Dryland's End

by Felice Picano

  Even with the infrared visors, the tunnel dimmed immediately. Like the outer walls, the inner walls had been constructed by Bella=Arth.s and appeared to be of the same rock-hard material. Because of the Vespids’ completely different physiology from Humes, the tunnels were rough underfoot, the walls curved yet tilted at maddening angles, and openings and connecting tunnels were abrupt and unexpected. Despite all this, as both women were in good physical shape, as their way led downward, they were fairly nimble at negotiating the difficulties.

  After a while, Rinne stopped Commander Lill. “Have you noticed the pattern of tunnel openings?” And when Lill didn’t respond, “While we were above, they all opened from this direction. Now they’re opening out toward this direction.”

  “Signifying?”

  “I think that we’re about to level off.”

  “Which means what?”

  “That we’ll reach an open space soon. And perhaps be able to get our bearings,” Rinne said.

  “Do you think we’ll find a floor plan?” Lill was only half joking.

  “From what I recall from Ed. and Dev., Vespids use scents and odor paths to find their way around. Maybe they marked them by scent.”

  “Could my wrist connection read them?” Lill suggested. She dialed her belt for olfactory sensitivity and, holding her wrist up to the nearest wall, read its register, then moved her wrist to a branching tunnel entrance and read it once more. “Well, there’s definitely a difference. I only wish I knew what the difference meant.”

  “And which led to where we’re going?” Rinne agreed. “Let’s both read them as we go along. Any changes, and we may be on to something.”

  They continued to descend; then, as she had predicted, the tunnel widened and leveled off. “I’m impressed,” Lill said. “You also have a theory on the scents?”

  “It’s just a theory,” Rinne cautioned. “But the standard scent seems to register at fifteen. That means ‘straight ahead,’ I believe. Another odor registering at twelve denotes a cross tunnel and means either ‘up’ or ‘down,’ and another one at nineteen means another sort of cross tunnel, again either ‘up’ or ‘down,’ – we’d have to follow those tunnels to find out which. I’ve also spotted two more variables. One scent at very high registration, almost twenty-six on this scale of thirty. Another very low, perhaps four or five. I don’t have a clue what they mean.”

  “Guess.”

  “Well, maybe one points toward living quarters and one toward working quarters. Or, even the very little I know about Bella=Arth.s, one toward general living quarters and the other toward their egg-chambers. They prized their young and protected them very well.”

  “Then that’s where the refugees would be hidden,” Lill said, which made sense to Rinne. “We’ve got to experiment with your high and low registrations. We should follow those scent paths.”

  “Are we deep enough yet?” Rinne asked. Lill only shrugged.

  The tunnel grew quite wide, and alongside it ran many tunnels, some opening out almost immediately to small chambers. Rinne wasn’t certain why it was, but she had the distinct impression of very distant, extremely quiet, but distinctly irregular sounds, like the scuttling of insect legs. Yet she knew that couldn’t be possible. These nests had been emptied of their inhabitants centuries ago. Even in this poor light, she could see the marks left on the chamber walls by the fire that the Bella=Arth. leaders had set deep in this nest, which had exploded upward, an unstoppable holocaust which had sped at hundreds of kilometers per second up, up toward the air, stifling with smoke, and incinerating everything alive in its path. Historians of the period had calculated that it had been carefully executed so that the entire nest had been depopulated within fifteen minutes Sol Rad. Few of its millions of inhabitants had time to do more than smell the first wisps of rising smoke. Ghosts – that’s what she was hearing. The ghosts of millions.

  “All the readings so far have been on the lower scales,” Rinne said. She left the main chamber now, trying smaller chambers, all of which registered low on the olfactory scale.

  “Mine too,” Lill said. “Let’s look for high readings.”

  After some time, Rinne found a small chamber that had a very high olfactory registration on her belt dial. But it was just that: a small chamber.

  “I don’t understand,” she said. “Maybe they had the young here temporarily.”

  Lill was inspecting the walls of the small chamber. Suddenly one wall moved – a solid chunk of wall was hinged. “The readings through here are very high. Shall we?”

