by Moulton, CD
"Can you have Klaht taken directly to pad eleven C?"
The captain picked up the com and gave orders. Z said the ship was under the control of T6 when he wasn't aboard. The arresting officers were to simply place him in the room it told them to. Their responsibility ended there. He then said it was a good thing only those three knew anything about the operation. It was easier to contain loose talk when there were so few. It was most important no one knew there were empire agents about or that there was an investigation. If word of either thing got out the emperor would be furious, and no one in their right mind wanted Maita to be furious.
They got the point. There wouldn't be any leaks from that area.
Z headed back to T6, where he told the officers still waiting outside of the ship he was delegated to deliver Klaht to Tltle, as he was going there, anyhow, and was already employed in a police capacity by the court. The captain looked at him through a VWPA officers scanner and okayed it. He went aboard and they headed for Tltle.
"What about Eed?" Z asked when they were in TTH. "How did he give us the slip so easily?"
"I have the listings of the ships at the port," T6 replied. "It took a good while, but I figured it out. It doesn't matter much, because we know he's headed for Bypass.
"Hoe translates to zero in Jornian. Goht is eight. Nea is F. It wasn't even a disguise. Eed simply told Klaht to use the name he used when he landed. He was going to use the ship on pad oh eight F.
"Maybe he didn't arrive in that one. Maybe the subterfuge would be that if they trace him here they'll assume he's still here because the ship he came in is still here. At best, they'll have to try to trace which ship he left in."
"He seems to be smartest when he's not trying. Let's get Klaht in here. We'll stay as we are, because we'll definitely go to Bypass after Eed. Klaht seems to know a lot about him, so maybe he can tell us about someone higher up. It won't hurt to try."
A panel slid open into a small but comfortable bunk room to reveal Klaht sitting on the bunk, glaring.
"Come on into the dome and let's chat," Z said. "Maybe you can save yourself a lot of trouble by answering a few questions now."
Klaht came to sit across the console. "What's this all about? You can't take me off! You're not even a legitimate cop! This is illegal detainment and imprisonment!"
"I just did, and I'm an empire agent. We're breaking up the Jornian deal on the vacation worlds. You have information that can save us a lot of time. We won't have to wait for the probe before going after Eed and his bosses on Bypass.
"Do you know who his bosses are?"
"I don't even know what you're talking about! You can't put me on any probe! I haven't done anything!"
"I can have T Six run the holos of you putting that bomb on Narmel's ship. Murder is capital. You go on the probe."
"You ain't got no body or nothin' and I can't be put on the probe for circumstantial evidence because I can't get a capital sentence on no circumstantial!" Klaht snarled triumphantly. "I ain't stupid! I know my rights!"
"Yes, you are stupid!" T6 snapped. "You're being charged with conspiracy to commit murder. That's capital. You go on the probe. Period."
"There ain't no such thing!" Klaht cried. "They done told me how tricky you cops was! You can't fool me! I ain't stupid!"
He wouldn't budge from that position. They had to take him to the judge and wait for the results of the probe. He didn't know much beyond what they already knew, but his results made it legally plain he did murder Narmel. It was done under direct orders of Eed.
Next stop, Bypass.
Following the Trail
*I'm preparing a great surprise for you. Thing is helping me with it while it can't be with you. I've only told you about it enough to keep you curious, but don't ask more. I was able to trace Eed's ship to Bypass. It's on pad six on Northport – not at Port City. You will have pad eight, right beside it. I handle all those port machines there. It's already arranged and natural-appearing. Very few organic beings are there at this season. I suppose that's why Eed uses it. You will have to be very careful. While it's true there are fewer and fewer people who know the higher bosses in these things, those bosses are better and better protected. Records show Eed has a large mountain estate that's somewhat isolated by the fact that access is limited to one small poorly-kept road. The air approach is too small for any but vertical take-off and landing craft. It will also be very well-fortified, I am sure. T Six, prepare the large floater on your way and Z can use it instead of renting something with a tracer beam built in. It should be fully shielded and what have you and should have a variety of weapons. There will be shields for most of them. It can be disguised as one of those ground skimmers they rent to tourists.*
"I'll go to the shop and design a few weapons they WON'T have defenses in place for," Z suggested. "I'm a little tired of all these technological things. We've used primitive weapons against these things before – and with success. We hit 'em with the last thing they'd expect. They’re never ready."
"We'll make whatever you need," T6 said. "We're on our way, Maita. I'll keep the channel open."
They made the trip, but orbited for several hours until the weapons and floater were prepared before landing on the pad Maita designated. T6 put microbeams on each ship at the port – there were only four others – so that, should Eed run again, the trace would already be aboard and would send location every time the ship came out of Idmode over the fastcom relay system. Maita could also follow them through the fastcom unit, itself, but Maita was in the Netdel system at that time. T6 would soon enough have the tracer system added to its equipment, but for now they would have to improvise.
The ship Eed had taken was a fast little number of a very expensive executive class ship. There was another of much the same type across the field T6 said it noticed before Z mentioned it. It was the perfect type of ship to make a quick getaway in.
"I'd say there's a good chance Eed has company," Z said. "I wonder, is it someone at his level or one of his bosses?"
