Close to Critical

VI. INFORMATION; NAVIGATION; OBSERVATION

“How much of a lead will that give you, Doctor?”

Raeker answered without taking his eyes from the robot’s screens. “Presumably the rest of the night, and a trifle more—however long it takes that river to dry up after sunrise. It’s twenty hours or so to sunrise.”

“Maybe the plants will grow enough to hide the robot’s trail in that tune; will they?”

“I’m afraid I have no idea.”

“After observing the life of this planet for sixteen years? Really, Doctor, I should have supposed you’d know something in that time.”

“In all sixteen of those years I never had occasion to note just what kind of vegetation is on the north bank of this river,” Raeker retorted a trifle impatiently, “and all I know from Nick about Swift is that he’s a good tracker; I have no quantitative information as to just how good. Really, Councillor, I know you have been living in Hell the last three weeks; but if you can give only destructive criticism I can say that you won’t be helping her much. You’re getting to sound like Aminadabarlee.”

“I’m glad you mentioned that.” Rich did not sound at all offended. “I know, Doctor, that it is difficult for you to bear up under Drommian mannerisms; they are a rather impulsive race, and while they are very courteous by their standards, those standards are not quite identical to ours. Aminadabarlee is an unusually restrained member of his race; that is why he holds the position he does; but I must suggest very strongly that you check your natural impulse to answer sharply when he gets insulting, as he occasionally does. There is no point in straining his capacity for tolerance. I assure you most solemnly that if he loses his self-control sufficiently to make an emotional report to Dromm, every word he has said about the results to Earth would be literally fulfilled. There wouldn’t be a war, of course, but the result of a ninety per cent— or even a fifty per cent—cut in Earth’s interstellar trade would be fully as disastrous as any war. You must remember that to most of the races we know, Earthmen and Drommians are equally alien; they are both ‘creatures from the stars,’ and what one race says about the other would have quite a ring of authority to most of them. This may sound a trifle exaggerated to you, but this little situation is potentially the most ticklish political and diplomatic affair that has occurred in my lifetime.”

That actually took Raeker’s eyes from the screen for a moment.

“I didn’t realize that,” he said. “Also, I’m afraid I must admit that it will make no difference in my efforts to rescue Easy and ’Mina; I was doing my best already.”

“I believe that, and I’m grateful; but I had to tell you about the other matter. If Aminadabarlee weren’t here it wouldn’t have been necessary; but since you can’t in decency avoid seeing him, it’s very necessary that you understand him. Whatever he says, however intolerant or impatient or downright insulting he may be, you must keep your own control. I assure you he won’t take your calmness as a sign of fear; his people don’t think that way. He’ll respect you the more for it—and so will I.”

“I’ll do my best,” promised Raeker, “but right now I’ll be just as glad if he doesn’t come in for a few hours. I’m busy juggling Nick across the river, and if you want to regard Nick as my child you won’t be too far wrong. I don’t mind talking as long as everything is going all right, but if I stop hi the middle of a sentence don’t be surprised. Have you been talking to the kids?”

“Yes. They’re bearing up pretty well. It’s lucky that Drommian is there; I’m afraid Easy would have let go all over the place if she didn’t feel responsible for her ’Mina. He seems to feel that she’s keeping everything in hand, so for the moment there’s no morale problem. Did I tell you that Mr. Sakiiro found that some of the inspection ports had been left open on the bathyscaphe, so that the electrolysis leads were undoubtedly corroded by outside atmosphere? He has some idea of getting your people down there to do a repair job.”

“I know. That’s all I can think of at the moment, too; but to do that means I have to find them, and they have to find the ’scaphe. It’s some comfort that the kids can stay alive almost indefinitely down there; the machine will keep them in food, water, and air.”

“That’s true; but Easy won’t last forever under three gravities.”

Raeker frowned. “I hadn’t thought of that. Have you any medical information on how long she’s likely to hold out?”

“None at all. The problem has never come up for such a young person. Adults have stood it for a good many months, I know.”

“I see. Well, I should think you’d have a good excuse to be nastier than Aminadabarlee, at that rate. The gravity won’t bother his youngster.”

“No, but something else will. The synthesizers in the bathyscaphe produce human food.”

“So what? Isn’t Drommian metabolism like ours? They breathe oxygen, and I’ve seen them eat our food here on the Vindemiatrix”

“In general, yes; in detail, no. Their vitamin requirements are different, though they do use fats, carbohydrates, and proteins as we do. ’Mina will almost certainly start suffering from vitamin deficiency diseases if he stays there long enough; and like me, his father has no exact medical information.”

