Their odd little open-frame vehicle rolled slowly toward an area where a half dozen similar vehicles were lined up. Their vehicle drove up to the end of the queue, brought itself to a full stop, and shut itself down. The gate in the back of the vehicle opened and the ramp reextruded itself. It was quite clearly the end of the line.
They stepped off the transporter, hauled their luggage out, and looked around, feeling rather uncertain. They had been told they would be met at the Nexus, but were given virtually no other information. Other than staying where they were until someone collected them, there was little they could do except watch the passing scene.
The facility bore a strong family resemblance to most other public transportation transfer centers--wide-open floor plan and broad walkways, allowing broad and rapid flows of foot traffic, as might be found in any spaceport or urban rail center. There were access gates to and from the Elevator cars, and to the Main Landing Field beyond. There were checkpoints and waiting areas and vending areas. A steady stream of purposeful passersby moved about, heading to and fro. Hannah was mentally settling in for the waiting part of the eternal travel ritual of "hurry up and wait" when Jamie spoke up.
"Something's wrong," he announced in a quiet voice. He didn't look at her as he spoke, but instead continued watching the interior of the Nexus, his face expressionless.
Hannah was instantly alert. She had to stop her hand from twitching reflexively toward her hidden sidearm. "What? What do you mean? Something bad?"
"There's something wrong with them, with this place. This isn't the way it's supposed to be."
"How can you tell that? We've only been here thirty seconds!"
"Even so," said Jamie. "There's something wrong."
Hannah had enough respect for Jamie's powers of observation and his tactical instincts to take him seriously. Prompted by his reaction, she began to see it for herself. There were two nearby sections of newly repaired wall panel--but the repairs looked to have been done hurriedly and not particularly well. It looked as if there were residual scorch marks on the floor near one of them. A fire? An explosion?
There were more security guards around than she would have expected, more heavily armed and armored than they should have been. Nor did the guards look entirely comfortable with their bulky equipment. And there was more than one style of uniform in evidence--a major red flag for the clothes-conscious Metrannans. They wouldn't bring in guards with clashing outfits unless it was absolutely necessary.
And, if she was reading Metrannan expressions and body language properly, more than a few of the passersby were giving the two humans suspicious, even angry looks. Maybe humans were rare in these parts, but not aliens. Metrannans should take them in stride.
"I see the wall and floor damage that's been fixed badly and the heavily armed amateurs pretending to be security pros and the paranoid civilians," she said. "What else have you got?"
"If I'm reading the info on the status and schedule boards right, it looks like they've been scrambling to get caught up after some sort of major stoppage or problem. The passersby look twitchy, and they're staring a bit too hard at us. Shouldn't they be used to aliens at their main spaceport? And we're the only off-planet sentients I've seen so far. Shouldn't there be aliens at their main spaceport? Why aren't there? Why is everyone else staying away? The cars coming up from the surface are packed and the lines to go down are very short. Plus I just spotted twelve, count 'em twelve, Xenoatrics boarding a transporter to take them out to the landing field--and that's where you go if you're leaving the planet."
"And unless our briefing books are all way off, Xenoatrics do not like to travel," Hannah said. "You're right. Something's wrong." She thought for a moment. "This have anything to do with that War-Starter designation? Has the war started, or almost started?"
"No idea, but let's keep on our toes. This could be tricky."
"That's one way to put it. You just trying to be careful that no one accuses you of overstating the case?"
"I'm just plain trying to be careful," Jamie said, keeping his eyes on the crowd. "We don't know that whatever happened has anything to do with the mystery message or our mission--but that'd be the way I'd bet."
"What the hell could be in that message that could set all this off?"
"If we're lucky, we'll get the chance to ask someone who could actually answer that question. For now, let's stay sharp."
"And let's keep our reflexes under control," said Hannah. "No itchy trigger fingers."
"You know my deal. I let them shoot first--but then I shoot last."
Hannah didn't answer that. The words sounded like hollow tough-guy rhetoric, out of character for Jamie. The problem was that there was too much truth in the trite phrase, but not in the way some people might think. Jamie was superb and sudden death with any sort of weapon. The trouble was there was also an odd streak of pacifism in his nature at odds with his hunter's instinct. If the situation required it in the line of duty and/or in self-defense, he would shoot to kill--and then likely suffer sleepless nights or guilt-wracked nightmares for weeks afterward.
Hannah could easily imagine a circumstance where Jamie would allow an assailant the first shot, just to keep his conscience clear. For the moment, however, it didn't matter. Whatever they were walking into, it was big, something that affected the whole planet. They weren't going to get out of it with guns blazing. All they could do for the moment was stand and wait. It was enough to make even Hannah long for some action.
They were stuck there, waiting, for about twenty minutes. Both of them saw enough to confirm all their worries. There was an unmistakable air of fretfulness and fear in the Nexus Center, strong enough to be noticeable even across the species barrier.