  This tunnel descended deeply, but was wider – and higher – than any previous ones. Because the Vespids were carrying their pupae and larvae?

  Rinne thought she heard the scuttling sounds again. But she ignored them, and the olfactory registration remained high. She almost bumped into Lill, who had stopped.

  “What – ?”

  “Shh! Look,” Lill said. “There’s light ahead. Artificial light. It could be the rioters. I’m going ahead. Stay here. Don’t move!”

  The MC soldier’s bulk filling the tunnel all but blocked out whatever light she claimed to have noticed, but Rinne remained still for what seemed an excessively long time. Finally she turned on the belt shield, even though, to anyone with a scanner, doing so would give away her position, and she moved forward. Just as Lill had said, it was getting less dark. Since the tunnel’s entrance had been so sharply delineated from daylight, this had to be artificial illumination. She kept moving forward.

  Right into Lill. “We found them!” the MC soldier was smiling. “You found them, with your analyses of odors. No wonder you’re such an Eve-adored official!”

  Rinne followed her past two more almost invisible hinged wall doors and into a series of lighted chambers in which several hundred women, most of them pregnant, lay upon mattresses or sat up chatting. The sound and smell of infants. About a dozen MC Security guards. Rinne removed her visor and was amazed by the sight.

  One lovely, quite pregnant young woman almost leaped up.

  “Councilor Rinne?” she asked. “It is you! I ... You probably don’t remember me. I’m Ewa Petra Benn. We met on Benefica. I was” – her eyes misted over – “You told me to wait. I suppose” – looking away now – “I ought to have listened to you.” Ewa looked up again, pleading.

  “My dear,” Rinne said, and embraced her. “You’ll be all right. All of you will.”

  “I want this child.” Ewa held her belly. “We all want our children. Will you help us keep them?”

  Surprising herself, Rinne said, “That’s why I’m here.”

  She remained with Ewa, who seemed to know who all the rest of the women were, and when they were due or when they had given birth. Ewa would be a great help, Rinne thought, as she sat and talked to them, and one woman lifted an infant to be held. Rinne held it. Of course it was fourlegged, but lovely. Its face was just like its mother’s, and Rinne told her so and did and said all the appropriate things.

  Commander Lill meanwhile was talking to each of the MC soldiers, guards, and sand-skimmer pilots; Rinne supposed she was collating their stories. Whatever the situation of this chamber, the look on Lill’s face said she didn’t like it. Finally she gestured to speak privately to Rinne.

  “Are these all the refugees?” Rinne asked.

  “There was another chamber full, much higher up in the nest, within the offices of the Bella=Arth. Museum. Contact with them was lost about an hour ago. Lieutenant Lemmpae believes they were too exposed and that they were taken by the rioters. Could have been the group we saw when we arrived outside. The Lieutenant thinks we’re safe here for a short while. Maybe a few hours.”

  Rinne waited for the MC Commander’s next words. Instead, the soldier looked at her as though expecting a command.

  “We’ve got to get these women out of here.” Rinne stated the obvious.

  “I thought you’d say that.”

  “What’s the problem?”

  “You mean aside from
the near-impossible logistics of getting this many women in their fragile shape up through the tunnels and out of here safely?” She let that sink in a minute. “I don’t even know if we’d be able to find our way back out the way we came in.”

  “You said ‘near’ impossible. Not impossible,” Rinne said. “It would be difficult, I agree, but ... there’s another problem, Commander Lill, isn’t there?”

  “The Lieutenant has been in contact with the orbiting fleet. Seems there’s a Very Important Flower Cultist in command up there. A Black Chrys. You may know her. Admiral Thol? No? Well, I know her. Seems she gave the order to these forces to hold the position. She won’t budge on that.”

  Rinne’s face flushed with anger. “Hold the position? That may be fine for the soldiers, but these women aren’t soldiers! Look at them!”

  “I see them.” Lill looked away.

  “I’ll get a count on those who are able to walk,” Rinne said. “We’ll simply have to try to carry the others.”

  “Wait! Just wait. I’m in charge here. For the moment, at least.”