"I'll check the registration and route...." T6 agreed. "Hmm. From Sentah. It could be ... it's registered to New Innovations In Mechanicals here on Bypass, but the records show it's on loan to – gasp! Choke! Gag! Shock! Surprise! – Hotel and Restaurant Robotic Engineering! I would never have thought of that! Wow! Do you think those people from Innovations might possibly know someone from Robotics?
"Crazy, man!"
"I think you've lost it," Z shot back. "I didn't know those old expressions were still in the records.
"Any indication of who's flying the thing?"
"It's supposed to be a Jornian citizen by the name of Clewt. Clewt is one of the six board of directors of all those lovely companies. He's probably Eed's boss," T Six replied. "Do Earth syndicates have boards of directors?"
"Not at this stage," Z answered. "There's just one person or family – and that family has a head – who's in charge.
"Are those on the board of directors blood relatives?"
"What the hell does that mean?" T6 demanded. "I don't have ALL of your stupid idioms programmed in. There's no record available to me that would tell if they've shared damned transfusions!"
"Gee! I thought you knew everything! You can come up with 'Crazy, man!' but don't know what blood relatives are?
"Are they all related in a single family situation? Are they genetically of the same recent lineage, not more than, say, three ancestors removed?"
"They don't seem to be second cousins or closer kin, no. I'm not going to get you into an argument, am I?"
"A battle of wits?" Z said innocently. "Not right now. I don't believe in attacking the mentally impaired. It would be too much like kicking someone solely because they were defenseless. It's against my creed to attack an unarmed foe."
"Good shot! I knew you'd come up with a good answer – given sufficient time."
"Time wounds all heels. Shall we get this show on the road?"
"Now you really did lose me! I get the
'show on the road' bit, but you can explain the other part."
"We're speaking English. Crossreference homophones and reverse the expression."
"Oh! Neat! I needn't mention it's obviously not one you came up with yourself in only three hundred years. It was completely out of context."
"But within wider definitions of the homophones if you're the subject. Look at the slang meanings of the homonyms."
"Hmmm? You cad! Get your wagon loaded and away!"
Z knew T6 was experimenting with the word games they played. He wondered about bringing homophones and homonyms into it with a machine who had all words in all languages at its disposal. If it went into translingual homophones it could leave all of them unable to reply, though that would be stretching the understood limits of the game.
Except for Maita.
And Tab and TR.
And maybe even Thing.
"Sheesh! Hell's fire! That only leaves me to be lost!" he mumbled as he climbed onto the floater.
He was relaxed now, which was the main use of the games. It would be to his benefit to have his mind freed of too many petty distractions that built up. Those little nags and worries were put aside. They wouldn't break his concentration at a critical time.
T6 was going to work out very well with the crew, but Z hadn't ever doubted it. He had known and liked Rimalt with his strange, subtle, dry humor and knew of the story of how Rimalt discovered T Six was independently intelligent (Short story: Describe Intelligent).
There was a map on the floater's holoscreen that showed Eed's estate as a flashing point. The floater was two meters across. It differed from the standard one in that it was half a meter thick instead of only a few centimeters. It had very large energy capacities and very powerful gravitics drive units. It also had several built-in grids that folded out to guide the shields and laser, stunner and other weapons and tools. It carried six small sensor floaters, along with a voice-programmed unit to control them as well as full ranges of sensors aboard. It also had the atmosphere shield that could make it into a spaceship, but the drive was relatively slow. The atmosphere would give out in four hours. It was useful as an escape pod in the near vicinity of a usable planet or to go from ship to ship in space.
T6 carried two of them, as did TR. Maita carried several. It could make them in its shop section as needed in emergencies.
This one looked from a distance like a groundskimmer craft of the type rented to tourists who wanted to explore the vacation worlds on their own.
The estate was sixty one kilometers from the port across some rough mountainous areas. It was a large stone castle built as a high wall around a central area that was about half an acre in area. There were three personal carriers parked in the central courtyard, all aerial.
There was a road winding along the valley and through a pass toward Northport. There were large doors at the castle end of the road, indicating there were probably land cars inside the castle in some sort of garage. This wasn't an area where mountbeasts could be pastured. Conveyance would all be mechanical. That would be a good point, should they have to follow any who left the place.
Z stayed a little outside of the pass to one side of the road. It wasn't likely there were sensors there except for the standard radar type the floater detected and neutralized. He rose to sit just behind the radar antenna to look over the situation. He could approach the place from any number of angles, but that would probably get him nowhere. He couldn't use the radio here. It could be detected easily, so he placed a light beam transceiver on the peak above the port, placed one on the peak across and would leave another one at the base of the radar installation.
"Look," T6 suggested. "Nobody here ever saw you or had any reason to notice you on Netdel. You could ride the floater along the road into the place. You're a tourist out exploring. I'll put a sort of beam tracer unit on the floater like the ones on the commercial models here you can turn off when necessary."
"They'll probably have posted signs. I won't have any reason to pass them."