Raeker whistled, and the frown stayed on his face. Rich thought for a moment that something had occurred on Tenebra to worry him, but the screens still showed nothing but river bed. The stream must have been fully a mile wide, judging by the time it was taking to cross it. The diplomat remained silent, and watched while the robot forged ahead and, finally, out on the far side of the great watercourse.

It was still raining, of course, and without Nick’s torch it was necessary to use a spotlight to locate descending raindrops. After about ten minutes in normal air, Nick began to revive; and when he was once again himself, and had found and kindled a torch, the journey went on as before, except for the lack of anxiety over Swift’s whereabouts.

Shortly after this, the relief operator appeared. Raeker didn’t want to leave the controls, since the situation below was still rather ticklish, but he knew there was really no choice. The human being didn’t live who could maintain decent alertness through a whole Tenebran night. He brought the other man up to date and, with several backward glances, left the observation room.

“I don’t think I can sleep for a while,” he remarked to Rich. “Let’s go back to communications and see how Easy’s making out.”

“She was asleep a couple of hours ago,” replied the girl’s father. “That’s why I came to see what you were up to. No harm in checking, though.” He added after a moment’s silence, “I like to be there when she wakes up.” Raeker made no comment.

Nothing further had happened, according to the communication watch officer, but the two settled down in view of the bathyscaphe screen. No one had much to say.

Raeker was more than half asleep when Easy’s voice came from the set.

“Dad! Are you there?” Rich might have been as drowsy as Raeker, but he answered instantly.

“Yes, dear. What is it?”

“We’re moving. ’Mina’s still asleep, and I didn’t want to wake him, but I thought I’d better tell you.”

“Tell everything you can to Dr. Raeker; he’s here, and knows Tenebra better than anyone else.”

“All right. You remember the first night we landed I thought we were on solid ground and the lake was getting deeper, don’t you?”

“Yes, Easy. We decided that the rain was diluting the acid in which you had fallen, so its density was going down and you weren’t floating so high.”

“That’s right. After a while the side windows were covered so we couldn’t even see the rain, and each night before morning the top one is covered too; we’re entirely under water.”

“That’s using the word a bit loosely, but I see what you mean. In that case you can’t see out at all, I should think; how do you know you’re moving tonight?”

“We can see, with the lights on; we’re at the bottom of the lake or ocean or whatever it is, and the lights show the rocks and some funny things I suppose are plants. We’re going by them slowly, sort of bouncing, and the ship is rocking a little from tune to time. I can hear the scrapes and bumps whenever we touch.”

“All right. I can’t see that it’s anything in particular to worry about, though I’d like to know why the change from the last five nights. When daylight comes the extra water will evaporate and you’ll float again as usual, assuming you’re still in the lake or sea. If, as seems rather likely, you’re being carried down a river, you may find yourselves stranded on dry land somewhere when it dries up. At least you’ll have a more interesting landscape to watch tomorrow, if that’s the case.

“The only problem we have here is locating you. If you’re going to start drifting around every night, directing our people to you is going to be hard, to say the least. You’ll have to give us every bit of information you can on your surroundings, so we can pass it on to Nick and his friends. You were very smart to call us just now, the moment you discovered you were moving.”

“Thanks, Doctor. We’ll keep our eyes open. I want to meet your friend Nick.”

“We’re doing our best to see that you do. If, as we hope, you landed within a few dozen miles of the robot, the chances are you’re being washed toward the same ocean that gave him trouble a couple of nights ago; we have reason to suspect that oceans don’t get very large on Tenebra, at least by Earthly standards, so getting you together may not take too long.”

“Maybe I’d better stay awake for a while, so as to report to you if anything special happens, and then let ’Mina take a watch while I sleep.”

“That sounds perfect. We’ll always have someone listening up here.” Raeker opened the mike switch and turned to Rich. The diplomat was eyeing him intently.

“How much of that was for Easy’s morale, and how much for mine?” he asked.

“I made it sound as good as possible,” admitted Raeker, “mostly for the kids. However, I didn’t lie. I’m reasonably sure I can get my crew to the ’scaphe before too long; I admit I’m less sure what they can do after they find it. We really haven’t the slightest idea of the conditions on the outside of that machine, remember; we’ll have to wait for Nick’s report before we decide what instructions to give him.”

Rich stared hard at the biologist for a moment, then relaxed slightly. “That sounds reasonable,” he said. If he had planned to say any more, he wasn’t given the chance.

