“That’s if they want to keep us alive,” Maxwell said. “We’re not sure of that. I think it’s probably a simple thing, a simple explanation we’ve overlooked, something either really alien or really absurd.”
“What?”
“Well, I’m not a Haber, either. I don’t know how they think. But from what I’ve seen, I don’t think they can just kill us. It’s beyond them. They couldn’t just march into the compound and shoot us, no matter how much they might want to. So they give us some food to soothe their consciences—enough to keep us alive for a week or two. And then they let us kill each other, or they let entropy take its course.”
Straka nodded, still staring off at the horizon. “Unless they … no, forget it.”
“What?”
“Well, I was just thinking. If they even want us dead, then why did they fix McGowen?”
“Good point,” Maxwell said, a little hope creeping into his voice.
“Maybe something’s happened to them—maybe they just can’t get back here. Maybe they want to, but they’re busy with something else.”
“Like?”
“Like a fight, a war. Yeah, that could be it. You remember what Markatens said when we were on the Paladin, don’t you? He ordered us to surrender and called us his prisoners. Not exactly peacetime terminology.”
“Okay, then, who are they at war with? Us?”
Straka shrugged. “If it’s us, this is one hell of a way to fight.”
“Then maybe it’s not with us.”
Straka laughed through her nose, a short exhalation. “Who else is there?”
She stood outside, waiting.
There’s only one thing that doesn’t change with time or space, Straka thought, and that’s being a prisoner. You quickly learn the basics of survival—hoarding food scraps, stealing from weaker prisoners, sneaking an extra swallow of water. If there had been guards, there would have been informants. You watch the others watch you, and then you watch the sky grow dark as another day passes. You wait for the sun to come up and pray your hope rises with the sun. In the still night, when there’s nothing but the sounds living creatures make, or the sound the wind makes whipping through the vegetation, you lie there with half-closed eyes, blurred vision, feigning sleep. You wait for everyone else to sleep so that you can creep toward the food stores. Or you stay up and watch and wait and pray no one tries it before you.
None of this would be happening if the Habers had only given them an idea that they would return. The crew could probably survive a few more days without looking at the plump little Kominski with atavistic longing, saliva freely flowing. That was weeks away yet. By then the Haber ship would have to have returned with more food and water. Water was the real concern.
If we’re prisoners like Markatens said, then why the hell don’t they treat us like prisoners? Straka wondered. What kind of battle is this? An entire planet against nine human beings? We attacked first, but that was on Gandji, and things were different there. And that had been Van Pelt’s doing. It was his fight—not ours. Why should we have to pay for his insanity?
She was struck with a numbing thought: The Habers might truly never return; the food and water they’d dropped off was all they’d receive. She may have had those thoughts before, and she may have always feared it was true, but she’d never really believed it, understood it deep down inside until now.
She shivered. Starved to death. And some of us will live longer than others, she thought. That much is for sure. Kominski will be the first to go—the plumpest, the least capable of defending himself, the least capable of functioning. Her stomach churned, and she worked hard to stifle the urge to vomit. Just thinking of butchering Kominski was enough to push her over the edge. Yank an arm out of a socket, like a leg on a roasted chicken. Nothing to it.
But she was panicking, letting her imagination get carried away. It hadn’t gotten that bad yet. This was only their first day without food, and there was enough water for tomorrow. They had some time before they degenerated to cannibalism.
She rubbed her gritty eyes and went back into the building.
Had Aurianta’s sky been normal, or even close to Terran, sunrise would have been a welcome sight. But the blob of shimmering color that crept slowly off the horizon and into the strange sky only reminded them of where they were.
There were beautiful things to look at, strange vegetation and life-forms to wonder about, to marvel at. There were small animals outside the compound’s protected perimeter, grazing animals, food on the hoof waiting to be rounded up and herded into the compound to serve a more noble purpose than simply eating, sleeping, and procreating.
The crew sat on the grass outside the building, too weary with depression to do much more than gaze longingly at the grazing animals. McGowen was chewing on something, and everyone noticed this at about the same time.
Jackson was on him in a second, and Straka braced herself for the worst. McGowen put up no resistance, though, as Jackson worked his way to sitting on McGowen’s chest. McGowen opened his mouth and gladly let Jackson remove whatever morsel of food he’d been chewing.
It was grass, in all shades of green.
Bitterly disappointed, feeling cheated, Jackson dug his knee into McGowen’s midsection as he rose. McGowen said nothing, and did nothing to protect himself.
McGowen sat upright and yanked another handful of grass out of the ground and started chewing off the tips. Jackson reached down, picked up a few blades, and stuffed them into his own mouth. He spat it out immediately.
“Christ! How can you eat this?” he screamed.
McGowen smiled. “It’s good.”
“It’s what?” Straka asked, incredulous.
“It’s good.”
“How long have you been eating that stuff?” she asked.
“A few days.”
“What?” Maxwell shouted.
“A few days,” Straka muttered. She reached down into the grass growing before her and plucked a few blades. She put them into her mouth and tried to chew. As soon as her teeth broke the outer membrane of the blades, she gagged. She spat the blades out as she collapsed to her side, feeling the dry heaves coming on in a powerful wave.
