Jim Baen’s Universe

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Jim Baen’s Universe Page 50

by Edited by Eric Flint


  “Umm.” I step­ped for­ward, re­luc­tant to po­int out the ob­vi­o­us. “Par­si­mony might sug­gest, in a calm city park, that yo­ur so­met­hing just might ha­ve be­en… well… per­haps a lo­cal ci­ti­zen?”

  Lieutenant Mo­rell gul­ped, lo­oking at that mo­ment just li­ke a yo­ung hu­man who had ma­de the sa­me ner­vo­us mis­ta­ke.

  “Of all the damn fo­olis­h­ness,” Guts grum­b­led, has­te­ning thro­ugh the un­der­g­rowth, dra­wing his me­di­cal kit whi­le I hur­ri­ed af­ter. Be­hind me, I he­ard the li­e­ute­nant sob an apo­logy.

  “There now,” Cap­ta­in Olm an­s­we­red. “I’m su­re he… she… or it is just stun­ned. You did use stun-set­ting, yes?”

  “Sir!”

  When I glan­ced back, he was le­ading her with one arm, his ot­her one sli­ding aro­und her sho­ul­der. I sho­uld ha­ve known.

  Guts sho­uted when he fo­und our prow­ler. A hu­ma­no­id, of co­ur­se, li­ke ni­nety per­cent of Class M sa­pi­ents. The po­or fel­low had ma­na­ged to crawl a few me­ters be­fo­re the stun na­nos got or­ga­ni­zed eno­ugh to bring him down. Now he lay spraw­led on his back, spre­ad-eag­led, with his arms and legs pin­ned by half a mil­li­on mic­ros­co­pic fi­bers to the le­af-st­rewn lo­am. He stra­ined fu­ti­lely till we emer­ged to sur­ro­und him. Then he sta­red with lar­ge, dark eyes, gur­g­ling slightly be­hind the na­no-wo­ven gag in his mo­uth.

  Nanomachines are of­ten too small to see, but tho­se that are fi­red at high spe­ed by a stun blas­ter can be lar­ger than an Ear­t­h­ling ant. At me­di­um ran­ge, only a do­zen might hit a fle­e­ing tar­get, and they ne­ed se­ve­ral se­conds to de­vo­ur raw mat­ter, dup­li­ca­ting in­to tho­usands, be­fo­re get­ting to work im­mo­bi­li­zing the­ir qu­ar­ry.

  There are qu­ic­ker ways of sub­du­ing so­me­one, but no­ne qu­ite as sa­fe or su­re.

  By now, a ve­ri­tab­le army of lit­tle na­nos swar­med over the cap­ti­ve, in­s­pec­ting the­ir han­di­work, ke­eping the tiny ro­pes ta­ut and jum­ping up and down in jubi­la­ti­on. So­me, for lack of an­y­t­hing el­se to do, ap­pe­ared to be hard at work se­wing rips in the na­ti­ve’s dark, sa­tin-li­ned clo­ak and black, peg­ged pants. Ot­hers re-co­ifed his mus­sed ha­ir.

  (Just be­ca­use so­me­one is a pri­so­ner, that do­esn’t me­an he can’t lo­ok sharp.)

  Guts pus­hed his bio-scan­ner to­ward the hu­ma­no­id, ha­ving to fight thro­ugh a tan­g­le of tiny ro­pes whi­le mut­tu­ring so­met­hing abo­ut how "… na­nos are the win­c­hers of our dis­con­tent," in a Sha­kes­pe­are­an ac­cent.

  Enough, I tho­ught, dra­wing my blas­ter, flic­king the set­ting, then sig­h­ting on the vic­tim’s fa­ce. He crin­ged as I fi­red-

  - a stre­am of tu­ned mic­ro­wa­ves that tur­ned all na­no fi­bers in­to har­m­less gas. The gag in his mo­uth va­nis­hed and he gas­ped, then be­gan jab­be­ring frig­h­t­ful­ly in a ton­gue fil­led with mo­ist si­bi­lants.

