Webdancers (12 page)

Chapter Twenty-Six

Just as there are byways and hidden passages within any sentient mind, so too is it with larger groups of living beings. As individuals, and as groups, conscious organisms have an obsession to do things that others do not know about. It is their way of controlling situations—or of altering their perception so that they believe they are in control.

—Thinker, data bank file * * * * *34ΩÆØ

Having been summoned to his homeworld of Adurian, the Ambassador waited patiently for the dignitaries to arrive. His pulse quickened. Uncel had received notification that the three leaders of the HibAdu Coalition would finally identify themselves, and that they would make a major military announcement. At last, he would learn who they were!

VV Uncel stood with other diplomats and local Adurian leaders, all gathered in a grand reception hall that had been converted from the remains of an old spacecraft. A buzz of anticipation filled the air, and people kept looking up at the speaking balcony and at the grand staircase that descended to their level, where the triumvirate might appear.

In its original form the large spacefaring vessel had contained numerous reception halls and meeting rooms, and had been built in an opulent style for one of the early Adurian emperors, Oragem the Third. The walls and ceilings were hand-painted and framed in gold filigree along the moldings and on the railings and banisters.

A tall Churian with thick red eyebrows worked the gathering, offering drinks that he balanced precariously on two trays.

“I’ll have a ku-royale, please,” Uncel said, pointing.

Nodding, the Churian contorted a very flexible leg that had long, prehensile toes on the foot, which he used to grasp the drink and pass it on to Uncel.

As the servant moved away, the Ambassador took a long sip of the alcoholic beverage, and tasted its delicate, minty sweetness. Surrounded by conversations around him in which he was not taking part, he took a few moments to reflect. Though born to wealth and privilege, Ambassador VV Uncel had always worked hard to improve himself, and took pride in his achievements. A pureblood Adurian born on the planet of the same name, his father had been a successful biochemist who earned numerous patents, while his mother had been a product designer who worked on the team that developed
Endo
, the most popular of all Adurian games.

Educated at the elite Sarban University in the capital city, Uncel had always known he would succeed. Everyone who knew him commented on his many attributes, especially his keen intelligence, his way of getting along with virtually anyone, and his burning desire to succeed. He had graduated first in his class.

For years, Uncel had been on the ascendancy in his career, culminating with his appointment as Ambassador to the Mutati Kingdom at the very young age of sixty years, quite youthful by the biologically-enhanced Adurian standards. In his professional life he had known the Adurian emperor and his advisers very well, and had established a vital communication line with the Mutatis and their difficult Zultan, Abal Meshdi.

Uncel had even been in on the early planning sessions of the Hibbil and Adurian rulers, in which they resolved to form a clandestine alliance to defeat both the Mutati Kingdom and the Merchant Prince Alliance. When the HibAdu alliance got underway, however, Uncel had been frustrated to find himself increasingly out of the loop, and that he was one of the people who only received information on a “need to know” basis. In answer to his queries about various issues, the Adurian Emperor and his advisers began to defer to what they called the Royal Parliament, which they said was making the key decisions about HibAdu military plans. Three names and titles had surfaced in that governing body, but not their faces: High Ruler Coreq, Premier Enver, and Warlord Tarix.

Prior to that, Uncel had never heard of the trio or their governing body, and he’d never been able to determine where they met. Rumor held that the Royal Parliament had been established on one of the secondary Hibbil worlds, which gave Uncel concern. But his life was busy with diplomatic assignments, and he saw the immense war machine building all around him, with thousands of factories gearing up to produce armaments and laboratory-bred podships, all necessary for the upcoming attacks on the enemy.

A career diplomat, VV Uncel had always managed to land on his feet when political winds blew, as they invariably did. With the HibAdu Coalition and weapons manufacturing in full swing, he fell into a pattern of just playing his part as a diplomat and as a spy against the Mutatis, without totally understanding what was occurring on his own side. But he had faith that it would all turn out for the best. Mutatis and Humans were the most loathsome of galactic races, and deserved the terrible punishment that was being delivered upon them.

“Another drink, sir?” The Churian was back.

“No.” Uncel watched as the prehensile foot extended again, and took the glax from him. The servant drifted away.

