John Rackham (10 page)

"Never
did I see anything like that before, nor want to, outside a cage. Stars and
comets, here's another!"

Beast
two came from a similar flap-door away to their left, approaching at a
thudding, thundering trot that spurned the dry weed. Beast one swung a head to
observe, let out a snort, then just stood and waited. The other came on at full
gallop. Jack held his breath. The collision was a booming thunder as the flat
snout of beast two struck beast one full in the side. Jack winced in
anticipation of the goring battle to follow, but no. The first beast staggered
a little, gave a grunt, shook its head, and stood fast, while the aggressor
galloped off in a tight arc and came back to do it all over again. Jack stared,
scratched his head, then the obvious answer dawned on him.

"Jasar!"
he muttered. "Were these
creatures
swine, I would
say this one is a sow in heat, and that one a boar, preparing to mount and
service. Do you see it like that?"

"I
do. And what's more"—the little man looked up and about anxiously—"I
think we could be at risk. Unless I am very much mistaken, this would be a
moment to be observed and recorded. Yes. I thought so. Up there, see? A spy-eye
pointed this way."

Jack
followed his indication and saw a bulbous dull thing in the comer of the roof
that seemed to peer at the spectacle. "Can it see us also?" he asked.

"Hard to be sure.
Depends on the angle of vision, depth of focus.
We had better keep still, anyway. Bum my
circuits,
they make enough noise with their mating. A man would think murder was being
done!"

"Swine
are noisy beasts," Jack agreed, watching the curious spectacle. By now
the aggressive male had battered the female into what was for him an acceptable
position, for he was marching on her steadily from the rear, while she stood
shaking her head and squealing. In that moment

Jack
felt Jasar's grasp fasten on his arm, heard the litde man gasp.

"Look there! Over to your right!
See?"

Jack
stiffened as he saw yet another flap-door open, cautiously this time, and out
of it came a man.
Undoubtedly an ordinary, normal, mortal
man, bowed and plodding under the weight of a miniature version of the two
beasts that were now coupling in screeching, struggling harmony.
The
stranger had only a fleeting glance to spare for the rowdy spectacle before he
ran, heavily but swifdy, away into the uncertain gloom of the far right of the
cage.

"Come
on!" Jasar urged. "If he is stealing Dargoon fodder, then he is on
our side.
After him!"

Together
they ran parallel with the mesh barrier into gloomy shade lit only by the red
and green glows from purring machinery. "We've lost him!" Jack
declared, peering about, but Jasar pointed.

"He
came out this way, see?" There was a gap cut in the wire mesh, enough
barely to fold back and pass a crouching man. "And this is his trail, the
blood spots on the floor."

"I
cannot see red on red!" Jack protested, but followed on Jasar's heels just
the same. The trail led into a narrow lane between two vast pedestals, by and
under a polished copper pipe, around a sharp corner into darkness. Jasar
halted, invited Jack in a whisper to feel the hanging coarseness of a sheet of
material of some kind.

"I
smell a man," Jack breathed. "And fear, too," and he shook his
bow into his hand by reflex, readying an arrow.

"Can't
blame him for that, lad. Be ready to duck. I'm going to part this curtain
...
now!"

Light
spilled out as Jasar drew the material swiftly aside, light that glittered on a
drawn and pointed blade, bright and watchful eyes, and the body and bulk of a
man, backed against a far wall. Beyond the blade was a bare arm bunched with
muscle, a shoulder, a face with a wild yellow beard and hair, and blazing blue
eyes that widened now in astonishment.

"Men?
By
the Three Suns! I thought you were beetles! Who are you, and how came you
here?"

"Beetles!"
Jasar snorted loudly. "Do we look like beetles? Whoever you are,
can we get this much clear? We saw you run off with the young of one of those
rutting beasts out there. You've killed it, I see. Can we assume that you are
against the Dargoon?" Jack held his arrow drawn and ready, taking no
chances. The strange man lowered his blade. He was big, as big as Jack and
a
lot older, the light picking out massive shoulders and a deep chest.
About his waist was
a
curious belt of woven gold wire that clung
snugly and seemed to have neither beginning nor end. For clothing he wore only
a ragged loincloth, none too clean, and scuffed black boots that reached to
mid-calf. He seemed to be pondering Jasar's words.

"Against the Dargoon?
In
a
way, I am.
In another way,
not.
I'm a prisoner here."

"A prisoner who runs free and steals
food?"
Jasar queried.

"Free?
Not while I wear this." The stranger touched the gold wire belt.
"This is my bond. When Garmel needs me he has only to touch a switch at
his wrist
...
and I bite my teeth
against agony,
then
run to do his bidding. Or I scream
my lungs ragged in further agony.
Which I have tried.
It is not very pleasant. My name is Haldar Villar, once of Berden, on Strella.
And you?" He turned aside to plunge the blade of his odd sword into a
water-spout from the side of a machine, rinsing the blood from it. "Where
are you from, what do you here, and how is it that you understand my speech so
well?"

"Put
away your arrow, Jack. I know of Strella, a planet of craftsmen, in the sixth
quadrant. Sir Haldar, I am Jasar-am-Bax, of Willan, scout of the Salviar Fleet.
This is my very good friend and companion, Jack Earl Fairfax, yeoman, of
Earth."

"Earth?
I have not heard of that planet." Haldar dropped his blade, came
to offer a hand. "That device, young man, has a familiar look to me. In
Berden we had men who made such things for sport. To propel a pointed shaft at
a target, I think."

"Or an enemy," Jack agreed. "I
would call your weapon
a
sword, only that I never saw one quite like
it before."

