Starfire (48 page)

Waiting on a call that no one answered was agony, and after thirty seconds Gordy gave up. He would try Nick later, but meanwhile time was too precious to waste. He recalled, with no satisfaction at all, that he was the one who had insisted that neither man have recording devices attached to the private line. To receive Gordy's call, Nick Lopez had to be in his office. He was, most of the time. But where the devil was he now?

Gordy replaced his hard shoes with soft-soled slippers. He crept across the floor in just enough light to follow the outlines of large objects. It was minutes since he had last heard the snuffling at the barricaded door. That had accompanied a scraping sound, the noise of a pile of furniture and kitchen fixtures shifting on the smooth floor. The minisaur had an advantage. The floor of the chamber was smooth, while anything on the other side had the purchase offered by the soft ground of the habitat.

He waited to make sure that the animal had gone away before he ventured close to the door. What he saw wasn't too bad. In the room's unnatural silence, the improvised barricade had sounded like it was collapsing or being pushed clear out of the way. In fact it had moved no more than an inch.

He eased everything back into position. As he was wedging a tilted chair against the handle of the refrigerator door he was struck by another thought. Could he hide
inside
the refrigerator?

But if he would fit in there, how long could he stay before he suffocated? And how would he know when it was safe to come out?

Not a good choice: death by suffocation, or death as a minisaur's dinner. But not a choice that he needed to make. He fully expected to be rescued.

All the same, Gordy opened the door of the refrigerator and confirmed that, small as he was, he could not fit inside. He went back to wedging the chair in place. As he did so, he heard new movement beyond the wall. He could smell a musky body odor, mingled with the stench of bad meat.

He sat down, braced himself with his back against the refrigerator, and took out the gray handset. He told himself that he had plenty of time. The minisaurs had learned to be cautious when dealing with humans. They would not attack until they were sure of the situation. Even so, Gordy felt a huge impatience as he waited for the row of red lights to indicate a call going through to its distant destination.

* * *

"And what can I do to help you?"

It was so like Celine's own technique for cutting through visitors' small talk that she couldn't help smiling at Nick Lopez.

"I'm not here for favors, Nick. Actually, I'm going to do you one—a doubtful one, and when you hear about it you may decide it isn't a favor at all."

The change in the world between the Washington takeoff and the New Rio landing was striking. The first particle wave had arrived, swelled to a peak, and as swiftly subsided to its steady background level. After the gridded sky and beautiful aurora, Washington had become calm and sunny. Here, just a couple of hours later, torrential rain gurgled away from the surface through endless thousands of little black pits that riddled the landscape. Roads, metal covers, the sides of buildings, concrete sidewalks, bare soil—nothing was exempt. The dark pockmarks were everywhere. The room she sat in had a leaky ceiling and a leaky floor, water streaming in and out through openings not much bigger than pinholes. The only unchanged element was Nick Lopez himself. Tall and broad, with water dripping steadily onto his gray pompadour and down his cheeks, he sat on a wet chair as relaxed as if today's particle storm had never happened.

He listened carefully to Celine's words and said, "A favor? Then you're ahead of the pack already. I'm not used to favors. Everybody else who comes to the WPF wants something from me."

"I want something, too. I want you to keep a secret."

"That's a big something. Remember the standard political assumption: anything you say, anywhere and to anybody, is likely to become public knowledge."

"I know. I can't ask you to keep what I tell you totally to yourself, because you may need to act. But I'd like you to use extreme caution in deciding who is told."

Celine summarized her morning conversation with Wilmer Oldfield and Star Vjansander. At the end of it, Lopez was not smiling.

"You believe them?" he said. "Of course you do, or you wouldn't be here. But they may be wrong. They even told you they may be wrong. But I agree with you, this has to be handled very carefully. Who else knows? Or rather, who else do you
know
knows?"

"Wilmer. Star. John Hyslop and Maddy Wheatstone, up on Sky City. Me. And now you. Of course, it will spread."

"Of course it will. There's no such thing as a secret. What plans have you made?"

"None. What plans can you make to deal with the end of the world?"