  I he­ard a hiss as Guts inj­ec­ted our cap­ti­ve with a hypo spray, using an oran­ge vi­al mar­ked ALI­EN RE­LA­XANT # 1. The na­ti­ve ten­sed for a mo­ment, then sag­ged with a sigh.

  It’s im­por­tant for an Ear­t­h­ling Ad­vi­sor to al­ways in­s­pect his ship’s supply of Ali­en Re­la­xant Num­ber One! Ma­ke su­re of its pu­rity. Very few sen­ti­ent li­fe forms ha­ve fa­tal al­ler­gic re­ac­ti­ons to 100 per­cent dis­til­led wa­ter. Ne­ver­t­he­less, most will res­pond qu­ickly to be­ing inj­ec­ted, as if a po­tent, lo­cal nar­co­tic we­re sud­denly flo­wing thro­ugh the­ir ve­ins. Bless the pla­ce­bo ef­fect. Its ne­ar uni­ver­sa­lity is among the few re­as­su­ring con­s­tants in an un­cer­ta­in cos­mos.

  Guts ga­ve me a sly wink. He knows what’s go­ing on, so I no lon­ger ha­ve to mix bat­c­hes of “ol’ Num­ber One” all by myself. But you can’t as­su­me a ship’s doc­tor will un­der­s­tand. Call it an “anci­ent hu­man re­ci­pe” un­til you’re su­re yo­ur me­di­co can be trus­ted with the truth.

  The na­ti­ve was now much cal­mer, prat­tling at a slo­wer pa­ce whi­le I set up the uni­ver­sal tran­s­la­tor on its tri­pod. Our cap­ta­in drop­ped to one knee, pre­pa­ring for that spe­ci­al mo­ment when true First Con­tact co­uld be­gin. Co­lo­red but­tons flic­ke­red as the mac­hi­ne scan­ned, se­eking me­aning in the slur of lo­cal spe­ech. Ab­ruptly, all lights tur­ned gre­en. The tran­s­la­tor swi­ve­led and fi­red three mo­re na­nos at the na­ti­ve, one for each ear and anot­her that stre­aked li­ke a smart mis­si­le down his thro­at.

  It isn’t pa­in­ful, but star­t­le­ment ma­de him stop and swal­low in sur­p­ri­se.

  “On be­half of the Fe­de­ra­ted Al­li­an­ce of-” Cap­ta­in Olm be­gan, ex­pan­si­vely spre­ading his arms. Then he frow­ned as the im­pu­dent cre­atu­re in­ter­rup­ted, this ti­me spe­aking aris­toc­ra­ti­cal­ly-ac­cen­ted Dem­mish.

  “- don’t know who you pe­op­le are, or whe­re you co­me from, but you must get out of the park, qu­ickly! Don’t you know it’s dan­ge­ro­us?”

  ****

  While I va­po­ri­zed the rest of the stun-ro­pes hol­ding him to the gro­und, Guts hel­ped the po­or fel­low back to his fe­et.

  I was abo­ut to re­su­me qu­es­ti­oning him when Nuts squ­e­ezed bet­we­en us, gi­ving me a sharp swi­pe of her el­bow. I rub­bed my ribs as she brus­hed le­aves and sticks off the na­ti­ve gen­t­le­man’s clot­hing, get­ting his me­asu­re with a few de­mu­re, ba­rely no­ti­ce­ab­le gro­pes.

  That was when the se­cu­rity li­e­ute­nant ca­me with bad news.

  “Captain, I’m sorry to re­port that Crew­man Wems has di­sap­pe­ared.”

  Olm ga­ve an exas­pe­ra­ted sigh. “Wems, eh? Mis­sing, you say? Well, hmm.”

  He glan­ced at the ot­her se­cu­rity men. “I gu­ess we co­uld send Jums and Smet to lo­ok for him.”