“It doesn’t sound reasonable to me!” The shrill voice needed no identification. “Every human being hi this place is dithering a lot of nonsense about teaching a bunch of savages to rewire a machine two thousand years ahead of their culture, and then risk not only a human but a Drommian life on their having done it properly. It’s the sheerest nonsense I ever heard. It’s hard to believe that anyone over three years old would fail to realize that nothing but another bathyscaphe has the slightest chance of making the rescue, but I haven’t heard a single word about such an activity. I suppose men put the expense before the lives involved.”

“I haven’t heard of any messages proposing such an activity going to Dromm, either,” snapped Raeker. “I’ve heard that it has an industrial capacity at least equal to Earth’s, and it’s not a parsec farther from Altair. I suppose Drommians don’t bother to repair situations that they feel are someone else’s fault, whether lives are involved or not.”

None of the human beings present could tell just how Aminadabarlee reacted to this; Rich gave him no time to say anything.

“Dr. Raeker, you’re forgetting yourself,” he said sharply. “If Councillor Aminadabarlee will come with me, I will discuss with him any points of value which may have been hidden in your words, as well as the very valuable suggestion he made himself. If you have any more courteous thoughts to’add, get them to me. Please come, sir.” The diplomats stalked out, and the watch officer glanced uneasily at Raeker.

“You don’t talk to Drommians like that,” he ventured at last.

“I know,” replied Raeker. “Rich was telling me, a little while ago. I didn’t like to do it, but it seemed to me that Rich needed something to take his attention off his kid.”

“You’re taking a chance. That fellow could easily turn his whole race so anti-Earth that every human trader side the solar system would be forced out of business.”

“So everyone seems to feel,” replied the biologist a trifle uneasily. “I couldn’t really believe that things were that critical. Maybe I was a little hasty. Anyway, Rich will be busy for a while, and so will the Drommian; let’s concentrate on getting those kids out of trouble. I’ll keep my nose out of interracial diplomacy after this.”

“Frankly, that relieves me. How about that suggestion—building a new ’scaphe?”

“I’m no engineer,” retorted Raeker, “but even I have a pretty good idea how long that would take, even with the experience from the first one to help. I am a biologist, and my considered opinion is that both those youngsters would be dead before another bathyscaphe could be made ready. If Rich and the Drommian want to try it, I wouldn’t discourage them; the new machine will be useful, and I might even be wrong about the time factors. However, I believe seriously that we will have to run this rescue along the lines already planned.”

“And the Drommian was right about those?”

“You mean, that we plan to get Nick’s people to make the repairs? Yes. It’s not as ridiculous as Aminadabarlee makes it sound. I’ve been bringing those people up for nearly sixteen years; they’re as intelligent as human beings, judging by their learning rate, and they could certainly splice a few wires.”

The officer looked doubtful.

“As long as they splice the right wires,” he muttered. “What will they use for insulation?”

“There’s a glue they make—I showed them how, after some experiment—from animal scales. We’ll have to make sure it’s a nonconductor, but I’m not greatly worried about that.”

“Even though you think there’s sulphuric acid in their body fluids?”

“I said, not greatly worried,” admitted Raeker. “The main problem right now is bringing the parties together. You’re sure you can’t get me a closer fix on the robot and the ’scaphe?”

“Quite sure. They’re putting out different wave lengths, and I have no means of finding the dispersion factor of the planet’s atmosphere in that part of the spectrum, let alone getting the precise depth of the atmosphere itself or cutting down the inherent uncertainty of radio directional measurements. The chances, as I told you, are about fifty-fifty that the two are within forty miles of each other, and about nine out of ten that they’re not over a hundred miles apart. Better than that I can’t do, without radiations neither machine is equipped to transmit.”

“All right. I’ll just have to get information from Easy, and try to match it in with Nick’s maps. At least, they don’t have to get too close under our guidance; Nick will be able to see the ’scaphe’s lights for miles.” The officer nodded, and the two fell silent, watching the live screen. Nothing could be seen in it; if Easy was awake, as she had said she would be, she was not in the control room. Occasionally the men could hear a faint bumping or scraping sound; presumably the ship was still being carried with a current, but no landmark had attracted the girl’s attention as being worth reporting.

Raeker finally went to sleep hi his chair. The officer stayed awake, but the only message he received was to the effect that Easy was going to sleep and Aminador-neldo was taking over the watch. Nothing excited him, either, it seemed; the speaker remained silent after the human girl signed off.