In one of the high points of his career, Ambassador Uncel had tricked the Mutatis into using Adurian gyrodomes and minigyros, devices that weakened their brains in subtle ways and made them easier to conquer. Afterward, his HibAdu superiors had sent him a laudatory message telling him he had done an excellent job of softening up the enemy for the imminent attack.

Uncel prided himself on an ability to get along with people he did not like, while artfully concealing any antipathies he felt from them. That included not only the Mutati Zultan, but the duplicitous little Hibbil, Pimyt. Though Uncel and Pimyt worked closely together on the Hibbil Cluster Worlds, Uncel had never trusted the furry little devil. Something troubled him about Pimyt’s red-tinged eyes, which seemed to conceal too much. While Pimyt professed to know as little as Uncel himself, the Ambassador did not entirely believe him. Pimyt was the sort of person who had schemes within schemes, and fallback positions to protect himself while sacrificing others.

As attaché to the former Doge Lorenzo del Velli, Pimyt had connections to leaders of the Merchant Prince Alliance, and for all Uncel knew he might have spilled the plans to them. Of course, the HibAdus had systems to check on such things, a way of taking cellular samples from Pimyt and others (and even from Uncel), samples that they could read in laboratories to obtain information. Uncel’s own father had developed the biotechnology and had been well-rewarded for it. Though VV held no legal rights to the particular patents involved with reading cells, since the patents were considered high-security assets of the state, he recalled how as a child his father had shown him that biological cells contained memories—memories that could be read in order to obtain evidence of a crime or of disloyalty to the government. It was the ultimate police tool, and a key contribution of the Adurians to the HibAdu Coalition.

But Hibbils were crafty. They possessed significant technology of their own, and might even have secret methods of thwarting the cellular lie-detection system of the Adurians. Pimyt was with the Humans now, ostensibly on a clandestine HibAdu assignment. Uncel would like to be a proverbial fly on the wall around that one.

The buzz of conversation intensified around him, and he heard exclamations. Looking up at the speaking balcony, Uncel gasped at the sight of three peculiar figures standing there, all dressed in orange-and-gray robes. HibAdu colors.

From their bodies and facial appearances, he thought two were men and one a woman. They were quite different from any galactic race he had ever seen before, but familiar to him at the same time, in a haunting and disturbing sort of way. A single word came to his mind, one he dared not utter, because he strongly suspected that these were the HibAdu leaders. At long last, they were presenting themselves.

Freaks
.

He couldn’t help the thought, though he knew it was dangerous. Their heads were of the Adurian insectoid shape, with large, bulbous eyes. But the eyes were pale yellow instead of the darker shades typical of Adurians, while their heads and exposed hands had Hibbil features. All three leaders were fur covered, and they had stunted bone structures. These were laboratory-grown people, horrific hybrids of the two races.

The male freak in the center was the tallest, if he could be called tall. Throughout the reception hall, no one spoke a word, and everyone stiffened up. Uncel felt a shortness of breath, and tried to calm himself. He hoped it was just a joke, something the Adurian lab scientists had cooked up.

“I am High Ruler Coreq,” the robed monster at the center said, in a whiny voice that sounded Adurian. Motioning to his left and right, he identified the other male as Premier Enver and the female as Warlord Tarix, and then added, “We are, as many of you have surmised, laboratory-bred, but make no mistake about it. This does not make us inferior to any of you in any way. On the contrary, we are far superior in every way imaginable.”

“Gaze upon us and see the future,” Premier Enver said. This one sounded more like a Hibbil, with a deeper voice. “One day, when the time is right, an entire race of HibAdus will be created, and there will be no need for any other races to exist.”

A chill ran down VV Uncel’s spine, and he heard an uneasy murmuring around him.

Warlord Tarix had something to add, in an echoing voice that carried deadly undertones. “Our enemies are on their knees, making their last stands. We have conquered every Human world except for two, and every Mutati world save for one.” She smiled cruelly, revealing sharp white teeth. “They cannot hold out much longer.”

