They sat for a long moment, drinking, while an oscillating fan stirred the tepid air. The Lemurians drained their tea with relish and then waited patiently while the haggard newcomers rehydrated themselves. Finally, Mallory wiped his mouth and cleared his throat.
“My God, sir, that was welcome. We only carried a little water, to save on weight. Enough to last a few more days, but… Anyway, thanks, sir. Your ship was a sight for sore eyes!”
“Thank you, Lieutenant. Seeing that plane was pretty exciting for us. But what about Mahan? Where the hell is she and what happened?”
The three men glanced at each other, then haltingly, together, told how Kaufman took over the ship. Matt and the other humans listened in stunned amazement. They just couldn’t believe it. Not only was it blatant mutiny, but under the circumstances it was insane. Brister told how Jim tried to take Kaufman’s gun away, and he saw the rage on Matt’s face when he told him Jim had been shot.
“He didn’t kill him, sir,” he hastened to add. “In fact, I think it was more an accident than anything.” He almost smiled. “I heard Mr. Ellis was beating the shit out of him, if you’ll pardon the expression. But Kaufman did shoot him. In the leg.” There was a pause while the lieutenant’s words sank in around the table.
“Go on,” Matt ordered harshly.
They told how the mutiny had proceeded, and of Kaufman’s obsession with Ceylon. Jim Ellis lapsed into fever and they put into Tjilatjap for fuel-only Tjilatjap wasn’t there, and they told of the horrors they saw.
Keje stiffened in his seat. “Chill-chaap? This Amer-i-caan speaks of Chill-chaap?” Larry Dowden had excused himself, and now he hurried back in with a chart that showed South Java and the waters nearby. Nakja-Mur and the Sky Priest fairly bristled at the way he spread the chart across the table, condensation rings and all, but Keje and Adar had prepared them somewhat, so they didn’t cry out in protest. Brister was looking at Keje when he put his finger on the South Java port of Tjilatjap. “Here, sir,” he said.
“Gone,” muttered Keje. “Chill-chaap is gone.” He spoke to the other Lemurians in his own tongue. Nakja-Mur rose to his feet and shouted something at Keje, then continued shouting at everyone in the compartment. “He is… excited,” explained Keje in a subdued tone, barely audible over Nakja-Mur’s rant.
“Well, tell… ask him to control himself! We must hear what else these men have to say!”
“I will try, Cap-i-taan. But forgive him… us. Chill-chaap is nearly as large as Baalkpan. It was one of the oldest colonies, and the only one on Jaa-va that remained friendly to us. Many thousands of people-our people-lived there.” Keje turned to Nakja-Mur and spoke in soothing tones. Slowly, the High Chief of Baalkpan eased into his seat. But his rage had only been contained, not extinguished. A moody, uncomfortable silence filled the compartment, and the quiet, after Nakja-Mur’s outburst, was particularly profound.
“Lieutenant Brister,” Matt prompted.
“Sir,” continued Brister after a last look at their guests. “Tjilatchap, or Chill-chaap, is gone. Nothing left alive. And it looked like the people there were eaten, and not just by scavengers.”
“My God,” gasped Sandra.
“Yes,” Keje growled. “Did I not tell you? We are mere prey to them.” He looked at the nurse. “You asked once why we threw them into the sea.” He shook his head.
Brister cleared his throat and resumed his tale. With Mallory’s help he brought them through the storm and the discovery of the plane. Then he spoke of the monsters.
“Grik,” Keje snarled.
“How many ships?” Matt asked.
“Three, sir.”
Matt looked at Keje. “They can’t have been the same ones we tangled with. It was at least two weeks later and hundreds of miles apart!” He turned back to Mallory. “What happened then?”
Ben described the hair-raising effort to get the plane off the beach. Between the three of them again, they told how they ultimately fought clear of the “monsters” and finally flew back to Mahan.
“They just left you?” Bradford asked incredulously. “Without a boat?”
“Yeah. Even if we’d changed our minds, it wouldn’t have done any good. We had plenty of motivation. Those creatures-I’ve never seen anything like ’em, sir. They were… pretty scary.”
