Tin Woodman (3 page)

THREE

Freedom,
Div thought.
Freedom from the oppressive cold cloister of walls.
Looking out through the transparent, filtering dome of the
Pegasus’
observation deck, Div watched the twin stars of the Aldebaran system and imagined that he could see the tiny island of life which had brought him here—
Tin Woodman.
Closing his eyes, he could see it clearly, as it had appeared on Galvern’s holographs. He saw the long, slender ovoid, glistening silver in the radiation of the great nuclear lights—not the hard, glinting silver of steel, but the rainbow-faceted gleam of a rare and beautiful fish.

So intent was Div upon this image that, for the first time in his life, other humans approached without his immediate awareness.

“I suppose it
is
awesome, when you’re not used to it,” a gravel-edged voice from behind Div said. The young Talent spun around, his heart racing, as if expecting attack. Willfully, he forced himself to appear calm.

“How can one become used to it?” Div replied, his voice quavering.

The intruder dismissed the question with a shrug. “I’m Edan Darsen,” he said, then began to introduce his two companions. Recovering from his initial shock, Div superficially scanned all three minds.

From Edan Darsen and Leana Coffer, he received mainly those feelings he had come routinely to associate with Normals: apprehension, defensive and useless guarding and dissembling; an offensive let’s-get-it-over-with-and-get-away-from-him underlying attitude. Darsen’s thoughts were tinged with something more frightening—a hatred for Talents which threatened at a moment’s notice to boil over and scald his thinking. Div fought to block all this out.

The woman in the medic’s uniform was different, however. She was a Talent, a fact Div could have ascertained without using his own powers. It was clear in the peculiar
listening
way that she held her head, as well as the indefinably drawn and melancholic lines of her attractive face. An aura of constant nervous agitation, apparent even to a Normal, surrounded her slim, almost angular figure. But, above all, her nature was evident in her eyes. They were like his own, a size too large for her face, and lacking any pigmentation. Pale orbs, which Div had come to think of as bleached—scorched colorless by the process of taking in so much more of the world than Normals. Div touched her mind only momentarily, seeking the reassurance of a chance meeting with another of his kind.

But he could sense no reaching-out from her. She seemed very careful; aloof.

“You were briefed on the situation before leaving Earth?” Darsen asked Div. Div nodded rather distantly, attention still on Mora. It seemed to annoy Darsen.
“Tin Woodman
is over two hundred meters in length,” he said hoarsely, “and to all appearances is a living creature. Degree of its intelligence is still undetermined. Our sensor data indicate that its stardrive and energy sources are highly sophisticated, far in advance of anything the Triunion possesses.

“In addition, there’s been a change in the situation since you first arrived.
Tin Woodman
seems to be coming out of its fugue. It still doesn’t acknowledge our existence, but its utilization of power is increasing throughout its systems.”

Div’s expression didn’t change. “How does that affect what you want me to do?”

The boy’s apparent confidence left Darsen nonplused. “It intensifies the urgency of your mission,” he snapped. “I want you to communicate with the thing. Persuade it, if possible, to follow us to our next port of call, where it can be properly subjected to study and experimentation.” Darsen drew up to his full height, attempting a dignified demeanor. “I don’t want anything to go wrong now. This could be the most important First Contact in the history of the Triunion.”

Important
in
the history of Edan Darsen. You want your name cleared. You want the fame of discovery.
Div picked the thoughts accidentally from Leana Coffer’s mind, amid strong currents of disdain for Darsen.

“Are you paying attention, boy?” demanded Darsen in exasperation. Div frowned slightly, trying to refocus his eyes on the pompous man.
You’re asking me
to
commit a cosmic sin,
he thought angrily. He became abruptly aware of another presence in his mind. Mora was scanning him. She gave no indication to either Darsen or Coffer of what Div was feeling.

“I’m simply tired, sir,” Div replied at last. “Disoriented . . . this is my first trip through space.” Darsen seemed satisfied with that. Div knew that the captain expected rather bizarre behavior from Talents. “There’s nothing I can do from this distance,” he continued, his voice steady, his tone firm. “I need to get much closer to
Tin Woodman
in order to attempt telepathic communication.”