  The two gre­eni­es pa­led, crin­ging bac­k­ward two pa­ces. I cle­ared my thro­at. The cap­ta­in lo­oked my way.

  “No?”

  “Not if you ever want to see them aga­in, sir.”

  The cap­ta­in may be im­pul­si­ve, but he’s not stu­pid.

  “Hmm, ye­ah. Bet­ter sa­ve 'em for la­ter.”

  He shrug­ged. “Okay, we all go. Form up, ever­y­body!”

  Each of us was equ­ip­ped with a lo­ca­tor, to find the spi­got in ca­se we got se­pa­ra­ted. I tri­ed scan­ning for Wems, but co­uld pick up no sign of his sig­nal. Eit­her so­met­hing was jam­ming it or he was out of ran­ge. Or the tran­s­mit­ter had be­en va­po­ri­zed-and Wems along with it.

  We sco­ured the area for the bet­ter part of an ho­ur, whi­le our for­mer cap­ti­ve grew in­c­re­asingly ner­vo­us, suc­king on his lo­wer lip and pe­ering to­ward the bus­hes. Fi­nal­ly, we de­ci­ded to let him cho­ose our di­rec­ti­on of march, flan­ked on one si­de by the cap­ta­in and the ot­her by our chi­ef ar­ti­fi­cer, Com­man­der-En­gi­ne­er Nom­lin, who grip­ped his arm li­ke a to­ur­ni­qu­et, bat­ting her eyes so fast the wind might ha­ve mus­sed his ha­ir aga­in, if it we­ren’t al­re­ady gre­ased back from a pe­aked fo­re­he­ad.

  Aside from se­ve­ral te­eth even mo­re po­inty than a Dem­mie’s, our gu­ide had pa­le skin that he tri­ed to ke­ep sha­ded with his clo­ak. Ta­king re­adings, I fo­und that the sun did emit high ul­t­ra­vi­olet le­vels. Mo­re­over, the air was la­ced with in­dus­t­ri­al pol­lu­tants and signs of a deg­ra­ded ozo­ne la­yer-fa­irly typi­cal for a world pas­sing thro­ugh its Le­vel Eig­h­te­en cri­sis po­int. If pro­per re­la­ti­ons we­re es­tab­lis­hed, we might help the na­ti­ves with such prob­lems. Per­haps eno­ugh to ma­ke up for con­tac­ting them in the first pla­ce.

  The na­ti­ve in­for­med Nuts that his na­me was “Earl Dra­gon­lord”-at le­ast th
at is how the na­no in his thro­at for­ced his vo­cal ap­pa­ra­tus to pro­no­un­ce it, in ac­cen­ted Dem­mish. He se­emed una­wa­re of any chan­ge in spe­ech pat­terns, sin­ce ot­her na­nos in his ears ret­ran­s­la­ted the so­unds back in­to his na­ti­ve ton­gue. From his per­s­pec­ti­ve, we we­re all mi­ra­cu­lo­usly spe­aking the lo­cal lin­go.

  The mas­ter tran­s­la­tor unit fol­lo­wed our party, wat­c­hing out for mo­re ali­ens to con­vert in this way. A typi­cal­ly Dem­mie so­lu­ti­on to the in­con­ve­ni­en­ce of a pol­y­g­lot cos­mos.

  Our chi­ef ar­ti­fi­cer swo­oned all over Earl, as­king him what the na­me of that tree was, and how did he ever get such dark eyes, and how long wo­uld it ta­ke to ha­ve a lo­cal ta­ilor ma­ke anot­her ca­pe just li­ke his. For­tu­na­tely, Nuts had to pa­use oc­ca­si­onal­ly to bre­at­he. Du­ring one of the­se in­ter­mis­si­ons, Cap­ta­in Olm bro­ke in to ask abo­ut the “dan­ger” Earl spo­ke of ear­li­er.