For hour after hour the bathyscaphe bumped merrily on its way. Sometimes it stopped for a moment, sometimes for minutes on end; always the journey resumed, as vagaries in the current dislodged it from whatever barred its path. Easy woke up again, and attended to the problem of breakfast. Later she prepared a rather unappetizing dinner—so she said, anyway. Aminadorneldo was polite about it, blaming the deficiencies on the synthesizers. There’s not too much one can do with amino acids, fats, and dextrose, even if vitamin powders are available for seasoning. Tenebra’s long night wore on; Raeker served another watch in the robot’s control room, bringing Nick and Fagin to a point which he believed was fairly close to the rest of the party from the village. A single night on a planet which takes nearly a hundred hours to rotate can become rather boring—though it doesn’t have to be, Raeker thought wryly, as he recalled the one when Swift had made his raid.

Things looked up after sunrise—unfortunately, since he was getting sleepy again. Nick definitely recognized the ground over which they were passing, and stated flatly that they would meet his friends in another two hours; Raeker’s relief arrived, and had to be given an extremely detailed briefing; and a message came from the communications room that the bathyscaphe seemed to have stopped.

“Will you please ask Lieutenant Wellenbach if he can have visual communication rigged up between his office and this room?” Raeker asked the messenger who brought this information. “It begins to look as though I’ll have to be talking to the bathyscaphe and my pupils at the same time in the near future.”

“Certainly, sir,” replied the messenger. “There’ll be no particular difficulty about that, I’m sure.”

“All right. I’m going up to the comm room now to hear Easy’s report; I’ll come back here when the set is rigged.”

“But shouldn’t you get some sleep, Doctor?” asked his relief.

“I should, but I can’t afford to for a while. You stay on duty after I come back, and stop me if I start to do anything really silly.”

“All right.” The graduate student shrugged his shoulders. Raeker knew he was not being very sensible, but he couldn’t bring himself to leave the scenes of action at the moment. He headed for the communication chamber at top speed.

Rich and Aminadabarlee were there. The human diplomat had apparently calmed his Drommian colleague down, at least for the time being, since Raeker’s entry produced no fireworks. Easy was speaking as the biologist came in, and he said nothing until she had finished.

“…minutes since we last moved. It’s no lighter outside, but we’re not being rocked so hard; I think the current is weaker. It’s after sunrise, if I’ve been keeping track of time properly, so I guess the water’s boiling away.” She paused, and Raeker made his presence known.

“I take it, Easy, that neither you nor ’Mina saw any living creatures in the water while you were drifting.”

“Nothing but plants, or what I guess were plants.”

“How about right now?”

“Still nothing.”

“Then my guess is you haven’t yet reached the ocean. There were definitely animals there, according to Nick— of course, I suppose they might be frightened by your lights. Would you be willing to put them out for five minutes or so, then turn them on suddenly to catch anything which might have approached?”

“All right, as long as you don’t mind the control room lights on. There aren’t any windows here, so they shouldn’t matter. I’d be afraid to turn them out; I might hit the wrong switch in the dark when it was time to turn them on again.”

“You’re quite right. I never thought of that.”

“I’ve thought of a lot of things the last three weeks, down here.”

For an instant the light-hearted mask she had been holding for the benefit of her young companion slipped a trifle, and all the men saw a miserable, terrified twelve-year-old whose self-control was near its limit. Rich bit his lip and clenched his fists; the other human beings avoided his eyes, Aminadabarlee showed no emotion; Raeker wondered whether he felt any. Then the mask was back in place, and the merry-hearted youngster they had all known before the accident turned to the Drommian child.

“ ’Mina, will you go to the window in the big lab? Call when you’re there, and I’ll turn off the outside lights.”

“All right, Easy.” The long body crossed the men’s field of view and vanished again. Then his piping voice came from the other room, and the girl’s fingers flicked the light switches.

“Is it dark outside now, ’Mina?”

“Yes, Easy. I can’t see anything.”

“All right. Tell me if you do; we’ll keep it dark for a while. Dr. Raeker, is ’Mina’s father there?”

“Yes, Miss Rich.” Aminadabarlee answered for himself.

“Perhaps you’d better teD me and Dr. Raeker how long it takes your people’s eyes to get used to the dark.” Not for the first time, Raeker wondered what combination of heredity and upbringing had given Rich such an amazing child. He had known students ten years her senior whose minds would have been lagging far behind— she was thinking of important points sooner than Raeker himself, and he didn’t have her worries…

He brought his mind back to the present when she called his name.

“Dr. Raeker, ’Mina couldn’t see anything. Maybe five minutes wasn’t enough for your sea animals to get over their scare, of course.”