Darsen didn’t hide his dislike for this idea, but he had no real alternative but to co-operate. “Very well,” he agreed. “You can use one of our robot-piloted Spiders. We use them for hull maintenance, and emergency transport between spacecraft. You’ll go alone—no sense in risking more than one person. I’ll take the
Pegasus
in as close to the alien as I judge safe. From there, you’re on your own.”

“Thank you, sir,” said Div. “I’m sure that will do quite well. Now, I’d like to rest awhile.”

Darsen grunted. “You have eight hours in which to do
so.
With
Tin Woodman
behaving unpredictably, we can’t afford to wait any longer.” Darsen turned to Mora, not looking directly at her. “See that Mr. Harlthor is made comfortable. Check with Accommodations. They should have a spare bed someplace for him to rest on.” With that, Darsen spun on his heel and retreated from the room as quickly as dignity would allow. The exec smiled awkwardly at Mora and Div, then followed Darsen.

Div and Mora were alone.

Some of the tension drained from her mind with Darsen’s departure.

Some. Not all.

She led him to the lift shaft and programmed it for one of the crew quarters decks. Div stepped onto the platform with her and the lift started with a slight lurch. The air smelled faintly of electricity.

“They’ve probably got you a cot by the bilge pump,” Mora joked awkwardly, grimly. “Our captain doesn’t care much for our sort.” She stared at him hesitantly. His face remained set in the impassive lines it had worn during his entire meeting with Darsen, “You are not what I was told you were,” said Mora. She realized she was fingering the left cuff of her jacket nervously.

“You were told,” Div said casually, “that I’m unbalanced. That they plucked me out of a sanitarium on Earth. That they picked me because no sane human being would volunteer to endure two weeks of non-relative space, alone.”

Mora nodded.

“It’s true,” Div said simply.

Here’s an enigma,
she thought. She had scanned the boy earlier. She knew that he had fear and panic and anger packed into a tight light ball inside himself. He was trying to win a game, with the Normals and with himself. The same game that Mora had been losing for a long time.

“You should understand,” said Div. “I know how you feel here.”

Mora, on sudden impulse, dropped the shield from her thoughts.
You couldn’t possibly.
I’m
a failure. A miserable shiplady. If I weren’t, Darsen wouldn’t have sent for you.

Just what are you failing at?
Div demanded. He was thought-casting, an unusual experience for Mora, who was accustomed merely to receiving emotional readings.
I’m not sheltered, nor naive, Mora. They couldn’t build walls thick enough on Earth to allow me that luxury. Four years in the service academy couldn’t persuade you of the nobility of your sort of prostitution. Who failed?

Very perceptive.
Mora was at once sorry for the bitterness behind the thought. Div was like her. That his impressions of her, based on ten minutes’ acquaintance, were somewhat superficial hardly merited her scorn.

Div reached out and took her arm. His eyes met hers, and he opened his mind to her, totally. Mora recoiled under the bombardment of images, feelings, and thoughts which flooded her consciousness. Even as she did so, she realized that Div was forcing nothing on her, She had merely to will it, and the flood ceased at once. Shutting him out, Mora was safe in the silence of her mind.

But she opened her mind again. Trusting Div now, she let him see into her own soul. She let him see the fear, the vulnerability which Normals always seemed to sense. Since childhood they’d abused her, stabbing into her mind to relieve their own pain. As
she had grown into womanhood, men became the worst, deadliest of vultures with their sadism-passing-as-virility pounding pounding pounding on her soul until she thought she—

So, Space Service was my last refuge,
Mora thought, suddenly compressing and organizing her thoughts and assigning them words.
I had tried . . . I’d moved around. I’d tried to live in the little farms and villages—Schuylkill Haven, Willowood—where Talents live apart, building their own worlds. But I felt as though I were running. The world that mattered, that I knew, was outside, allowing us to do this.

They call us Talents and laugh. They mock us. They call us Talents and then can’t decide to cure us or kill us. Because they know all we really are is disturbed. Unbalanced and dangerous. But when I was a child, I didn’t understand the laughing. They called me a Talent and I believed it. I felt I should use my “gift” to help others.