Then, eerily, the three of them spoke in synchronization: “To retain what we have gained, our forces have established impregnable defense systems on every conquered planet. Thanks to Hibbil ingenuity, we have wide-range sensor-guns that sweep considerably more than the areas around pod stations, as the Humans have. Our sensors encompass entire planets. If any unauthorized podship appears, it will be blasted into oblivion.”

The triumvirate began to clap, as if for themselves. Everyone in the reception hall joined in, including Ambassador Uncel, but he felt a dark gloom seeping into his soul.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Those who adapt, survive. This basic rule applies to all living things, and to all places they exist in the universe. Biological creatures, being much smaller and weaker than the natural forces of their surroundings, can only control their environments to limited extents. When things change around them, they must change as well. Or die.

—Master Noah Watanabe, Journal of the Cosmic Sea

It could have been much worse.

At least that was the first impression Princess Meghina got when the space station stopped tumbling and the gravitonics system went back on. The glax-walled gambling room on the orbiter had righted itself, and was lit with soft illumination coming through the windows. But was it really over? And what in the world had happened?

She crawled out from under the gaming table and assessed the bumps and bruises on her face and body. Around her, others did the same. Some were groaning, but as she saw them move, it didn’t look like anyone was seriously injured. Pimyt stood on top of the upside-down gaming table, complaining that one of his hips hurt. His tunic was torn, showing silvery fur on his chest.

Meghina’s dagg whined, and scampered over debris to reach her. The large black animal licked her hand, where a bruise was beginning to show.

“Thank you, Orga ,” she said with a gentle smile. “That makes me feel better already.”

“Are you all right?” It was Kobi Akar, the impeccably dressed Salducian diplomat who was one of her immortal companions. He stood over her, looking down with concern in his dark, close-set eyes. Though he had always been nice enough to her, she’d never really liked him that much. There seemed to be an undercurrent to him, something just beneath the surface that was decidedly unpleasant. Exactly what that might be, she had never been certain. But she didn’t admire the way he sometimes alluded to getting away with things that others could not, because of his diplomatic immunity. Even so, he could be funny and witty at times, and the others in her elite group of elixir-immortals all seemed to like him.

Typical of his race, Akar was sturdily built, with an oblong head, two small, crablike pincers for hands, and a multi-legged underbody concealed beneath a long robe. The Salducians, while trading partners and military allies of the Merchant Prince Alliance, were a galactic race of their own, and had settled in only a small sector of the galaxy.

“I’m fine,” Meghina said. She looked around. “And the others?”

“All minor injuries, it appears.”

“That’s good.” She rose to her feet and gazed out through the clearglax walls in all directions, onto a star-encrusted canvas of space. Looking down along the connected modules of the space station, she noticed large dents that had not been there before, and jagged pieces hanging loosely from sections that were too badly damaged to be saved by airtight emergency doors. Beyond this startling view, she saw something just as unsettling: a brown planet that was obviously not Canopa, where they had been orbiting previously. Sunlight came from behind the orbiter.

An odd, queasy feeling came over her. “Where are we?”

Akar scratched the thin line of hair on his forehead, the last patch of his hairline. “Hard to say.”

He was considered handsome by his people, and was reputed to enjoy the company of many mistresses. As for herself, the courtesan Princess Meghina had never found him or any other Salducian male physically attractive, and his quirks and deficiencies were irritating. He looked worried now, but often had a rather artificial smile on his overlarge mouth.

Pimyt limped past her, grimacing in pain from his injured hip. “We need medical packs,” he said. He went down a short stairway to the corridor door, and shouted back, “I’ll see what I can find.”

“This space station is seriously damaged,” someone said.

A man’s voice came over the onboard com-system. “I am Colonel Truitt of the Red Berets. All passengers are advised to make your way to emergency stations and put on survival suits.”

“We’re in one of the emergency stations now,” Lorenzo said.

Someone activated ceiling hatches, causing nets to drop down slowly, containing life-support suits and emergency supply canisters. Moments later, Red Beret soldiers entered the chamber, opened the nets, and began handing out suits. The emergency doors for this module, which were supposed to be airtight, were leaking.

“But there are immortals among us,” said Prince Okkco, a nobleman with wavy white hair. “They do not need life-support.”