Matt nodded. “We’ve seen them too, and they are pretty scary. I congratulate you all on your escape.”
“Thank you, sir,” they chorused.
“Did the lizards see you fly?”
“Maybe,” answered Mallory. “We could still see them when we took off. Why?”
Matt smiled at him. “Nothing, Lieutenant. Don’t worry about it. It might’ve been a handy surprise for later, that’s all.”
Mallory looked at his hands. “Sorry, Captain. I didn’t think of that. Not till later. We saw half a dozen more of their ships while we were looking for you, but we were pretty high and far. If they heard us, I doubt they saw us.”
“My God,” murmured Bradford. “As many as nine ships, then. Perhaps a dozen, if the ones seen in the strait are still others.” He looked at Keje, who seemed stricken. “Your enemy is here at last, and in force. We’ve not a moment to lose!”
Matt held up his hand. “I’m afraid we must lose a few more moments, Mr. Bradford. Lieutenant Mallory? What happened next?”
“Kaufman wanted us to fly to Ceylon, and we didn’t say squat, but ‘Yes, sir, will do.’ We took on all the fuel we could and then came looking for you.”
“I saw Mr. Ellis before we left,” Brister said. “The nurses were all fine and were taking good care of him.” He looked at Sandra. “Nurse Cross said they were keeping the faith. We talked a couple of minutes, and Mr. Ellis said…” He turned to Matt. “He said to tell you he’s sorry-but, Captain, it wasn’t his fault!” Perry’s gaze was emphatic. “Anyway, they probably all know we went looking for you by now. At least the ones that aren’t crazy will have some hope.”
Keje cleared his throat. “Excuse me,” he said. “These flying men bring momentous news. We learn Chill-chaap has been sacked and the Grik are indeed rampant, worse than we’d even feared. The dark time we’ve dreaded seems at hand. Now is when we will learn if all we’ve worked for, for generations-our colonies, our culture, our very way of life-will survive, or be cast to the winds once more. This… is important to us.” The irony of his understatement wasn’t lost. “I would think it would be important to you, our allies, as well. Yet you seem more concerned with this ship, this Mahan. What is Mahan, and what, or where, is Say-lon?”
Matt took off his hat in the awkward silence. He wiped sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief and slicked back his greasy hair. “Forgive me, my friend. I am concerned, and this news means our preparations are even more urgent. The significance of Mahan, however, is this.” He looked around at all of them, but rested his gaze on Keje and Nakja-Mur. “Mahan and Walker are the same. They’re just alike, and she has the same capabilities we have. What’s more, her people are my people, and I’m responsible for them. I’m obligated to help them any way I can, just as I’m obligated, now, to help your people to the best of my ability. The reason Mahan should concern you, however, besides-like you said, we’re allies-is there’s another ship just like this one, apparently steaming as fast as she can directly toward the Grik. What if they take her? You say they’re mimics; they copy the works of others. How long to copy Mahan? A while, surely. Maybe a generation or two. But what of the meantime? How will they use her? At the very least, they might figure out ways to counteract our superiority.” He stopped and looked around. “We’ve got to get her back.” He paused. “Or destroy her.”
Nakja-Mur rose to his feet and, after regarding them all with a steady gaze, he began to speak. Keje translated as he did so. “You Amer-i-caans, you know us now. You may not know us well, but we’ve kept no secrets from you and our desperation is clear. Yet we know almost nothing about you. At long last, tell us where you come from. If you have two smoking shi
ps, why not summon more? The flying boat outside is clearly made of metal, and yet it floats! It flies! With but three Amer-i-caans on board, it is a match for three Grik ships! We’ve never seen such wonders! Surely you can do anything! You can save us from the Grik! Please, summon more of your people. Together, we could destroy the Grik menace completely, and our two peoples could live in peace for all time!”
Matt looked at Nakja-Mur when Keje completed the translation. Conflicting emotions swirled through him, but he knew, in spite of his desire to pass as little information as he could-the same desire he suspected the first “Tail-less Ones” had-the Lemurians who’d taken them in and now depended on them so heavily had a right to know. He glanced at Sandra and caught a nod of encouragement.