Maxwell had tried the same thing but had swallowed a mouthful and was retching with such force, his body was out of control. He convulsed with huge spasms.
The others had been smart enough to wait.
McGowen continued to chew and swallow complacently. Straka slowly stopped heaving and managed to sit up. She felt weaker than ever. Maxwell was still convulsing.
“You okay?” Wilhelm asked by her side.
Straka nodded. “Barely. The grass is toxic.”
“That’s putting it mildly,” Wilhelm said. He left her to check on Maxwell. He bent over and looked at him, determined there was nothing that could be done, then sat down to wait for the convulsions to subside.
Straka glanced hungrily at the animals. They could be as toxic as the grass, she thought. And then she caught sight of Kominski, waddling up to the barrier.
“Come back here, ’Minski!” Straka shouted with as much strength as she could muster.
Kominski showed no signs of having heard. He stood fifty meters away from the grazing animals. They looked a little like Terran pigs in general shape. Their hides were creamy yellow, their hindquarters covered with a brown, downy fur.
Kominski walked straight into the barrier, attempting to close the distance, then jumped back in surprise. The barrier had given him a small shock—nothing debilitating—just a warning of what would come if he pressed too hard against it. He tried again and recoiled from the shock.
“’Minski!” Straka shouted.
Kominski pressed forward again, this time letting out a little yelp of pain. The crew watched, amused.
“Leave the poor slob alone,” Jackson said. “Let him fry himself. That way we won’t have to cook him when the time comes.” He laughed a sick laugh, slightly over the edge.
Straka
shook her head, swallowing the bile taste that lingered in her mouth. Kominski was beating against the barrier with his fists, emitting a short cry of pain with each blow. His hands seemed to penetrate the barrier’s inner surface, but didn’t go all the way through. Perhaps with a concerted effort—
“Wilhelm? Go on out there and give Kominski some help,” Straka said. “It looks like it’s giving a little. Maybe with the two of you it might collapse.”
Wilhelm was on his feet and moving toward Kominski before she had finished talking.
“You really don’t think that’ll work, do you?” Jackson asked. “We tried that four nights ago, while you were sleeping.”
Straka glared at Jackson. “Thanks for telling me, Jack. You’re a real sweetheart.”
“Don’t mention it.”
Kominski and Wilhelm were working together, trying to break down the barrier. They were getting nowhere with it. “Come on back, Wilhelm. And bring Kominski with you,” Straka shouted.
“Spoilsport,” Jackson said. “It was just getting to be fun.”
Straka didn’t let the man get to her. She’d had enough run-ins with him to know when she was being baited. If she lost her temper and Jackson felt justified, there would be a fight, and Straka knew who would be the loser. And dinner for the crew.
Maxwell had stopped convulsing and was breathing shallowly, panting, staring into the sky with glassy eyes. De Sola approached and sat beside Straka.
“You think they’ll be back today?” De Sola asked.
“The Habers?” she asked, stalling.
De Sola nodded.
“Of course she does,” Jackson said. “Don’t you, Cathy?”
Straka shrugged.
“Why don’t they come back?” De Sola asked.
“Tell him, Cathy. Go on,” Jackson said.
“I don’t know, De Sola. I really don’t. I’d like to think they’re coming back today. If they don’t—”
“If they don’t, Cathy, guess who’s going to be the first to go?” Jackson asked.
“Shut up, Jackson!” De Sola shouted.
McGowen lay on his back, chewing on the native grass.
Wilhelm and Kominski returned from the edge of the compound.
“You think they will come, though, don’t you?” De Sola asked.
Straka nodded. “Let’s finish off this water now.”
“But what will we do if they don’t?” De Sola asked.
Straka sighed. What could they do? It was up to her to come up with some kind of answer that could appease them enough so that they’d restrain themselves from killing and eating each other.
They were taking her advice, looking to her for leadership. Van Pelt had been the real captain, the person no one but Markos had questioned, the one who had been trained to be a leader.
Straka’s desire for command may have been self-serving, but she had given the crew a goal, something to live for, a direction in which to move. It had been different then; her taking command had been symbiotic. She helped the crew by taking on responsibility, and they unknowingly helped her by going to Alpha Indi so that she could find Markos and the answer to death.
She had found the wrong answer, though—death by starvation.
And now, when command meant nothing more than responsibility, De Sola continued to force it on her, like the others. Command through default, command through convenience. Command without a ship.
“Cathy?” De Sola asked.
“Huh?”
“What are we going to do if they don’t come back?”
“Give me that!” Katawba shouted, leaping on Martinez.
Martinez struggled, trying to fight off the heavier and larger Katawba. Straka saw it for what it was—a fight for survival. Martinez had probably hoarded a small strip of the dried meat and had been caught trying to slip a tiny piece of it into his mouth unnoticed.
Straka, De Sola, and Wilhelm moved as quickly as they could to break up the fight, but it was over by the time they got there. The men were tired and weak, in no condition to wrestle with each other.