“Everyone puts on a suit,” Lorenzo said, with a scowl. “No exceptions.”

“We are orbiting an unknown planet in an unknown solar system,” one of the Red Berets said, looking at the readings on a handheld device.

One of his companions, with a similar unit, said, “We’re still taking astronomical readings, but nothing looks familiar.”

In a few minutes, everyone in the chamber including the Red Berets had put on puffy, pale blue survival suits. But they left the face plates hinged open, since the on-board air systems were still functioning.

More guests and soldiers from other portions of the orbiter entered the wrecked gambling hall, since it was one of the principal emergency stations on the orbiter. Colonel Truitt came in as well, a tall man with a thick mustache. He conferred with Lorenzo and Pimyt.

Presently, Lorenzo announced, “Though we’ve lost one of our primary shuttles, we still have two in working order. We’re going to use one of them to send a scouting party down to that planet, and see what we can find out. Our scanners show it has a breathable atmosphere and moderate temperatures on the surface, so we won’t need these suits when we get down there.”

“There could still be unknown dangers,” Meghina said. “As one of the immortals, I’d like to volunteer to go down with the scouting party.”

“No,” Lorenzo said. “You’re staying here. But I’m going down, and so is Pimyt.”

“Why?” Meghina said.

And Pimyt said, too, almost at the same time: “Why?”

“Because,” Lorenzo said, “ one of you is my wife, and the other is my attaché, and both of you will do as I command.”

In shared reluctance, Meghina and Pimyt nodded.

Then the Salducian diplomat said, “If you want an immortal to go along, I’ll do it.”

“No, you’d just get in the way,” Lorenzo said. He scanned the four Human immortals, and seemed to consider taking one or more of them along instead. Then he looked at Pimyt and said, “Make the necessary arrangements. Add a dozen elite Red Beret guardsmen to the scouting party.”

“Fourteen in all, then,” the Hibbil said.

“Right.”

As she watched her husband take charge of the situation, Meghina felt a renewed surge of attraction for him. He looked rather handsome in this time of crisis, and was displaying courage that she hadn’t seen before.

Noticing her looking at him, Lorenzo smiled. But his resolve appeared suddenly shaky. As if to conceal this, he turned and led the others out the door into the corridor.

* * * * *

When the shuttle dropped down through the atmosphere, Pimyt saw predominantly brown hues on the planet, from horizon to horizon. The world had grayish-brown mountains and formations of rock in other muted colors, but he saw no evidence of water or plants.

He heard one of the guardsmen comment on the same thing.

Looking at them, Pimyt said, “If the air’s breathable there must be water and plants somewhere.”

“Maybe our instruments are wrong,” one of the guardsmen said. A lieutenant with gold stripes on his shoulder, Eden Rista was the highest ranking guardsmen in the party.

“Instruments are still showing good oxygen levels,” another guardsman said, as he stood at a console. They were only a few hundred meters above the surface. The shuttle slowed, fired retro-rockets, and set down on a wide expanse of rock.

Four guardsmen went through an airlock and stepped outside, leaving the rest of the party on the shuttle. As Pimyt watched through a porthole, the men performed several tests, using handheld instruments. Then they swung aside the face plates on their suits, and gave the all-clear signal.

Now the entire party disembarked, and climbed down from the rock onto an expanse of dry, dusty earth. The air was a little cool, even in direct sunlight. That didn’t bother Pimyt, but his companions wore jackets.

Moving off by himself, Lieutenant Rista held a ground-penetrating radar unit.

“Network of subterranean waterways down there,” he reported. “Average depth around thirty meters.”

“So, there is water here, after all,” Pimyt said. Looking at Lorenzo, he added, “If you want, sir, I could bring a hibbamatic down here and build something to dig, and to explore the waterways.”

“For what purpose?” Lorenzo asked.

“We’re in an unknown region, on an unknown planet,” the Hibbil said. “Maybe we should take soil, rock, and water samples. Comparing the data with galactic exploration records, it could give us information on where we are.”

“Let’s do it,” the former doge said.

An hour later, they had the hibbamatic set up on the ground. Pimyt made several settings on the machine, then began feeding cartridges of raw materials into the hopper on top.