“We can’t send for help,” he said, “because there’s no one to send to.” He looked at Sandra and smiled resignedly. Then he held the gaze of each American for a moment before returning his attention to the Lemurians. “Remember how the first Tail-less Ones said their home was gone? Ours is too. Whether that makes us like them or not, I’ll leave up to you to decide. But I think it’s time you heard a story about a war that was bigger than anything you can possibly imagine. A war so big, the entire world was engulfed in fire and millions had already died… and it was only starting. This ship that seems so impressive and full of wonders to you was only the smallest, most insignificant part of that war, in the grand scheme of things.” He took a deep breath. ”And it was a war we were losing. Then something happened and somehow, we were… here.”
Keje managed an expression of confusion. “But you’ve told us you come from near the Edge of the World, from a land so distant we’ve no
… ah, charts that show its position.”
“That’s true. We do. But the war we fought-the part we were fighting, that is-was here. Right here.”
There was no sound but the voices on deck and the paint chippers plying their tools on a scaffold rigged alongside.
Courtney Bradford leaned forward in his chair. “My dear friends, Mi-Anakka and Americans, there’s no question we all spring from the same world. There’s no other explanation.” He laid his hand on the chart before him. “These are the same, for the most part, as the Scrolls the People revere. The land shapes are mostly the same, although we’ve noticed a few slight differences. But the water is water and the air is the air and the heavens are no different. But in the world Captain Reddy described, where all upon it were at war-the ‘world,’ if you will, we come from-all this”-he gestured at the charts-“was the same except for one thing: the people and creatures that inhabit it. Where we come from-evidently an entirely other ‘here’-there are no Grik, no mountain fish, and… no People.” He leaned back in his chair and it creaked beneath him.
“Personally, I don’t come from ‘the Edge of the World,’ like my American friends. I come from…” He glanced at the chart and put his finger on the small piece of coastline southeast of the Sunda Islands, right on the edge of the paper. “I think your Scrolls call this place ‘New Holland’ or something like that, although I assure you there were few Dutchmen when I left.”
Keje was looking at him like he’d just crawled out of a gri-kakka’s mouth with its stomach in his teeth. “I’ve been to that land,” he said quietly. “There are colonies there, and in the south, they build some sea homes as well. I’ve never seen an Amer-i-caan.”
Bradford sighed. “I’m not a bloody American, but that’s beside the point. By your charts, everything’s the same, but there aren’t any of us. By our charts, everything’s the same, but there aren’t any of you. The only explanation is that, somehow, there are two worlds… parallel worlds…” He stopped and looked around. “Two worlds side by side, perhaps even occupying the same space at the same time, only on which life has developed, for some reason, in two entirely different directions.”
“But-but-” Keje stammered, “that cannot be.”
Bradford sniffed and leaned back again. “Perhaps not, but it’s all I’ve been able to come up with. Captain?”
“No, Mr. Bradford, that’s a better explanation than I’d have managed, but the idea’s essentially the same.”
Nakja-Mur said something and Keje spoke for him. “If that is true, then how did you get here?”
Matt spread his hands. “We have no idea. All we know is Mahan and Walker were together, fighting a battle against a powerful enemy ship. We entered a strange squall, and the next thing we knew… No-” He looked thoughtful. “We didn’t really know for a while. But somehow we were here. In your world.” Abruptly, his expression hardened, and he leaned forward, placing his hands on the chart. “Which means, since we’ve no idea how we got here, we haven’t got a clue how to get back. However it happened, we’re stuck with each other. Unlike the old ‘Tail-less Ones,’ we’re not going to run off and leave you. Even if we wanted to, we can’t. Our fates are intertwined. The survival of our people, yours and mine, depends on defeating the Grik. So you better explain to your complainers, Nakja-Mur, U-Amaki Ay Baalkpan, they have not yet begun to be inconvenienced! After the information we’ve received today, we’re going to have to kick into high gear.”
“High Gear. It means, All Out? Sink or Swim? Same?” Keje asked.
“That’s right.”
Keje blinked solemn assent. “Your man, Silva? He told me these, and I agree. He also told me another.” He looked around the table with quiet dignity and determination, then looked directly at Nakja-Mur. “However the Amer-i-caans came to us, it’s clear only the Maker of All Things could have arranged it as they say. If that is so, then surely we must all either Shit, or Get Off the Pot.”