  Rinne waited. She went back to looking at mothers and infants, occasionally casting what she hoped were accusing looks at the MC Commander. She also counted. Eight women were far too weak to walk at all: six were either newly birthed or about to at any time, two others had been wounded and were now sleeping fitfully. The others, well, who knew how they might manage a steep uphill walk through oddly shaped tunnels in almost-total darkness over built-in obstacles, without getting lost or hysterical, or how long that trek would take. Rinne had to admit the logistics involved were daunting, at least!

  A sudden burst of activity among the MC soldiers. Lill joined them. They were listening to the Lieutenant’s belt device. Rinne went closer to hear.

  “The rioters have broken down guard posts the Lieutenant left about two levels above this,” Lill reported dourly.

  “We’ve got to move!” Rinne gestured for the MC pilots and soldiers to gather around while she outlined the plan and its difficulties.

  None of them seemed enthusiastic about it. The Lieutenant summed up the attitude of the MC guards: “We’re under direct orders to remain here.”

  “We’ll stand and fight until every one of us dies!” another said.

  “You’re all out of your minds!” Rinne commented.

  One thing was clear: if they would do nothing, she would have to. She would climb out of the nest herself, T-pod up to the orbiting ship of this Black Chrys Admiral, and demand that the women below be rescued. At once. She would use every clearance, every connection she had ever made in the Matriarchy, every bit of influence she had managed to gather: she’d cajole, finagle, lie, if needed. Rinne located Ewa and told her to help keep up the women’s spirits: she would be back with help. Then Rinne left the chamber the way she’d come.

  “Wait!” she heard one of the guards call after her as the second rock door was shut. She ignored the shout, put on her infrared visor, and found her way into the small chamber that connected to the main tunnel. A left turn now.

  Just to be certain she was headed the correct way, she kept her wrist near the wall, checking to make sure the olfactory-registered readings were the same as they had been when she and Lill had come this way. Cleverly, or luckily, they had managed a fairly straight path. Hadn’t they? She could have sworn they had. Yes, she was almost sure of it. First had been the drop, the tunnels all going one way, then the tunnels all going the other way, before it leveled off, so that meant – Her wrist brushed something it shouldn’t have, something that didn’t feel like wall. Rinne stopped. In the infrared light, she could make out something ahead, something black, yet with a dull gleam matte or metal or ... No, something breathing, although not with the regularity of a Hume.

  Something reached out and touched her lightly. Rinne jumped back, startled. It touched her again, as though probing, and she fought down her deepest fears and turned to stumble backward, muttering, “Leave me alone! Leave me alone!” under her breath, until suddenly the palps were around her torso, lifting her up, and now she was saying it out loud, crying it aloud, terrified.

  “Gemma! Gemma Rinne?” she hallucinated his voice calling to her as she struggled.

  “Leave me alone!” she screamed.

  “Put her down, Ckw’esso. She’s a friend of mine. Can’t we have light? All right, into that chamber. Yes, with the door shut. Fine!”

  Now Rinne was being carried into a chamber, other legs, many legs entering behind her, and she was set down on her feet. Sudden artificial illumination made her hide her eyes. When she looked again, she was treated to a sight: North-Taylor Diad was in front of her. And on either side of him, two full-sized Bella=Arth.s, wearing their own version of Deneb’s blue-Plastro agro.-suits.

  “Taylor? Is that really you?”

  “Don’t be frightened. These are friends of mine. New friends, but good ones. Ckw’esso and Nh’iss. They brought me here. But, how did you get here? There’s a full MC Fleet ringing the planet.”

  “Commander Lill sneaked me down. Oh, Taylor, I was so frightened!” She held onto him, and the two Bella=Arth.s turned their heads away politely and bent their antennae so as to not appear to be listening. “And you, how did you get here?”

  “On a Hesperian Fast. Have you seen the Alpheron refugees?”

  “I just left the ones who are still free.”

  “Good, they’re nearby. Ckw’esso,” Taylor had to tap the Bella=Arth.’s carapace to get her attention. “You were right. They’re close.”

  “We smelled the pupae,” Ckw’esso said, speaking a highly sibilant and slightly sound-warped but otherwise comprehensible Universal Gal. Lex. “Also the invaders.” She gestured with her head and foremost palps.