  “It’s be­co­me a nig­h­t­ma­re in our city!” he re­la­ted in hus­hed to­nes, glis­te­ning eyes dar­ting ner­vo­usly. “The Li­cans are bre­aking the­ir age-old vows. They no lon­ger cull only the le­ast-de­ser­ving Stan­dards, but prey on an­yo­ne they wish! Why, they’ve even ta­ken to po­un­cing on no­morts li­ke you and me! Then the­re’s the on­go­ing stri­ke by the cor­pam­bu­lists…”

  It so­un­ded aw­ful­ly com­p­li­ca­ted al­re­ady, and we’d only go­ne fifty me­ters from the spi­got. I in­ter­rup­ted.

  “I’m sorry. Did you say-‘li­ke you and me?’ What do you me­an by that?”

  He glan­ced at me, no­ti­cing my hu­man fe­atu­res. “I was re­fer­ring to yo­ur com­pa­ni­ons and me, of co­ur­se. No of­fen­se me­ant. Al­t­ho­ugh you are cle­arly a Stan­dard, I can tell that yo­ur li­ne­age is strong, and yo­ur bi­le is un-ri­pe. Or el­se, why wo­uld you min­g­le with the­se no­morts in ap­pa­rent fri­en­d­s­hip? True, yo­ur kind is used to be­ing hun­ted. Ne­ver­t­he­less, you must re­ali­ze the ru­les are dras­ti­cal­ly chan­ged he­re. Tra­di­ti­onal res­t­ra­ints no lon­ger hold in our po­or city!”

  I sha­red a glan­ce with the cap­ta­in. Cle­arly, the na­ti­ve tho­ught we we­re vi­si­tors from anot­her town, and that the Dem­mi­es we­re fel­low “no­morts”… his own kind of pe­op­le. Per­haps be­ca­use of the si­mi­la­rity in den­ti­ti­on. In his hurry, he se­emed wil­ling to over­lo­ok our uni­forms and stran­ge to­ols.

  The af­ter­no­on wa­ned as our path clim­bed a tree-cres­ted hill. Sud­denly, spre­ad be­fo­re us, the­re lay the city pro­per… one of the mo­re in­t­ri­gu­ing ur­ban lan­d­s­ca­pes I ever saw.

  Some skyscra­pers to­we­red eighty or mo­re sto­ri­es, with can­ti­le­ve­red decks prot­ru­ding in­to a gat­he­ring mist. Many spi­res we­re lin­ked to­get­her by gra­ce­ful sky-brid­ges, ar­c­hing ac­ross open spa­ce at giddy he­ights. Yet no­ne of the­se to­wers com­pa­red with a dis­tant edi­fi­ce that sho­ne thro­ugh the sun­set ha­ze. A gle­aming pyra­mi­dal struc­tu­re who­se apex glit­te­red with jewe­led light.

  “Cal'mari!” Earl an­no­un­ced, ges­tu­ring with ob­vi­o­us pri­de to­ward his city.

  “What?” blur­ted Nuts, bri­efly ta­king her hand from his arm. “You me­an squ­id?”

  “Yes… Squ­id,” Earl sa­id with sub­li­me dig­nity, as the tran­s­la­tor to­ok its cue from Nuts, auto­ma­ti­cal­ly rep­la­cing one word with anot­her. Earl se­emed blit­hely una­wa­re that two en­ti­rely dif­fe­rent so­unds had emer­ged from his vo­ice­box.

  “Squid it is,” Olm nod­ded, re­gar­ding the skyscra­pers. And that was that. From now on, any Dem­mie, and any spe­ech-con­ver­ted lo­cal, wo­uld use that word to sig­nify this town.

  I sig­hed. Af­ter all, it was only a city. But se­ve­ral ci­vi­li­za­ti­ons ha­ve ma­de the mis­ta­ke of dec­la­ring war on Dem­mi­es, over the in­sult of chan­ging the­ir pla­net’s na­me wit­ho­ut as­king. Not that it ever did any go­od.