“Maybe,” admitted Raeker. “Maybe they’re just not interested in the bathyscaphe, for that matter. However, I think we’ll assume for the present that you haven’t reached the sea yet. It will be interesting to see whether you’re in a lake or stranded high and dry when the rain evaporates this morning. In either case, get us as complete a description of the country around as you possibly can.”

“I know. We’ll do our best.”

“We’re rigging up an arrangement that will let you talk more or less directly to Nick, when you’re in a position to give him directions, so you won’t have to trust my relaying of your reports. It should be ready soon.”

“That’s good. I’ve wanted to talk to him myself ever since I saw you in the robot control room. It looked like fun. But can’t I talk to him without going through you, if he finds me? Doesn’t this ship have outside mikes and speakers?”

“Oh, yes. Mr. Sakiiro will tell you how to turn them on. This is for the time before he finds you.”

“All right. We’ll call you again as soon as the water’s gone. ’Mina’s hungry, and so am I.” Raeker sat back and dozed for a few minutes; then he realized that he, too, was hungry, and took care of the situation. By this time he really wanted to sleep; but a call on the intraship system informed him that the communication equipment he had requested was ready for use. Sleepy or not, he had to try it out, so he went back to the robot control room. It was a good many hours before he left it again.

Nick and Fagin had just rejoined their friends at the new camping spot, and Nick was bringing the others up to date on events. Naturally, Raeker had to listen carefully; there was always the chance that Nick had seen things in a different light from the human observer. It had been known to happen; a human education had not given the Tenebrites human minds.

This time Nick’s report showed no signs of such difference, but Raeker had still to learn what the others had done. Since this, as Nick had planned, involved a great deal of mapping, some hours were spent hearing the various reports. It was customary for the maps to be shown to the robot for photographing in the Vindemiatrix; then each was explained in detail by the one who had drawn it, since not all the information could be crowded onto the paperlike leaves or summarized in conventional mapping symbols. These verbal accounts were recorded as spoken, and as a rule immediately pre-empted by the geological crew. Since the present area was very peculiar in that it lay close to the sea and was largely submerged each night, a great deal of time was spent in bringing the men’s maps and charts up to date.

Too much time, in fact.

Raeker’s relief had not received, perhaps, a really clear idea of the current danger from Swift; and Raeker himself had not given the matter a thought since his return to the observation room. Neither had thought to advise Nick to have anyone on the lookout for danger, and it was sheer chance that the danger was spotted in time.

Jane was telling her tale, and everyone else was listening and comparing her map with his own, when Betsey caught sight of something. It was just for an instant, and some distance away, showing among the shrubs on a hilltop. She knew the Teacher could not have seen it; she was aware that her own vision equipment had superior resolving powers to his, though she didn’t know the terminology. Her first impulse was to shout a warning, but fortunately before she yielded to it she got a better glimpse of the thing on the hill. That was enough for identification. It was a creature just like herself; and since all of Fagin’s community was standing around the teacher, that meant it must be one of Swift’s warriors. How he had gotten there so soon after things dried up she couldn’t guess at the moment.

Speaking softly so as not to interrupt Jane, she called to Nick and John, who were closest.

“Don’t make any move that would let him know you see him, but one of the cave men is watching us from the hill three quarters of a mile west-north-west. What should we do about it?”

Nick thought tensely for a moment.

“Just one is all I see. How about you?”

“Same here.”

“You’ve been around here, and I haven’t. Is it possible to go down the south or east side of this hill we’re on and make a long circuit so as to get on the other side of him without being seen?” Both John and Betsey thought for several seconds, reconstructing in their minds the regions they had mapped in the last day and a half. They spoke almost together, and in almost the same words.

“Yes, from either side.”

“All right, do it. Leave the group here casually— you’d both better go together; the herd is on the south side of the hill, and I would judge that some of the beasts are in his line of vision. You can go down and drive them around out of his sight, and we’ll hope he thinks you’re just doing an ordinary herding job. Once you and, the cattle are out of his sight, get around behind him as best you can, and bring him here, preferably alive. I’d like to know how he got here so soon, and so would Fagin, I’m sure.”

“Are you going to tell him, or the others?”

“Not yet. They’ll act more natural if they don’t know. Besides, there are still a couple of reports to be given, and Fagin never likes that to be interrupted, you know.”

“I know he usually doesn’t, but this seemed a sort of special case.”

“Special or not, let’s surprise him with your prisoner. Take axes, by the way; they seemed to impress those folks a lot, and maybe he’ll give up more easily.”

“All right.” John and Betsey pulled up their resting legs and started casually downhill toward the herd. None of the others appeared to notice them, and Nick did his best to imitate their attitude as the two scouts disappeared from sight.