Martinez finished chewing, flat on his back, Katawba’s tears of frustration and anger slowly making their way down his cheeks.
“I’m sorry,” Katawba sobbed. “I didn’t mean it.”
Straka bent over and put a comforting hand on his shoulder. “We know you didn’t. Don’t worry about it.”
“Cathy?” De Sola asked again.
“Oh, yeah. What to do, what to do. Let’s see, De Sola. About all I can say is that we’ve got to keep our heads. We need to keep from killing each other.” Jackson leered at that. “There’s a real chance they’ll come back today with food and water. And if not today, tomorrow.”
De Sola nodded, then dropped to the ground, shaking his head.
The answer seemed good enough for him, Straka thought. For now, anyway.
13
“I know what I’m doing, Old One,” Markos said. The Old One looked at him, eyes yellow tinged with blue. “I don’t want you to worry about this anymore.”
The common room in Markos’s house was their command center. One whole wall was lined with crystals; each contained a life-and-death experience of some encounter with the Hydrans. Markos had studied them all and had learned a lot about his enemies.
The Old One rose slowly from his chair and walked to the window. He looked out onto the street, watching young Habers play in their strange, nonaggressive way, listening to the wind whip through the alleys. “I, I have faith in your judgment, Markos.”
“But?”
“Yes, there is a but. These actions are hard to condone,” the Haber said.
Markos flashed red. “I understand. I appreciate your point of view. If we were dealing with any other life-form, I might agree. But they’re Terrans, and I know how they think. They’re not like Habers at all.
“If these creatures could flash green, they would. You would approach them in friendship, and they would do the same. You would turn around and flash something to another Haber with you. And then they might kill you, while your back was turned. It has happened before. I’ve learned through experience the best way to deal with them, and trust has its place. But trust is not enough.”
“Very well. I, I only wanted to voice my, my feelings. You do what you must do, as always. I, I understand this. But you must tell me, me how long this will continue.”
Markos looked at the Old One’s back. He shook his head slowly, empathizing with his friend’s cultural and biological bias, with the Old One’s attempts to pick up the way Markos thought, with his frustration and anguish over the senseless deaths that had occurred, that would occur. If only there were some way to make him understand.
“I’ll let this situation continue until it’s too late. Until they all die. Or kill each other. Until trust is no longer a consideration. Until it’s just the right time.” As he spoke these words, he thought of the imprisoned Terrans in the abstract. They weren’t the people he’d trained with, traveled to Tau Ceti with, shared the geltanks with. They were simply Terrans, components in some total system, gears within a war machine.
If he had thought of the filth, the hunger, the fear these creatures felt while struggling to survive, he might have said something different, something sympathetic. He might have done something he knew he shouldn’t do.
“I know what they’re like,” Markos said. “I’ve seen what they’re capable of. You have, too, or don’t you remember what they did on Gandji? It wasn’t that long ago for you to forget.”
“I, I remember.”
“This is the same group of creatures.”
The Haber turned to Markos, flashing a weak red. “Yes, but creatures change, as do all things.”
Markos shook his head. “Even if there were a chance we wouldn’t need them, I couldn’t let them go.”
Alpha walked into the room and stood a meter away from Markos. He said nothing, did nothing to disturb him, waiting to be recognized.
“We can’t
afford to take chances,” Markos said. “If there’s a chance, no matter how slight, of winning this war without their help, we’ll do without it, and then feed them to Aurianta.”
If the Old One could have shrugged, Markos figured he would have then.
“What is it, Alpha?” Markos asked.
“The crystal is complete.”
“Did he … survive?”
Alpha handed Markos a small, smooth crystal structure. “No.”
Markos said nothing. Triand, the first of his children to meet the enemy, was dead. He didn’t want to know what was stored inside. He didn’t want to see Triand die. He tasted metal, felt his breathing shift, saw particles of dust swirl through the room with incredible detail and resolution, heard his bodily fluids oozing through his veins.
The Old One approached and laid a hand on Markos’s shoulder. Markos looked up into his eyes. The Old One started to speak to him in patterns, in graceful displays of scintillating colors and shapes that sparkled in his mind. He became aware of the fear he’d been suppressing, the grief he was afraid to deal with. It may have been war, but Triand had been his child.
The pain surged and peaked, then was suddenly gone as the Old One did something with his eyes. He felt washed out and tired. The old Haber took his hand away.
“Thank you,” Markos said in a raspy whisper.
“We, we will leave you alone with your thoughts and the crystal. Call if you need us, us.”
“Thank you,” Markos said.
Some of his strength was returning. He turned the crystal over and over in his hands. It was cold and hard, and all that remained of Triand. He watched the old Haber and Alpha leave the common room and disappear around the corner of a tubular hallway.
He glanced at the wall of crystals opposite him. All of those encounters, and I still had to send Triand to Theta Alnon. Alone, as a test—a test that didn’t work.
He was starting to shake, and he realized he was gripping the crystal with all his strength. He relaxed his hold on it and dropped it into his lap, shaking his head.
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