  “Squid” was im­p­res­si­ve for a pre-star­f­light city. At one ti­me, it must ha­ve be­en even mo­re grand. The met­ro­po­lis cle­arly used to sur­ro­und the park on all si­des, tho­ugh now many qu­ar­ters se­emed empty, de­vo­id of li­fe. On­ce-pro­ud spi­res we­re aban­do­ned to the ra­va­ges of ti­me, with blank win­dows li­ke blind eyes sta­ring in­to spa­ce. But stra­ight ahe­ad, the burg still thri­ved-a no­isy, vib­rant fo­rest of tall bu­il­dings dra­ped in co­un­t­less she­ets of co­lo­red glass, re­sem­b­ling twen­ti­eth-cen­tury New York, dres­sed-up with os­ten­ta­ti­o­us, spi­ral mi­na­rets.

  Skeins of filmy ma­te­ri­al, li­ke mos­qu­ito net­ting, span­ned the spa­ces bet­we­en most bu­il­dings. Many win­dows and bal­co­ni­es we­re al­so co­ve­red with a ga­uzy, spar­k­ling she­en-sc­re­en co­ve­rings that I la­ter le­ar­ned held bits of sharp me­tal or bro­ken glass. As the sun sank, Squ­id re­sem­b­led a ma­ze of glit­te­ring spi­der­webs, fes­to­oned with drops of dew.

  Broad ro­ad­ways we­re con­ges­ted with cyclo­pe­an mo­tor cars and lor­ri­es, all jos­t­ling for spa­ce and rev­ving the­ir en­gi­nes be­fo­re ra­cing at top spe­ed for an open par­king spa­ce. I saw that every fo­urth ave­nue was a ca­nal car­rying bo­ats of all des­c­rip­ti­on. My si­nu­ses stung at the smell of ozo­ne and un­burnt hydro­car­bons.

  “Well, will you lo­oka that!”

  Our doc­tor po­in­ted be­yond the dow­n­town area, to whe­re jag­ged ter­ra­in ro­se ste­eply to­ward a rocky hill, its sum­mit top­ped by stri­king sil­ho­u­et­tes, to­tal­ly un­li­ke the met­ro­po­li­tan cen­ter. Sco­res of mid­get cas­t­les sto­od on tho­se he­ights, with dark bat­tle­ments and to­wers jut­ting from every slo­pe. Earl Dra­gon­lord sig­hed with glad­ness to see them, and mo­ti­oned for us to fol­low.

  “Come along, Co­usins. Sun­s­hi­ne is bad eno­ugh, but we de­fi­ni­tely sho­uld not be out by mo­on­light! At ho­me I’ll fit you with mo­re ap­prop­ri­ate clot­hes. Then we can go to the Crown.”

  “Uh, is that whe­re we’ll spe­ak to yo­ur go­ver­n­ment le­aders?” Cap­ta­in Olm as­ked. “We do ha­ve work to do, y’know.”

  The last part was di­rec­ted at Nuts. Her re­su­med grip on our gu­ide’s el­bow might for­ce a les­ser fel­low to cry un­c­le. Earl was cle­arly a man of sta­mi­na and pa­ti­en­ce, all the mo­re al­lu­ring to a Dem­mie fe­ma­le.

  “Government?” he an­s­we­red. “Well, in a man­ner of spe­aking. I’ll in­t­ro­du­ce you to our lo­cal co­un­cil of no­mort el­ders. Un­less… do you ac­tu­al­ly wish to me­et the ma­yor of Squ­id? A stan­dard?” He glan­ced at me. “No of­fen­se.”

  “None ta­ken,” I as­su­red. “Actu­al­ly, I think our capt-our le­ader re­fers to go­ver­n­ment on a pla­ne­tary sca­le. Or, in li­eu of a world go­ver­n­ment, then so­me in­ter­na­ti­onal me­di­ati­on body.”