So I came to the service. What human beings were doing in space was noble—surely such people were too disciplined, too respectful of one another to waste energy on the luxuries of torture. I went to the academy. I spent four years trying to learn the mental discipline, the little tricks a shiplady has to know. I learned the soothing ways of “physical therapy” and a lot of other nonsense—all their excuse for sticking me here to whore in a little metal can falling through space, where people are only people after all . . .

Mora let the train of thought fade as she tottered there on the brink of night. She looked at Div. There was no pity in his eyes. Instead, there was understanding. And the beginnings of something deeper. Their clasped hands tightened together.

“Would you like some coffee? We can take it to my cabin,” she said aloud as the lift platform came to a halt on Mora’s deck.

Div said, “Something else besides coffee, maybe.”

She gave him a trembling smile and led him to a drink station.

RAC COMMUNICATIONS, INC.

MAGNEPAPER® #TX8794a

Leana Coffer

Exec. Commander

Triunion Starship PEGASUS

Dear Me,

Vocoder time again.

Met the Talent from Earth. Div Harlthor. He worries me. Reminds me of Mora Elbrun—without Elbrun’s strength. Odd. Never thought of Mora as a woman with a strong character. Compared to this boy-freak she seems sturdy as a soldier in combat armor. Harlthor was confined to a sanitarium on Earth, and seeing what the Talent can do to a human being I rather wonder at the inner reserves Mora must have to exist in the hostile world of this ship.

This ship. Darsen’s little world. Another reason Harlthor worries me. I know what Darsen wants—and why—though I don’t think he knows himself. He’s not analytical but emotionally driven and on the
Pegasus
his needs become commands and are translated into obedience so quickly that he need never define, measure, or control them. I can see what the man’s ideals are: entirely egocentric, a puffing up of self. Darsen’s damned selfish, and I’m sure this fact has not escaped Harlthor. I just can’t see their intentions or modes of approach toward the alien as compatible at all. Darsen’s reasons are entirely personal—but I can’t fathom Div Harlthor’s yet. If this perception is correct, why is Darsen giving the Talent such power?

Of course, the captain hasn’t thought this through. He’s incapable of that. He needs a personal triumph so badly that he can’t conceive of his need being frustrated—certainly not by a boy whom he holds in such obvious contempt. To Darsen, Harlthor must be a piece of equipment, a robot to be powered by his will, to be ordered about and used and possibly sacrificed for an objective—just as that minor megalomaniac must have viewed his soldiers in that battle on Goridan.

I think I’m making sense. But I’m not an uninvolved observer, and may be projecting my feelings on to the situation more than I like to admit. I can’t forget my horror—no, anger—when I learned that Darsen was to be the new commander of
Pegasus.
It’s useless to pretend to myself that experience and time have changed my belief that I should have been given command. I still wonder what kind of system gives a man like Darsen a second chance after a disaster like the Goridan massacre. Someone in the high councils of the service, far beyond the levels of Darsen’s personal influence, saved his career for him. Well, maybe it fits in with my theory . . .

Mora lounged in her chair, watching Div, who lay on her bunk in a semi-somnambulent condition, his breathing slow and quiet. There had been much to discuss, and they had done so exhaustively, with minds and mouths. Realizing that not much time was left, Mora had insisted that Div rest on her bunk. No time to see about your quarters, she claimed. And Div had not objected.

She sat now, content to watch him rest, to feel his presence. Delicately, she let her mind attempt to lull his into deeper sleep.

••• A GLIMPSE OF RAINBOW DAWN THROUGH THE MIST OF A METHANE WORLD •••

••• WHIRLING VORTEX DROPLETS OF AMMONIA ICE CLINGING TO HULL •••

••• THE BURNING RAIN WHICH KILLS •••

••• VUL ••• DEATH ••• ALONE •••

••• EMPTINESS •••

••• COME ••• YOU HAVE COME •••

••• WELCOME •••

“Div!” Mora cried out inadvertently, stiffening. The alien sensation passed. Div tried to sit upright abruptly, as if in terror. Mora stood, trying to ease him back. “What was that?” she asked, afraid of the answer she already knew.