Jamie noticed one other peculiarity. There seemed to be a clear hostility toward the Xenoatrics, the beings the Metrannans called the Unseen Race. From all that he had read and learned, the Metrannans' normal attitude toward the Xenoatrics was one of enormous respect, verging on the worshipful. It took no effort at all to catch the Metrannans scowling at Xenoatrics--or, for that matter, at the two well-dressed human loiterers. If the Xenoatrics weren't entirely welcome, then humans certainly weren't welcome at all.
The Xenoatrics--or more accurately, the artificial carapaces that supposedly contained the Xenoatrics--Jamie could not read at all. There no doubt were ways to interpret the mood of one of the Unseen by the twitching of the multiple arms and mandibles or the exact angle of tilt of the metallic head that was halfway between an ant and lobster, or the way the two long ostrichlike legs were held, but Jamie didn't know them.
But he did know that their escort hadn't shown up. "Look," he said, glancing toward Hannah, "we can't stand around here forever."
"No," said Hannah, who very clearly and deliberately did not return his gaze. "But we can stand here for a good long time. Hours at least."
"We're already starting to look suspicious. I'm pretty sure I spotted some citizen reporting us to a guard."
She nodded absently but continued to scan the crowd, her face expressionless. "Did the guard come over? Did he arrest us? Are we in fact doing anything suspicious or illegal?"
"No."
"And what would you do if the guard did come over?"
"Um, probably show him my credentials and tell him that we had been instructed to stay where we were and await our local contact."
"My guess is that would satisfy him, at least for a while. And it has the advantage of being completely accurate."
"Well, yes."
"Now look at the other side of it. Think a move or two ahead. When our local contact, this Learned Searcher Taranarak, does show up, given what you know of Metrannan culture and psychology, what sort of state is she likely to be in?"
Suddenly the light went on. "Ah," said Jamie. "Flustered. Apologetic. Worried about losing face."
"And with any luck, that will make her more eager to be helpful, to make amends. I'd be more than willing to trade tired feet and an hour o
r two of boredom in exchange for a well-informed local who feels under some sort of obligation to us."
"Oh. Okay. I guess that makes sense."
"Think of it as being on a stakeout, watching for a high-value suspect."
"I never much liked stakeout duty either."
"Patience is a job skill, Jamie. Patience is a job skill." She spotted something, turned her head to one side, and then spoke again. "And I think it's about to be rewarded. Five gets you eight that's our contact."
"No bet," said Jamie as he spotted the worried-looking female Metrannan who was plainly rushing toward them.
"Smart man," she said. "Now, we're going to be extra, extra, extra polite and incredibly gracious because we're just such nice people--and because with a little luck it'll pay off big-time later."
Taranarak spotted two humans, one male and one female--as best she was able to judge such matters--and huffed a sigh of relief as she trotted toward them as fast as she could in her long, flowing, muted brown robes of semi-hemi-formal greeting and welcome.
She opened her rearward eyes, just for a moment, and scanned the area behind her. No sign of being followed or observed, but it was a safe assumption--indeed, very close to a certainty--that she was being tracked in some manner.
She came within about a hundred short paces of the aliens and worked to compose herself. She slowed her pace to a dignified walk and forced a calm expression to her face. Things were happening too quickly. Her release from house arrest--her conditional release--and her reinstatement at the Geriatrics Institute had only just happened the day before. And now, here she was, greeting the human investigators, playing her part in the effort to pretend that everything was fine, all was in order.
She knew she was merely a game piece, being moved around as part of some strategy or other of Tigmin's. But she had no idea what the game was. Did they want the treatment recovered--or want it lost, destroyed, perhaps forever? Did they even know for sure themselves? Did they want the humans to help them find it--or would they instead do whatever it took to ensure it was never found again?
She herself did not know what choice to make. Was it better for Metrannan society as a whole to leave things as they were--or, more accurately, strive to put them back the way they had been before the riots had started? Or would it be wiser to accept inevitable change?
Too much, Taranarak told herself. Too much to worry about and not enough time to think it all through. You can decide later. With a start, she realized she was no better than the Bureaucrats. It was, no doubt, part of the fear of change bred into all of them. Put it off, push it away, choose later. Maybe the need to choose would go away. But some things could not be put off. There were the humans, not thirty short paces in front of her.
Learned Searcher Taranarak came to a smooth halt before the two humans and gestured, all four hands extended, palms up, before them. She spoke in Lesser Trade Speech. "You are Special Agents Hannah of geneline Wolfson and James of geneline Mendez. I am Taranarak of geneline Lucyrn. I offer you welcome to this world." Not the most poetic sort of greeting, but that was to be expected. Lesser Trade Speech was essentially the spoken form of Great Trade Writing, which had been invented for the primary purpose of setting down clear and unambiguous business contracts. It wasn't well suited to flowery phrasings.
The two humans imitated her gesture as best they could with only two hands each, then offered her a slight and careful bow.
"I am Wolfson," said the slightly smaller of the two, the one Taranarak judged to be female. Odd that they preferred their geneline name for formal individual identification. How many geneline names would be required to prevent that being confusing?