For once, it was a beautiful day on Baalkpan Bay. The humidity was low and it couldn’t have been much over eighty degrees. There was a cooling breeze out of the south-southwest, and the launch’s motor droned pleasantly with the sound of good health and proper maintenance. The water had a slight chop, stirred by the wind, and the occasional packet of spray spritzed Matt, Letts, Bradford, and Shinya in the cockpit of the launch. To them, it was refreshing. But to Tony Scott, at the wheel, each drop that struck him made him shudder as if he’d been sprayed with caustic acid.
Matt knew something had come over his once fearless coxswain, who’d acquired a deep and abiding terror of the water. All he could do was hope he got over it. They were too shorthanded to put him on the beach, at least until their Lemurian “cadets” were fully trained, and the man stoically refused to be relieved from his primary duty. He clearly hated the water now and he constantly cast worried looks over the side as if expecting to see some huge, ravenous fish pacing the boat. But he was, after all, the coxswain, and he wouldn’t shirk his duty.
For Matt’s part, he was enjoying the outing. Walker had been laid up for more than a month, and he’d grown anxious and irritable over her immobility. Her refit had gone as well as conditions allowed, and he expected she was in better shape now than when they’d left Surabaya ahead of the Japanese. But his anxiety over Mahan and the growing Grik menace left him feeling frustrated and impotent. It was good to be moving over water again.
He looked back across the bay, toward his ship, but he couldn’t see her. Seven of the huge Lemurian Homes lay at anchor off Baalkpan now, crowding the area near the shipyard. More were expected within the next few days. Nakja-Mur had sent word as far as his fishing fleet could reach, for a “Great Gathering,” or in essence, a council of war, to be held. Many of the Homes were intercepted already on their way. The threat was apparent to all by now. There’d been other fights like Big Sal’s, although none against so many Grik, but at least one Home was overrun. Its smoldering, half-sunken carcass was seen aground on the northeast coast of Java, near where Batavia would have been. That news threw Keje into a frenzy, and he’d been willing, at last, to perform the modifications to Big Sal that Alan Letts had suggested. Even now, as the launch nosed into the estuary of the river the locals called the Sungaa, Alan was discussing his plan with Bradford. Captain Reddy w
as deeply interested in whatever scheme the recently hypermotivated supply officer came up with, but for the moment he couldn’t help but be overcome by the primordial landscape surrounding them.
The Sungaa wasn’t long and was navigable for only a short distance before it choked into a narrow, swampy stream. But the waters that fled into the bay from the Lohr Mountains to the north provided a quicker, more convenient passage to the site where they’d sunk their first well. Except for his brief, tragic foray on Bali, Matt had stepped on land only for frequent trips into the city to see Nakja-Mur. Now, after passing the last hardy outposts of fishing huts and “frontier” hunters-only a few miles from town-he beheld Lemurian Borneo in all its savage beauty.
Amid raucous cries, dozens of species of colorful birdlike creatures whirled and darted with the erratic grace of flying insects. Their short, furry feathers covered streamlined and exotically lethal leathery bodies. They incessantly chased small fish, insects, and any “bird” smaller than they were. Vicious aerial combat flared when one of the creatures caught something another wanted or thought it could take. Unlike similar battles that Matt had seen among birds back home, the losers here rarely survived. The bodies of the slain never even made it to the water.
The deadly flasher-fish weren’t nearly as numerous in the fresher water of the bay, and they didn’t venture upriver at all. Matt’s party passed a herd of large animals marching solemnly through the shallows near shore. They were the size of hippos, but looked like spiky armadillos with longer necks and forelegs. Here and there, ordinary crocodiles lounged on the muddy banks. For all Matt knew, the trees hanging over the water were quite normal as well, but he knew little about trees of any sort, so their wide, palmated leaves looked exotic to him regardless. Bradford said they were as unusual as the fauna and Matt took his word for it. The whole scene was simultaneously shockingly beautiful and horrifying in a deep, secret, instinctual way.
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