A Day for Damnation

THIRTY-SEVEN

THERE WERE eight people in the room, all seated around a huge shiny-topped conference table. I knew Colonel Tirelli, Colonel Anderson, Jerry Larson, Dr. Zymph and Dr. Fletcher. General Poole was flanked by two of his aides. The three of them looked about as pleasant as a bowl of cafeteria chili.

"Based on the evidence of your videos," Dr. Zymph was saying, "we have to assume that communication with the bunnydogs or the worms may actually be possible." She still looked like a truck driver-she was a squat barrel-shaped woman with the expression of a bulldog and jowls to match. There was more gray in her hair than I remembered from Denver, but her voice was as fierce and gravelly as ever. "We were able to identify over a hundred and forty-three specific interactions among the creatures we are now calling `bunnydogs' and another eighty-seven interactions between the bunnydogs and the worms."

"And based on that evidence, you want to drop a man in their midst. Is that correct?" I asked.

"The mission specialist will be given every protection possible," grumbled General Poole. "You'll have two full squads behind you."

"But-essentially, what you're asking me to do is step out of a chopper and walk up to the first bunnydog I see and offer to shake hands, right?"

Dr. Zymph admitted it. "We want to put a man and a bunnydog face to face and see what happens."

"And if I don't get eaten, then you'll know it's safe for the real scientists to come out and talk," I finished.

"Not exactly, but-"

"But exactly!" I interrupted. "You want to stake me out like a goat. That's what you've outlined here."

"Lieutenant," said the general warningly.

"Excuse me, sir. I think it's time I said something about this idea. It's not going to work. At least not the way it's been explained here. I know I'm only a lieutenant-but I've had more experience with the worms and the bunnydogs-face to face-than anybody else in this room. That makes me the expert."

"That's right," said General Poole. "That's what makes you so important to the success of the mission. We want the benefit of your experience." He was wearing his plastic smile.

"If you really do mean that, General, then you'll listen to what I have to tell you. I've seen a lot of cute ideas come down from Denver and everywhere else about how we should deal with the worms. Some are-interesting. Most are dangerous. A few are damned foolish. But almost all of them require some dogface like myself to go out there and put his ass on the line to test somebody else's theory. If the mission fails, you don't lose anything but facebut the asshole who trusted you finds himself on the inside of a giant pink appetite with hair."

"So you are sayin'-?"

"-That if someone has to put his head in the lion's mouth, he should be allowed to choose his own lion."

Dr. Zymph cleared her throat. We all looked toward her. "I think you're exaggerating the situation a bit, Lieutenant-"

"No, I'm not! I'm the guy who froze three worms before we found out it was impossible. This makes even less sense than that. I admit I'm unpopular, but couldn't you find something a little less transparent?"

"Are you through?" she asked.

"For the moment. If I think of anything else," I growled, "I'll interrupt you again."

General Poole said quietly, "Lieutenant. Ah'll be glad to acknowledge the contributions of the Uncle Ira Group any day or night-but let me remind you that you are still part of Uncle Sam's army. When you took your oath you were signifyin' your willingness to give your life, if need be." He gave me his famous intimidation stare.

I gave him my defiant look. "I took an oath, not a suicide pact. Sir."

"Ah'm talking about service and commitment, Lieutenant."

"I hear you. And if I'd wanted to talk about service and commitment, I'd have joined a Tribe and played follow the leader."

"Ah take it that's your answer? You don't want this opportunity, after all."

"On the contrary, sir. I want this opportunity very much. But-if I'm the guy who's gotta get out of the chopper and say howdy to the bunnies and the worms armed only with my own good looks and sparkling personality, then it's my responsibility to make sure this thing is actually doable."

General Poole looked around in disgust. "This isn't getting us anywhere. Who else have we got? Preferably someone with balls."

"No one else who's qualified-" said Dr. Fletcher. "If we don't use McCarthy, then it'll have to be me or Jerry here-"

"That's out of the question," said Dr. Zymph.

Lizard said, "Excuse me-but I've seen McCarthy in action. He's neither a coward nor a fool. I'd like to hear what he has to say."

Poole glowered at her

"General," said Colonel Danny Anderson, "so would I."

The general shifted his glower to me. "All right... if you have something else to say, Lieutenant, let's hear it."

"Sir-you have me at a disadvantage. I've only had a half hour with this proposal, just enough time to recognize that it's seriously flawed. My apologies to those who wrote it." Jerry Larson looked grim. I mushed on. "But I don't think it takes into account who or what we're really dealing with."

Larson raised his hand. "If I may-" General Poole nodded; Larson continued, "I disagree! This proposal takes very much into account who or what we're dealing with." He opened his copy of the briefing book and turned it around for me to see. "We know how dangerous the worms can be. We're sending in enough firepower-"

"'I'hat's the first mistake," I said. "You've set this up as a military operation. You want to put men and machines down in the thickest part of the infested region to see who'll come and say hello. The worms have got to have some very bad feelings about choppers by now. We spread death from the sky. You're not even going to get close to them or the bunnies until you demilitarize the mission. You're going to have to put the team down and get the choppers out of there fast-or hide them. And hide anything that looks like a weapon. Maybe take no weapons at all.