"I am Mendez," said the other.
Yes, that one must be the male. He was more similar to Wilcox than the other one, his voice was lower, and his upper body shape was less rounded. Taranarak lowered her hands, indicating that the formal greeting was completed. "Please," she said, "come this way." She gestured for them to follow her. As they started walking, she noted with surprise that they both had to carry some of their luggage and pull the rest on its own built-in wheels, rather than having the bags follow their owners under their own power. Should she have brought some sort of luggage carrier? Well, too late now, and that was far from the worst of her errors. "There is much for us to say," she said, "but the concourse is loud and far from secluded. Let us move toward a waiting area, which will be more quiet and private."
The two humans looked toward each other, and she had no need of her rush training in reading human expressions and gestures to know they were interested, perhaps even intrigued. "Agreed," said Wolfson.
A brief time later, they were in the number four Ranking Persons waiting area for the downward Elevator service. It seemed unlikely to her that even the Order Bureaucracy would have dared attach listening devices there--but it was, nonetheless, possible. She would have to take the risk--but carefully. She saw to it that her guests were comfortably seated in what she hoped was a fair simulation of human-style chairs, and began.
"Let me begin by apologizing for my tardiness," she said in Lesser Trade. "There have been a number of dislocations and schedule changes of late, and my Elevator car was significantly delayed. The problem was beyond my control."
"It is of no consequence," said the female agent, Wolfson, replying in the same language. "We had noticed various indications of recent difficulties here on the Free Orbit Level, and we fully accept that you were not at fault."
Taranarak cringed internally at the use of the word "fault." Wolfson was either quite skilled in her use of Lesser Trade Speech or being unwittingly brutal. Merely to use the word was to imply that there was in fact fault to be found, that it was not mere chance or ill fortune or uncontrollable events that had produced the problems, but incompetence or worse. Wolfson was agreeing that she, Taranarak, was not to blame--but was also telling her that Metrannans as a group, as a whole, were in some way inept.
Given the evidence they had apparently already seen, and given what they would inevitably witness on the surface, there was no point in pretending there wasn't something seriously wrong. "I apologize on behalf of those responsible for my tardiness, and for those who have caused the difficulties that you have noted. I assure you that every effort is being made to resolve the problems."
"To make assurances that an effort will be made is not an assurance that the problems will be solved," said Agent Wolfson. The words were harsh, but there was a note of sympathy in her voice. "That you cannot make such assurances suggests that much indeed is amiss. I sympathize with your circumstances, being forced to accept responsibilities for items you do not control, while those who caused the flaws do not lose face."
"I thank you for that," said Taranarak.
"A question," Mendez said. "Our initial communication requested that we speak with one named Hallaben. We have received no communication in return from him, and we meet with you instead of him. Have we committed some slight, or error, that he refuses to speak with us?"
Taranarak lowered her head for a moment. "Hallaben is dead," she said. "I was his assistant, and his friend, and am now his successor."
"We regret his death," said Mendez. "Agent Wolfson and I know full well the sorrow of losing a close colleague."
"I thank you for those words as well," Taranarak replied. "They are soothing to me." She checked a schedule board and saw she had even less time than she had hoped. "But there is much to say, and it may be this is the last chance for the three of us to speak freely. Much is observed, and listened to, these days."
The humans once again traded glances with each other. "'These days'?" echoed Mendez. "We were under the impression that even the other Elder Races saw your world as an admirably stable society that suffered few alterations."
"I fear that our reputation does not reflect current circumstances," she said. "'These days' are truly different--unpleasantly so--from days as they were."
"But why?" asked Agent Wolfson.
And so we come to the center, the focus. Taranarak needed desperately to know what the humans did and did not know. Were they--and therefore, presumably, their colleagues and superiors--aware of what the encrypted message contained? This was the moment where she might learn. She watched eagerly for the reaction to her reply. "I will tell you things you will quickly learn in any event from studying our news reports, or by speaking with any person you might meet. The story is known to all. A rumor became current. It was claimed that a major discovery, one that would vastly extend Metrannan life spans, had been made--then suppressed. It was suggested that certain organs of power, perhaps including the Order Bureaucracy, were withholding this treatment."
The human agents did not exchange glances with each other, or indeed reveal any particular reaction at all that she could observe. Instead they retained their expressions of puzzled interest. She knew precisely how much of an amateur she was, how many subtleties she might be missing. A twitch, a tremor, a shift in breathing patterns, might reveal all--but if so, she had missed the clue.
But even so, she would be willing to stake all--indeed she was going to stake all--that they did not know what was in the message Wilcox had carried. Except, of course, assuming they were even moderately intelligent creatures, and they took more than a few moments to think about it, she had just as good as told them what was in the message.
She was about to speak further, to warn them about what they were about to face, when a chime sounded and the status board in the waiting area flashed an alert.
"Ah," she said. "Your transportation--and accommodation--have arrived. I wish you a pleasant voyage to the surface. I will rejoin you there. I shall walk with you to the departure section."
Death Sentence Page 17