"If this homeostasis thing is right, nothing." Nick flicked water droplets away from his bushy eyebrows. "Hiding a mile deep or ten miles deep won't do a bit of good if the planet has no oxygen, or if temperatures go up a hundred degrees. I think we stay with the original party line: We're in for a storm bigger than anything we expected, but Earth will come through it and finally return to normal. We plan for that."

"That's exactly what I decided. But I wanted another expert opinion."

"With something like this, there are no experts."

"I take that as approval. There's one other thing I want to mention. It won't affect anything now, but it could make a difference in the long run—if there is a long run. I've had a disturbing warning about the Argos Group activities on Sky City."

Celine described her conversation with Maddy Wheatstone. Nick listened closely, his face expressionless.

"Does she have proof?" he said when Celine finished.

"Apparently not. Nor do I. This hasn't exactly been my top priority."

"So what do you propose to do?"

"For the moment, nothing. Unless you disagree?"

"No. I don't disagree. It can wait." Nick glanced in annoyance at the red handset on the near corner of his desk. It had begun to buzz, loudly and insistently. "Damn that thing."

"Answer it, Nick, if you have to. I'm the one who's intruding."

He hesitated. "It's a private line. Would you . . . ?"

"Of course. I'll wait outside. Take your time."

Nick waited until she was gone and the door was closed before he picked up the handset. "Yes?"

"Where the hell have you been?" The voice at the other end was rasping and breathless.

"Working. I don't know how it is with you, Gordy, but we've had a particle storm and a major crisis down here."

"Yeah, yeah. The hell with that. Listen. I need help."

"Tonight?"

"Right this minute. I'm down in my underground headquarters, and I can't get out."

"How did that happen?"

"It's not relevant. I don't have time for chitchat. The point is, the hatch is locked on the other side and the door to the habitat is open."

"Can't you go out that way?"

"Are you crazy? Listen to the 'saurs."

Gordy stopped speaking. In the silence that followed at the other end of the line, Nick picked up guttural grunts and snorting.

"I hear them. What do you want me to do? I'm down in New Rio."

"I know. But you have people in Washington. How long does it take to get here from there by high-speed airdrop?"

"Half an hour. Maybe less. But you have people in Washington. Why don't you call your own people directly?"

"Can't. My communications are out and this is the only working line. Listen, soon as we finish talking, you get hold of one of your people. Send him here. Tell him how to get in through the schoolhouse. He comes down in the elevator, opens the hatch from below, and lets me out. You got that?"

"Yes. But it will take me a while to contact somebody, and they'll have to find a plane. That could be another hour."

"Shouldn't be a problem. The 'saurs are cautious. They're scared of coming into this chamber; I taught them that the hard way. I figure I can hold out five, maybe six hours. But don't rely on it. Get somebody out here at once."

"I'll do it. Sit tight, Gordy."

"
At once,
I said. Don't fuck up. I'll call you in half an hour to make sure everything's set."

"Right." Nick waited for the line to go dead, then slowly replaced the handset. He sat silent for half a minute, beads of water trickling unheeded down his forehead. At last he roused himself, stood up, and went to open the door.

Celine was waiting outside, leaning against the wall. "More problems?"

He shook his head. "I don't think so. Maybe one problem less. That was Gordy Rolfe on the line."

"Offering any help that he can give, I assume?"

He smiled at Celine's tone. "I see you know our Gordy. You're right, he wasn't offering help."

"Where is he?"

"At his northern headquarters—the underground one in Virginia."

"That place. I haven't forgiven you for talking me into going there."

"It's not that bad. And you were there before, when it was the stronghold of the Legion of Argos."

"It's worse now." Celine grimaced. "Horrible. I told you what he did when I went to see him, that fight to the death between a carnosaur and a group of rats. I feel sure he arranged it just for me."

"I don't think so." Nick led them back into the office and waited for Celine to sit down. "It's part of this general fixation Gordy has about dinosaurs and mammals."