  “They’re above us somewhere,” Rinne said. “They’re looking for the women.” She went on to explain the situation: her listeners found the part about the Fleet not helping the women very odd indeed.

  “Not protect their pupae!” Nh’iss all but screeched. “It’s terrible (not to be listened to ((and extremely un-Bella=Arth.!))).”

  “It’s also un-Hume,” Diad said. He’d still not let go of Rinne, and she was pleased and comforted by his nearness. “You said Lill is in there? Does she agree with the Black Chrys?”

  “She seemed conflicted.”

  “Good, then she’ll help us,” he predicted. “How many women all told are there in there?” And when Rinne told them, she in turn predicted that the MC soldiers with the women would not help, although Lill and the six pilots probably would.

  “Hume help will be useless,” Ckw’esso said. “Pardon the impoliteness!”

  The Bella=Arth. then outlined the escape scheme she and Diad had worked out. They had left a great number of their sister-Arth.s not far below this tunnel. Each of them could carry a Hume – Rinne and Diad included – down below to a larger and far-longer tunnel which only they knew of and which apparently connected this nest to the most distant nest on the plain. There, a large group of Bella=Arth.s who had returned to Deneb XII over the centuries since the great defeat had rebuilt some semblance of their original community. It was a long distance even for Bella=Arth.s to travel – and it was far too long for non-Arth.s. Once arrived at their home nest, Diad would comm. his Fast, which would send down gondola pods for the women.

  “To go where? Hesperia?” Rinne, ever-the-Matriarchal, asked.

  “If that’s necessary, yes,” Taylor answered.

  “Why should it be necessary? Wicca Herself put them here. They should be returned to Melisande.”

  “Fine! If She’ll take them back.”

  “Of course She will. She has to.”

  It was the closest to an argument they had had, and Taylor immediately said that it could wait until later. Getting themselves and the women out was crucial, especially if the Deneban rioters were as nearby as she said.

  Rinne led him and the Bella=Arth.s into the egg-chamber. Naturally, at first, everyone half panicked at seeing th
em. But Lill gave Taylor a smart slap on the back and a hearty MC warrior forearm clasp, and he explained what was happening.

  As Rinne had predicted, the MC forces would not leave. Being civilians, the skimmer pilots would leave. And although the Alpheron women were frightened about being handled by the Bella=Arth.s, they soon realized that this was their one way to safety.

  Lill took charge of the operation, and once the chain of Bella=Arth.s were lined up in the tunnel outside the chamber and the women ready – if still somewhat nervous, their infants well wrapped – and after they were once again told that the Bella=Arth.s were friends and would never harm a Hume group with children, Rinne leaned back and let herself be comfortably lifted and was passed along a conveyor belt of palps and legs until she found herself stopped, being held by Ckw’esso, who was to guide them out.

  Seconds later, Ewa arrived to be held behind Rinne, then a skimmer pilot, then Diad, and another woman. She held an infant, and the Bella=Arth. holding her asked to see the baby and made the appropriate gurgling noises back, and was even allowed to touch it, which it did very gingerly and with its lightest and most velvety palp.

  Finally everyone who was coming was ready, and the signal to go was passed forward by both Humes and Bella=Arth.s. Ckw’esso moved off slowly, then immediately turned left and began to descend. And began to talk.

  “No Hume has ever been this way. And few enough of Our People.”

  “You know, I thought I heard Bella=Arth.s in the corridors,” Rinne said, as much out of politeness as out of a need to ignore the truly frightening decline and speed with which Ckw’esso was moving.

  “Several of us patrol here,” Ckw’esso admitted. “Although not often.”

  “It’s a tragic place,” Rinne said. “I felt it from the minute I came inside.”

  “You’re an extraordinary (sensitive ((and Bella=Arth.-like))) Hume!”

  They continued down the sharp decline. Behind her, Rinne heard Diad’s voice, and Ewa’s, others’ too, as they spoke to one another, trying to keep up their spirits. Even with her infrared visor on, the darkness seemed complete.