"I
would be surprised if you had." Haldar smiled crookedly. "I made it
myself from scrap. It is
a
crude
thing, but it serves. I am a craftsman in metal, but not in archaic weaponry.
Will you rest a while, gentlemen? This is not luxury, but then it was never
meant to be. However I can offer you food, and drink, too." Jack began to
get perspective on this curious cranny. Machine plinths on either side made
its walls. Odd and discarded metal boxes and lids furnished it. A water-pipe
had been bent out of shape to run continuously into a nearby drain. Unshaded
lamps hung here and there from their own wires, and there were scattered heaps
of patchwork cloth, enough to make comfortable seats.

"I
call this my hunting camp," Haldar told them, reaching up to take a wire
that led to one corner lamp. "Garmel preserves me as a useful pet, and as
such he has equipped me with a luxury home, but I get the urge to break out and
run sometimes.
And to win a little fresh meat."
As he spoke he had taken the wire apart, simply by forcing two hooks to
separate from each other. The lamp went dark, but Haldar wasn't bothering about
that. Instead he thrust the two hooked ends against a pair of copper rods
where they protruded from a pot.

"This,"
he explained, "is a discarded plastic bin that once held fine welding
rods. It makes an excellent kettle, as you see." And, truly, the water
inside was already singing, and the corner lamp glowed only dimly. Jasar saw
Jack's bafflement and grinned.

"Just
power, Jack. The same power that makes the lamp glow will also make water boil.
Is that so surprising?"

Within
a few minutes Haldar had poured them a hot and reviving drink
each,
into cups that he explained were protectors for fine
jeweled bearings. For food he dipped into a metal box and produced a stack of
disks, of a texture very like bread, a hand-span across and about an inch
thick. "I offer no apologies for these," he said, putting them handy,
"as they are whole-meal chips, and provide everything anyone needs. Garmel
feeds them to his bruggs. The beasts you saw mating, back there. One male, six
females, and there's a brood of ten or so, every thirty cycles."

"You are permitted to
steal younglings?" Jasar inquired.

"No
one misses the odd one. It's within the tolerance estimate of the machines. I
survive, Jasar, and have my little bits of freedom, by knowing the fine
tolerances of the system, and sneaking between the spaces. I've been at it for
a long time. So long that I lose count of the cycles. But do not wait on my
gossip. Eat and drink. It's good if not inspired. And tell me about yourselves
and how you came here. I was not aware there had been any wrecks brought in
recently."

"We are not from any wreck." Jasar
gnashed on a food-disk and nodded his approval of the flavor as he chewed the
fragments. Jack, copying him, had a taste that reminded him of some cinnamon
bread his mother had baked once, as an experiment. "We"—Jasar cleared
his mouth and throat—"are an invasion. It may sound a trifle presumptuous,
but that's the truth of it. We are attackers, our mission to cripple, if not
destroy entirely, this space station."

"I
see!" Some of Haldar's easiness
dissipated,
his
eye hardening as he sat forward. "Assuming I believe that.
Just the two of you, with a bow and arrows?
Where will you .
. . ah . . . start?"

"I
have all the necessary violence with me, sir, provided only that I can get at
the heart of the station, into the control room."

"That's
easy enough. I work there, from time to time, by Garmel's order and
instruction. I can lead you there."

It
was Jasar's rum to look guarded. "That sounds too easy. What are you not
saying?"

"Merely
that Garmel will net you and ring you, as he has ringed me, once you get within
any of his alarms. Do you take him for a fool?"

Jack
couldn't hold himself in any longer. "You con-stanüy say," he
interrupted, "he will do this, and that.
Meaning this Garmel,
who I take to be a Dargoon.
Is there, then, but one of him?"

"Only one.
There's no need for more, here. Not in this station. All the defense
and offense circuits are fully automatic, the screens, detectors, tractor and
thrust beams, stun and disrupter beams, all controlled and monitored by the
brain-complex. That is in addition to the fact that this station collects and
integrates and relays essential data for the entire sector front to all the
Hilax fleet units.
Which you ought to know already, if you
are what you say.
So what call would there be for a large crew? One
Dargoon is ample."

Jasar
scowled. "It is my turn to disbelieve, Haldar. A strategic computer
complex of that power is far beyond the Hilax competence, as known to us. It is
equally far beyond anything we can do, either!"

"Of
course it is!" Haldar was suddenly savage and intent. "Here's
something you don't know. The Hilax policy is cannibalism! They use us! People
like you and me. That's how they do it!"

"I don't understand.
Explain!"

Haldar
stood, all at once a very large man in a terrible mood. Jack eyed him warily.
"See me?" he demanded. "I serve Garmel.
And
why?
Because, as I told you, he can activate this belt
at his whim, to punish me, to hurt me, to kill me if he feels like it.
And I can't get it off. He can, literally, cut me in half. So I serve him.
And, even like this, I am more fortunate than most. More fortunate than those
unhappy other survivors of the ship I served in. Let me tell you. We were
guarding a convoy of cargo ships.
Vital supplies.
We
were attacked by a Hilax squadron. We engaged them, while the convoy scattered,
as it was their right to do. I was a senior instrument repairman. My ship was
hit and wrecked, along with others.
The fortunes of
war."
He leaned his back against a plinth-wall and laughed harshly.

"War?
We
don't know how to fight a real war. Listen. The wreck was seized in traction
and dragged here.
And gutted for everything useful.
The bodies of the dead were fed into the protein store! No, hear me;
that's
not the worst. The unfortunate living survivors were
put through analysis.
Myself also.
Scanned
by brain-probe, estimated for potential.
Those with special skills of
any use in strategy, or sheer information, were put into the brain-complex. I
mean put in.
Literally.
Brain removed and wired into
the complex. They are now part of the machine. That's how it's done,
Jasar."