for a time. Then,“I’m glad we didn’t bring mosquitos,” Carlos said. “I’m sure they are a part of the cycle of life and all . . aren’t they, Shaka?”

  Shaka smiled and went into an imitation of his father’s voice. “Mosquitos, like all other life-forms, are part of a complex food web. Many fish feed on mosquito larvae, which are aquatic, and plenty of birds and spiders and other insects feed on the adults. Dragonflies and damselflies love mosquitoes. Frogs eat adult mosquitoes, tadpoles eat the larvae. Bats eat mosquitoes. Some eat many mosquitoes, others prefer other diets, but the mosquito does have a place in their food webs.”

  “Do tell. Elucidate,” Sylvia said, smiling. They needed the humor.

  “The only ecosystem where mosquitoes play a major role is the arctic tundra, where migratory birds depend on them . . but the caribou suffer dearly. In most of the world and for most predators, mosquitoes can be easily replaced with other flying insects in the food web.”

  “In other words . . ?” Sylvia said.

  “Screw ’em,” Shaka said, and they dissolved into much-needed laughter.

  It was still uncomfortable. The unspoken topic hung in the air, and finally, Joanie couldn’t take it.

  “I don’t know what you expected me to do. I didn’t testify against him,” she said.

  “No, you didn’t. Potato?” The others took food as if nothing of consequence was happening.

  “I wasn’t there,” she said. “I didn’t see anything.”

  Carlos nodded. “And you testified honestly and fairly about the conversation between Cadzie and your father.”

  She began to cry. The others waited. “I feel like I never really knew him,” Joanie said.

  Carlos laid a gentle, weathered hand on hers. “I’m not sure anyone really knew him, Joanie. Aaron lived apart from us. Deep . . .” he paused, seeking the right word. “Inside his head, perhaps. Maybe somewhere else.”

  Little Shaka spoke up. “Once upon a time I knew him. Thought I knew him pretty well. Then . . that thing happened with Cadmann’s grandfather.”

  “You were there,” Joanie said.

  “Yes.”

  “I’m not sure I ever really wanted to know.” A small voice.

  “Do you now?” Shaka asked with exaggerated casualness.

  She nodded again, a woman transformed into a little girl by the simple wish to comprehend her father.

  Little Shaka said, “I don’t have a lot to tell you. We were hiking, me and Aaron and Cadmann. We were talking, something important. Then I was hit in the face. Then I was in water, and samlon were nibbling at me and Cadmann, who was dead. A bigger, older grendel pulled me out of there, dragged me to where I could be rescued. I was half-conscious the whole time, and it all seemed like a nightmare. When I testified later I must have sounded like a lunatic. Aaron did too, and he’d tamed the grendel, or else the grendel had adopted him.

  “But I was unconscious when Cadmann died.”

  “And so my father’s version of the events could very well have been true,” Joanie said.

  “Yes,” Little Shaka said. “When it came down to it, we gave him the benefit of the doubt.”

  She seemed defensive, and a little proud.

  “More salad?” Sylvia asked.

  “Yes. Please.”

  Quiet ea
ting. Night insects croaked around them, awakening. “How long have you known Cadzie?” Sylvia asked.

  Joanie’s voice was tiny. “All my life.”

  “Did you ever talk to him about what happened, and how he felt about it?”

  She nodded.

  “And what did he say?”

  “He said he wasn’t there, and that he would go with what the colony decided . . but he didn’t have to like it.”

  “No, he didn’t.”

  “No. He didn’t like my father. Didn’t trust him.”

  “How many times did you see them together?”

  “Maybe a dozen,” Joanie said.

  “Was he ever impolite, aggressive? Anything?”

  Joanie couldn’t meet his eyes. “No.”

  “How would you describe their interactions?”

  Her eyes flashed anger. “You’re not a damned lawyer, and this isn’t a damned trial.”

  “No,” he agreed. “Just friends and family talking.”

  Joanie’s face was icy, her every movement carefully controlled.

  “And on the expedition?” he prodded further.