"The superiority of mammals." Celine noticed that water was no longer dripping onto her head. She looked up. The ceiling was covered with suspended droplets, but few were falling. Outside, the rain must finally have ended. Flights would be resuming. "I know Gordy Rolfe's theory. He told me mammals always win. They beat dinosaurs."

"Get it right.
Small
mammals win, not big ones." Nick grinned at her. "I'm pretty big, so of course he made a special point of putting it that way to me."

"What did Gordy want this time? Oh, I'm sorry, I shouldn't ask. It was a private call."

"That's all right. It was nothing new. He wanted to yak on about his experiments on the survival of small mammals. Seems he's conducting one at this very moment."

"It sounds revolting. I'm sorry I asked."

"And I'm sorry he interrupted us." Nick stood up. "Look, I know you're in a hurry, but you and I need to discuss how we'll handle the next three weeks. There are going to be leaks—there always are—and I wouldn't be surprised if a few days from now everybody knows. Would you have any objection to my flying down to Tierra del Fuego with you, so we can talk?"

"No objection at all. I'd welcome your company. But don't you have things that need doing here?"

"It's a whole new ballgame now." Nick was staring at the red handset, but he seemed to be listening to something far away.

Finally Celine repeated, "Don't you? Don't you have things that need doing?"

He was with her again. He shook his head. "Sorry. I was just remembering something. The last time I spoke with Gordy he was furious with me."

"He's probably over it by now."

"Yes. If not now, soon." Lopez reached out a hand to Celine. "Come on. I'm ready. Let's get out of here before we have another nuisance call."

31

From the private diary of Oliver Guest.

Every human, I suggest, is a victim of this aberration: At the same time as we assert our common humanity, we seek evidence to show that we are different from, and superior to, our fellows.

I was drawn to this conclusion in examining an earlier statement I made, delivered from the Olympian heights of impartiality to which we so often aspire. Thus I find, in my own diary and in my own hand, the following: "Human beings find it difficult to act on facts alone. We are plagued by overactive imaginations. And of the things that human beings are called upon to do, doing nothing can be the most difficult act of all."

I was not, of course, referring to myself. Perish the thought. I would be above such frailties. Now, however, my words returned to haunt me.
"Doing nothing can be the most difficult act of all."

It had been my conclusion that the best time to catch the Sky City murderer would be at the height of the particle storm, when everyone, including the killer, would be distracted by events. It did not occur to me that such a decision had a corollary: Until the storm arrived, it was necessary that Seth and I take no action relevant to capture.

A principle easy to state, but oh so difficult to observe. As the particle storm continued its steady march toward the solar system and the Sky City defense system prepared for the final onslaught, I found myself in an agony—a chafing, a ferment, a convulsion—of enforced inactivity.

I had nothing to do. My preparation of the deep shelters had long since been completed. My darlings had been thoroughly briefed and knew exactly what each would do on the day of the particle storm. Seth was employed in his own inscrutable pursuits, on Earth and off it. And I? I suspect that I became intolerable, since my darlings tiptoed around Otranto Castle and minimized their interactions with me.

The days crept by. At last they turned into weeks. And finally, after an interval so apparently protracted that within it mountain ranges rose and continents were subducted, the weeks also passed and I rose one autumnal morning to discover that today was the day.
The
day. The day when the particle storm would strike. The day when Seth and I would also strike and, with a modicum of luck, bring to justice the Sky City murderer. The day, after endless eons of subjective time, for a final confluence of significant events.

Seth is a man able to handle major hardship with considerable fortitude. He is, however, less tolerant of small irritations.

Witness today.

The next few hours would bring danger and possible death. Beyond that, scant days hence, stood the prospect of universal destruction. So what were, in this time of final crisis, Seth's concerns? His complaint—his only complaint—revolved around the RV jacket. "Makes me feel stupid," he grumbled. "Lookatit. Them colors."

I could have pointed out that the previous occupant of the apartment he occupied on Sky City had favored walls in shades of mauve and pale orange. Instead I said, "As you well know, looking at your jacket is for me impossible, unless you choose to stand in front of a mirror. However, if today's outcome is satisfactory, you will never need to wear it again."