"What if the bunnies or the worms are telepathic or have some other way of sensing hostile feelings? We're doomed before we start.

General Poole looked to Dr. Zymph. "Is that possible?"

Dr. Zymph pursed her lips sideways in a thoughtful grimace. "As a matter of fact, it just might be."

General Poole made it clear by his reaction that he did not like that answer. "Would you clarify that please?"

"Yes, of course. This information has not been made generally available yet, because we're not sure how to interpret it, but there is some kind of communication going on between the worms that we cannot explain. I believe you've seen Dr. Fletcher's demonstration-"

General Poole made an affirmative-sounding snort.

"Well-" said Dr. Zymph, "you should find this very interesting. In January of this year, we introduced three new weapons against the worms on the Cumberland Plateau in Tennessee. That's a fairly isolated area of infestation, so it gave us a pretty good test of the effectiveness of our operations.

"We tested three kinds of biocide capsules, two types of gas mines, and four different worm barriers. Within two months, the worms in the region had learned to recognize and avoid the mineseven when they were buried. They learned to ignore the heifers wearing the biocide collars, and they learned how to neutralize two of the fences.

"We then moved our region of testing to Western Canada. Within one week, we had established that the worms in the Canadian Rockies already knew how to recognize our gas mines and how to neutralize two of the test barriers. They did not take a single heifer we staked out. They took two ponies wearing biocide collars and none after that. When we went back to Tennessee, the worms there would not take ponies. They learned to recognize the biocide collars and they learned to pass the information on. Would you call that pretty fair intelligence, General?"

General Poole scowled. I could have kissed Dr. Zymph.

I said quickly, "So, the point is-we don't dare bring in anything that is identifiable as military hardware. That's one. The second point is-"

"Wait a minute. Ah still haven't digested the first one," said General Poole. He frowned at me. "First you tell me that it's your butt on the line, then you tell me you don't want any protection-"

"I don't want it visible," I said. "That's my second point. This proposal makes too many assumptions about the behavior of the worms and the bunnies, and I don't think we should even try to structure a contact like this proposal suggests. It would make sense only if we were trying to contact another human species. It doesn't make sense here."

"Ah'm sorry, Lieutenant." General Poole looked annoyed. "You've lost me. Ah understood the proposal clearly: set down and talk. "

My annoyance must have shown visibly because Dr. Fletcher reached over and stopped me with a touch on my arm. "I think that what Lieutenant McCarthy is saying is that we're not completely sure about the relationship of the bunnydogs and the worms. It's clear that we're seeing a level of partnership that doesn't exist on this planet, because there hasn't been enough time on our evolutionary clock for this kind of thing to happen.

"In our lab experiments, we have been able to train worms. We have not been able to talk to them. This suggests that we are dealing with an essentially unintelligent life-form. But-the other side of that argument is that we may have been dealing with immature or feral individuals, so there is as little possibility for communication as there would be with a three-year-old baby or a wolf-boy. So-that whole area of investigation is still unresolved.

"Now, as for the bunnydogs-well, the evidence of Lieutenant McCarthy's very extensive video record is that the bunnydogs do exert considerable influence, perhaps even control, over the worms. We very much need to know the source of that relationship and if it is possible for human beings to create a similar relationship with the worms. That's our goal in communication. Lieutenant McCarthy is suggesting that the bunnies and the worms may have goals or methods of their own that could be way beyond our best ability to extrapolate, and we need to allow for that in our planning. We need to be flexible."

General Poole looked around the table. He rubbed his jaw thoughtfully. The rest of us waited. Finally, he returned his attention to Dr. Fletcher. "For once, you make sense," he said.

Dr. Fletcher did a better job of concealing her annoyance than I would have. She merely said, "General, it's the same thing I've been saying all along."

General Poole shook his head and looked around the table. "When Ah walked in here, Ah thought this operation was all settled and needed only a Go-date, but the more Ah let you people talk, the more I wonder."

Dr. Zylnph looked like she wanted to interrupt, but General Poole held up a hand to stop her. "No-it's mah turn now! Rank still has some privilege. You people are the most confused operation in this entire effort. Mah orders are to provide the Science Section with total support. So Ah have to give you what you need. But Ah can't work like this. You people don't know what you want. First you want military backup, then you don't. Next you'll be telling me that the lieutenant here has to dance naked with the furballs-"

"That's not a bad idea either," I said softly.

The general heard me and shot me a withering look. "Before this goes any further, Ah want to see some agreement about what you want to do and how you want to do it. Now Ah'm through listenin' to you people squabble. Ah've got some real work to do. Don't come back to me until you're sure about what you want to do. Understand? This meetin' is adjourned."

The general stood up and walked out, followed by his aides. Lizard traded glances with Danny Anderson and then the two of them followed quickly. "General Poole-" She hadn't even glanced in my direction.

Dr. Zymph looked across the table at me. "You know, Lieutenant, you're even more deadly without a gun in your hands."

Then she got up and walked out. Jerry Larson muttered something unintelligible and followed.

I looked to Dr. Fletcher. "I don't get the job, huh?"

She touched my arm again. "James-you said what had to be said. Thank you for saying it."

"But-?"

"But I think you'd better make yourself scarce. This is going to take a while."