  “Excited. Eager to use the capacity of the power suits.”

  “And when he saw Aaron?”

  “Angry,” Joanie said. “Thought it would complicate the trip.”

  “It did that. Yes. And you’ve known him all your life.”

  “Yes.”

  “And . . you love him, don’t you?” Sylvia said.

  Little Shaka quickly added: “Like a crazy big brother.”

  “Well . . not exactly.”

  They paused, and then everyone cracked up. The laughter was a release.

  Joanie dropped her face into her hands. “God. Everything is so screwed up.”

  “You extended the benefit of the doubt to your father, who you barely knew. Can you do the same for Cadzie?”

  She sighed. “Yes. But . . what difference does it make. I mean . . they’re not going to kill him. We’ll learn more about the cthulhus, and be able to prove he’s innocent . . .”

  “Unless we can’t. You know what happened to so many of us. Ice on their minds.” Sylvia raised a bowl. “Fruit salad?”

  An obscene menace lurked just below the surface of the conversation.

  “What do you want me to do?” Joanie whispered.

  “That would be sedition, dear,” Sylvia said. “I’m not asking you to do anything. Of course, if there’s something you want to do, we wouldn’t stop you.”

  “Why are you talking to me?”

  “Because of all of us, you’re the only one who has to be sure, really sure, of what happened in there. I mean, what you think happened. You know him. You didn’t know your father, but still gave him the benefit of the doubt. So I ask you . . what happened in the caves?”

  “I don’t know . . .” Joanie said. “But . . but I know it wasn’t Cadzie. We can’t let them freeze him. We just can’t. They’ll never thaw him out.”

  “Do you have any ideas?” Carlos asked.

  “Maybe.”

  ♦ ChaptEr 38 ♦

  autopsy

  The main colony’s central skeeter pad rested idle. The pad manager took his time walking out to greet a skeeter with a pod slung underneath.

  Mappers, it looked like. The label was sometimes considered an insult, and used as such. Most of the men and women who chose that life were thought antisocial, loners so averse to human company that they couldn’t live in even small multifamily groups, the smallest units found on Camelot.

  But there were no absolute loners. No one was suicidal enough to travel totally alone on Avalon. Not any more. A few had tried.

  “Howdy, Eric,” the one with the bushier beard said. That was Hal, and his partner at the pod was Towner.

  “What have you got?” the pad manager asked.

  “We have rock samples from sectors three and eight, and some biological samples for Shaka. Figure that’s worth a month’s scrip.”

  “We’ll get you set up. Let’s take a look.” Eric swept the tarp back. Flinched. “Jesus! It stinks. What is that, your bag lunch?”

  Towner was grinning. Hal said, “Don’t know. Found it in sector nine, ran out of ice. Almost didn’t bother. But . . figured it might be interesting. Looks like a water thing, but we found it a distance from the river.”

  “I wonder why. . . .” Eric said. He looked more closely.

  “Well?”

  “Looks familiar,” Erik said. “Let me get Shaka out here.” He triggered his lapel communicator. “Shaka? Are you able to get over here to the pad?”

  “What do you have?” Shaka’s voice.

  “I’m not sure.”

  “I’ll be right out.”

  A few minutes, and Shaka walked over.

  “Good to see you.”

  “Hope you have something interesting.”

  “Hope so,” Eric said. “What do you make of this?”

  Shaka studied the mass of squidlike flesh. “Where did you find this?” he asked.

  The mapper flinched, as if wondering if he had done something wrong. “Sector Nine? On land, east of the dry lake.”

  Shaka frowned. “On the land?” he asked, prodding at part of a blackish mass with the tip of a medical probe. “This is a water . . oh, my.” His eyes widened as a thought occurred to him. “Get it to the biology hutch!”

  Within twenty minutes, the autopsy had begun. Others drifted in as Shaka proceeded: Carlos and Zack, then Charlotte Martine, the young Godson medic.