"An isolated place like that? On this kind of world? Signs would attract attention – the last thing they want. On those rare times anyone comes they'll have some way prepared to make the situation there seem normal, I'd think. The fastest way to get rid of unwanted guests is to welcome them, then be too busy to spend time with them. If you try to keep them out they get suspicious."
Z had to agree to that. There was nothing to lose, so they would try it. If the people in the castle wanted to appear to be regular vacation world natives they would have to be very open and friendly to drop-in guests.
"All I want to do is learn what the situation is and where things are in there. I'll leave the sensors in place for the light beam relays and will send through the keyboard if I'm not in a position to use vocals. I'll improvise a reason to be there. Something that'll make them want to help out. I can appear to be in trouble of some sort ... I know! I'm supposed to be back already, but the radio won't reach Northport and I've broken the satellite bounce antenna. Can I call to say it'll be an hour or so more, so don't send a search party yet?
"I can call you on the standard comline. What code can you arrange?"
"Punch thirty three forty three oh nine. I'll program for that to come directly to me and will answer. You can bet they'll have the line tapped."
Z nodded at the camera and went back along the mountain for a distance to a small stream, came down the center of the stream (The floater was mimicking a hovercraft), across the beam and onto the road. The floater indicator light showed a scanner was focused on it. He stopped and waited a moment, then went on toward the pass, stopped in the pass for the sensors, then went down toward the castle.
From down at that level it was much like the pictures of castles in Scotland of old Earth. It was a truly massive stone structure. He went to the doors at the end of the road and spoke into the microphone/speaker box there, saying he needed to report in, asking if he could use their com, as his antenna was hanging in some trees back there and he was already late. He didn't want his friends to worry.
Two Zurn came to lead him to the unit in the outer room. There was a large hall through the castle with that room on one side and a garage with eight land cars in two rows of four on the other side. The floater was left outside of the door where he lowered it on a tripod to dismount.
"I was being stupid," Z explained apologetically. "I thought I could get through a place that was a bit too thick. I'm pretty lucky it didn't break any vanes! I've got to get used to that kind of car.
"I hope they haven't sent a party after me. I should've been back two hours ago. My mate will be – I guess not. I've been lost before. She'll probably report I'm late so the police can call me to come on back.
"I do things like that. I have absolutely no sense of time and I don't seem to have much of one where direction's concerned!"
He coded the com and a smooth sexy female voice answered. He explained about the antenna and said he would be back in about an hour and a half. The road was on his maps and he wouldn't get off of it again until he had the radio fixed, so don't send anybody after him unless he was late again.
The voice asked where he was and he said it was called Rock House on his map.
He finished the call and smiled at the Zurn – which wasn't so smart, when he thought about it. Showing the teeth wasn't a friendly sign in many races. Particularly sharp carnivorous teeth like those of the Kappins.
"We would invite you to relax before your trip back, but there is illness in the house and the doctors don't know what it is yet," one of the Zurn said. "You would probably be quite safe, no matter what it is, but we are reptilian and fear you would be chancing that you would possibly carry some form of disease back to reptilian beings in Northport on your skin or something."
"But I saw a mammal on the wall as I came in!" Z cried. "At least it looked like a mammal. It had hair."
"Oh, uh, yes," the Zurn replied. "That is the point you see. The doctors have quara
ntined them here until they know what we are up against. They fear it could be a virulent strain of a plague or a highly contagious virus."
"Oh!" Z exclaimed, showing great concern. "I would recommend you two stay as clear as you can of them. Take care! I've seen some really nasty things before in some of those exotic diseases. I thank you for your kind help. May the fortune you so much deserve find you!"
He liked that cordiality. It said enough, but not too much. It could fit the situation – whatever it was.
He also had a great idea!
The Zurn were simply repeating what they were coached to say. It really wasn't a good idea if they said it to someone who was familiar with the workings of the empire. One did not mention plague, even as a joke, around certain people.
He headed along the road until he was past the scanners, then raced back to T6 as quickly as he could. He was excited and even laughing as he came aboard.
"Call the fleet!" he called to the ship as he came into the port gates. "We've got this bunch! Oh, boy! Have we got them by the short hairs now!"
"The fleet?" T6 asked. "I'm calling, but why? Half of them are still helping Tab and TR! What's going on?"
"I want to have one ship come here. One lousy little ship to cause a panic you won't believe! This is perfect!"
*What do you want with the fleet? Have you started something too big for you to stop?*
"Maita? What are you doing answering a call to the fleet?"
*I answer all calls for the fleet. What's going on there? Do you need help? Thing is having a fit because you never tell us what the hell you're doing!*
"Maita, they gave the excuse at the castle that there was a plague or a suspected plague, so I couldn't be invited in. The doctors are supposed to be puzzled about exactly what it is. You see what that means!"
*You should be calling Hospital, not Fleet! A suspected plague must be reported immediately, whether it's you or anyone else!*
"Maita, send one Fleet ship with a Feach crew, except maybe for an Acnian or two. There's room for a scout class to land in the courtyard. Put Hospital logos on it. Hospital must identify everyone in such a place where there's possible plague. Eed is wanted because of the probe of Klaht. There will happen to be a Fleet ship in Northport – called to aid in a possible plague situation."