  Earl’s lo­ok of puz­zle­ment was fol­lo­wed by a daw­ning light of un­der­s­tan­ding. But be­fo­re he co­uld spe­ak, a low gro­aning so­und in­ter­rup­ted from the city, ri­sing ra­pidly to be­co­me an ulu­la­ting wa­il. Our gre­eni­es drew the­ir we­apons. Earl’s dusky eyes dar­ted ner­vo­usly.

  “The sun­set si­ren! A wel­co­me so­und to our kind, in most ci­ti­es. But alas, not in po­or Squ­id. We must go!”

  “Well then, le­ad on Mac­Duff,” Olm sa­id, ne­arly as eager to be mo­ving along. Earl lo­oked baf­fled for a mo­ment. Then, with a swirl of his ca­pe, he hur­ri­ed east (with our ship’s en­gi­ne­er clin­ging li­ke a happy lam­p­rey), pus­hing on to­ward the pi­le of gin­ger­b­re­ad pa­la­ces that now se­emed ag­low aga­inst a swol­len red­dish sun.

  “It’s lay on, Cap­ta­in,” I mut­te­red to Olm as we hur­ri­ed along. “If you fancy qu­oting Sha­kes­pe­are
, you might try to get it right.”

  Lieutenant Mo­rell chir­ped a gig­gle from her gu­ard po­si­ti­on, co­ve­ring our re­ar. Olm win­ced, then ru­eful­ly grin­ned.

  “As you say, Ad­vi­sor. As you say.”

  From the park, we drop­ped to­ward a dim pre­cinct of low dwel­lings that lur­ked bet­we­en us and yon­der hil­ltop cas­t­les. I glan­ced back at the dow­n­town area, no­ting with sur­p­ri­se that the stre­ets and ca­nals no lon­ger thron­ged with traf­fic. In a mat­ter of mo­ments they had be­co­me com­p­le­tely, eerily, de­ser­ted.

  ****

  Dusk de­epe­ned and the lar­gest of three mo­ons ro­se in the east, abo­ut two thirds the si­ze of Lu­na and al­most as bright. Its pha­se was al­most full.

  In or­der to re­ach the ele­gant to­wers whe­re Earl li­ved, we first had to cross a spraw­ling zo­ne of dark ro­ofs and small, over­g­rown lots, la­id along an en­d­less se­ri­es of curvy la­nes and cul-de-sacs.

  "Urbs,” Earl Dra­gon­lord com­men­ted with ap­pa­rent dis­tas­te.

  “Hold on a mi­nu­te,” of­fe­red Guts, rum­ma­ging thro­ugh his me­di­cal bag. “I think I’ve got so­me bi­car­bo­na­te for that.”

  “No, no.” The na­ti­ve gri­ma­ced. “Urbs. The­se are the sur­fa­ce dwel­lings whe­re Li­cans ma­ke the­ir ho­mes for the gre­ater part of each month, fe­ig­ning to li­ve as Stan­dards used to, long ago, be­fo­re the Gre­at Chan­ge, in tacky pri­va­te dwel­ling pla­ces, dep­res­singly ali­ke. All blis­sful­ly equ­ip­ped with li­no­le­um flo­ors and for­mi­ca co­un­ter­tops, with do­ili­es on the ar­m­rests and bow­ling trop­hi­es on the man­tel­pi­ece. And ne­ver for­get a lawn mo­wer in the ga­ra­ge, along with hed­ge trim­mer, we­ed-eater, auto­ma­tic mul­c­her, le­af blo­wer, snow blo­wer, and ra­zor ed­ged po­le-pru­ner…”

  Of co­ur­se the­se terms we­re pro­du­ced in Dem­mish by the tran­s­la­tor in his thro­at. They might only ap­pro­xi­ma­te the ac­tu­al me­anings in Earl’s mind.

 

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