  “Look at these organs,” Shaka said. “We have a large amphibious creature with multiple limbs, partially devoured by an unknown predator, and starting to decompose, but clearly the creature we’ve called ‘cthulhu.’”

  Zack leaned forward. “What are you seeing as interesting?”

  “Something tore it half apart. But it was on land,”

  Shaka said. “Within ten klicks of the spot we’re calling the ‘temple,’ and if you’ll look here . . .” He displayed a scan map.

  “What am I looking at?” Zack asked.

  “Well . . it isn’t more than a klick and a half from one of the tributary underground rivers. Far from any aboveground waterway connecting with the ocean. I’m thinking it might have been savaged by something toothy, then fled. But—”

  Zack asked, “Grendels? Are you thinking . . ?”

  “That it might have been attacked by Aaron’s tame grendels,” Shaka said. “Impossible to say, as limbs have been removed by scavengers. But it could have been in that tunnel, or near the temple. Another thing. The microorganisms responsible for decomp reproduce at a consistent rate. Measuring that decomp I’d place this creature’s death at about three days ago.”

  “The timing is nice,” Carlos said. “Suggestive. Died within a day or so of Aaron.”

  “That’s possible. But the real question is: why would you find an amphibious creature so far from water? Perhaps it was headed to a lake or stream. But these creatures had never been sighted away from running water, or the ocean.”

  “Went crazy?”

  “That might be it,” Big Shaka said. “Or crazy with pain.”

  “Speculative,” Dr. Martine said. Then, “Don’t mind me. I’m just here to observe.”

  Carlos asked, “Are the mappers still here?”

  “Probably getting lunch,” the pad manager guessed.

  Towner set down a sweetened carrot as he saw Carlos approaching. “We’re honored,” he called. “What can we do for you?”

  “That was a very nice find,” Carlos said, as Charlotte Martine came up behind him.

  “How nice?” Towner asked.

  “Four notches in scrip, I think.” Carlos handed over a handful of little notes. “If you find more in the area, I’ll pay eight each.”

  The mappers leaned close. “Where in the area? You’ve got a hunch? Towner and me, we like hunches.”

  Martine was showing her curiosity. Carlos spoke to her. “It would take more than one cthulhu to
kill two grendels. Aaron’s grendels weren’t tied up, they were loose when we found them. They’d have fought. Cthulhus don’t go alone; they would have attacked in a pack, school, whatever. Maybe they attacked Aaron too? And then ran, for whatever reason. In a pack.”

  The autopsy continued.

  “So,” Shaka said. “These are the electrogenerators.” He probed inside the cthulhu corpse, revealing paler flesh. “Can we estimate the amount of current they can generate?” Carlos asked.

  “From this hacked up corpse? No. I’d like to find one intact.”

  Martine said, “It’s still all guesswork. And your man’s been convicted.”

  The others nodded. “We follow the evidence,” Big Shaka said.

  ♦ ChaptEr 39 ♦

  countertrust

  By eight o’clock, Captain Sven Meadows and a Sergeant Cubbins were beginning to wind down. As Godson Security Forces they had been informally assigned, as GSF had no permanent correctional staff. Until Sikes could be shipped up to Messenger and frozen, guard duty would have to rotate between NCOs and officers.

  They perked up when they heard the skeeter coming in from the mainland. Captain Meadows hit his comm link. “This is Green Leader. We have an authorized skeeter coming in from the mainland. Double checking: they have authority?”

  “Authority granted,” the voice on the other end answered.

  The skeeter landed. Trudy and a Starborn girl he didn’t recognize emerged. The guards checked the skeeter to be certain it didn’t hold more people. “What is your business with the prisoner?”

  Trudy’s face was carefully neutral. “Cord cutting ceremony,” she said.

  He nodded. All Godsons understood the various mating and separation rituals.

  “And why is this one here?” He indicated the Starborn.

  “Her name is Joanie Tragon. The dead man’s daughter. Call her moral support. Knew how much he hated her father. If she can get him to confess, it will make it easier on me.”

  Meadow’s narrow face softened. “Must be hard.”

  “More than you know.”