In a short while, the little Hibbil stood at a glistening black machine, which he had assembled from components that the hibbamatic produced. The new machine was around the size of a small passenger car, except it had a seat on top, and handlebars.

“This thing is dual purpose,” he said. “Watch.”

Pimyt touched a button, and wheels began grinding on the bottom of the machine. Then he climbed onto the seat and plopped himself there, while holding onto the handlebars. The mechanisms started digging, and in short order it had produced a tunnel sloping down into the ground.

The tunnel had just enough headroom for the others to follow down the slope, on foot. At the bottom, Lorenzo found Pimyt on a flat section of rock inside a low-ceilinged rock cavern, by the edge of a stream. The Hibbil knelt beside the black machine, with lights on the unit illuminating the silvery, luminous surface of the cavern and the underground waterway. Pimyt was making adjustments. As he did so, the seat and handlebars melted into the surface of the machine, and like a shapeshifter it enlarged and morphed into a teardrop shape, with a windshield on the fat end.

“Four-man mini-sub,” Pimyt reported. “Perfect for underwater exploration.”

“Clever,” Lorenzo said, walking around the gleaming black boat. “But what does this have to do with taking soil, rock, and water samples?”

“Very little, perhaps,” Pimyt admitted, “but where there’s water there’s life. Or so the saying goes. Undoubtedly there are organisms in the water, but we’re looking for something more substantial. If anyone lives on this planet, we might find them beneath the surface.”

“Follow the water,” Lorenzo said.

“Precisely. And with instruments, we can always get back here.”

“Very well, but for only a couple of hours, at most. If we don’t find any evidence of meaningful life, we take the samples and go back to the orbiter.”

Pimyt nodded.

A number of the guardsmen were older, and said they had experience with a variety of machines. Lieutenant Rista designated two men to go in the sub. The other men lowered the machine into the water, where it bobbed on the surface. Climbing inside the sub, the two guardsmen familiarized themselves with the controls, taking the boat underwater and back up again. The twin engines purred smoothly.

Using a handheld unit, Lorenzo sent a comlink message up to the orbiter, informing them where the landing party was, and what they were doing.

“I should go,” Pimyt said, to Lorenzo. “If necessary, I can operate the sub, too. I’ve been watching them and listening in, and it looks easy enough to handle. How about you, sir? Want to take a little submarine ride?”

“Are you sure it’s safe?” Lorenzo asked. He shut off his comlink unit, replaced it in a holder at his belt.

Pimyt grinned. “Absolutely not.”

With a grimace, Lorenzo climbed into the four-man craft and took one of the two aft seats, in the narrowest section of the teardrop hull. Pimyt followed, and sat in the remaining seat directly beside him, while the two guardsmen sat side by side ahead of them, in the pilot and co-pilot chairs behind the windshield.

Slowly, the mini-sub proceeded downstream, casting a powerful headlight to illuminate the watery tunnel ahead, through murky darkness. At first they made their way on the surface of the water, like an ordinary motor-propelled boat.

“Low rock overhang ahead,” the pilot announced. He was much thinner and shorter than his companion, and proved to be entirely bald as well when he removed his cap and stuffed it in a uniform pocket.

“The water is deep enough to submerge,” the larger soldier said, reading an instrument panel.

“OK,” the pilot said. “Here we go.” He submerged the vessel, and they proceeded to the other side of the overhang, where they surfaced again. But only for a short distance. The waterway widened considerably, but across the entire width the ceiling dipped so low that they had to submerge again.

As they proceeded underwater, the big soldier looked back at Lorenzo and said, “Quite an adventure we’re on, sir.”

“I’m not afraid,” the former doge said, “not at all. I’ve seen much worse than this.”

But Pimyt heard fear in his voice, and this amused him. He’d never liked Lorenzo, and secretly enjoyed seeing him suffer. The Hibbil had other feelings as well, of a more aggressive nature. In his mind, he savored the possibilities.

Suddenly he felt the mini-sub’s speed increase dramatically, a strong thrust forward. Moments afterward, a warning buzzer went off.

The pilot swore loudly, and slammed the engines into hard reverse.