Fugitive of the Stars

CHAPTER II

On Skereth, once in a lifetime a man may see the sun or catch a glimpse of the stars. Otherwise he lives beneath a wall of eternal cloud and takes the universe beyond on faith. Some people said that that peculiarity of nature explained the whole psychology of Skereth.

But, in the port city of Skambar, there was no need either of the stars or the single unseen moon to light the long nights. The glare of neons did that job with eye-searing efficiency. Skambar was a new city, grown up all haphazard around the big modern spaceport that served Skereth's lively interstellar trade among the Fringe worlds. There were blocks of tall new buildings set on fine straight streets, and then suddenly you were past them into a jumble of plastic shacks and jerry-built rooming houses, bars and shops and more bars and dubious-looking places with shuttered windows, gambling dens and still more bars, the whole mass of it shrieking with red and blue and green and yellow light. These lesser streets were narrow and inclined to wander furtively. By daylight, under the tawny blaze of the sky they looked cheap, frowsy and unclean. By night, while not exactly a fairyland, they were attractive enough to men who had been a long time in space.

Vinson was finding it delightful. Horne had been at some pains to take him to the better places he had found when he was here before. There were girls, quite human girls because the dominant people of Skereth were quite human, and some of the girls had cried out, “Jim! Jim!” and been glad to see him, which made Horne feel pleasantly experienced, so that he swaggered just a little before Vinson's admiring gaze. The girls were glad to have drinks bought for them, and they made much of Vinson, and altogether it looked as though it was going to be a good evening.

"Remember,” he said dryly to Vinson, “that the nights here are as long as three of ours, so space yourself. That palegreen stuff will have you flat on your ear."

"It tastes like soda-pop,” Vinson said.

"It pops, all right. Like the top of your head off.” Horne lay back on the shoddy cushions that were provided for sitting, finding his head most pleasurably propped against something soft and warm. The room was big, with a low ceiling and no windows. Inside here the light was soft and dim, the warm air murmurous with voices and laughter. Horne thought fleetingly of Denman out on Allamar Two, crouched in some dismal village with his charges hunkered around him like so many unhappy Saint Bernards. He shook his head, and once again he felt a faint twinge of guiltiness.

The food, placed on tiny tables islanded among the cushions, was very good, and the girls were friendly, and presently the lights dimmed even more, except for one pale shaft in the middle of the room, and, a girl appeared in it carrying a curious basket woven of rushes. She was not a human. Her beauty was faintly shocking at first, and Horne heard Vinson draw his breath in sharply. The girl bent her silvery head over the basket and opened it, and then she began to dance.

Golden globes of light no bigger than might be circled by a thumb and finger floated up out of the basket and joined in her dancing.

Her body was slender and glinty and pliant as mist. It drifted and swayed in the single shaft of light, and the golden globes swirled around her, making a game out of the dancing, swooping with a rush like bursting bubbles up the slim curve of her flank, evading her hands as she laughed and caught at them, clothing her in veils of soft radiance and then whipping free in a kind of comet's tail to follow shining behind her head. At the last she lifted up her arms and all the shining globes were gathered into them, and she let them fall in a glittering cascade back into the rush basket, and closed the lid, and all the lights went out. When they came back on again the girl and her basket were gone.

In the midst of the applause, Horne saw that two young men had come up and were standing close by, looking down at him and Vinson.

They were natives of Skereth, with the light hair and clean-cut features of their race. They were little more than youngsters… students, Horne thought, out for an evening of glamor and excitement among the wild life of Skambar. They were staring with great interest at his and Vinson's shoulder patches with the insigne of the interlocking suns on them.

"You're off the Federation packet, aren't you?” one of them asked, and Horne nodded. They both smiled, and the other one said, “May we buy you a drink?"

Horne said that was an invitation he couldn't refuse, and he and Vinson and the girls rearranged themselves on the cushions so that there was room for them to sit down.

They wanted to talk about space and spacemen. They were starry-eyed about it, but they also wanted to know how much it paid and what conditions were like on the Federation ships. After a while Vinson said, “But you people aren't in the Federation."

"We're going to be in it,” said one of the boys. “And soon. Morivenn's going to Vega in your ship. We thought you knew that."

"Outside of our department,” Horne said, “which is navigation, we don't know anything."

"I remember hearing some talk of an envoy, or envoys,” Vinson said, “but we thought it might be just rumor. Who is Morivenn?"

"The leader of the Pro-Federation party here on Skereth,” said the boy. His name was Mica, and he had eyes of a darker blue than one would ever see on Earth, so dark they were almost black. “Oh, he'll get us in, all right, one way or another. They can't keep us barred off forever from the big wide universe beyond the Fringe."

"Who's they?” asked Horne.

"The anti-Federation party,” said the other boy, and grinned. His name was Durin, or something like it, and there was nothing at all extraordinary about him. “They've had things their own way so long that they just can't bear to think of competition. But it's got to come."

"And when it does come,” said Mica, “we'd like to get berths on a Federation ship. You see, our traders just make the same stupid little circuit around the posts out here on the Fringe, and we want to go to Vega, and Altair and the Cluster Worlds, and all the other places there are to see."

"What are the girls like at Vega?” asked Durin.

"What kind do you want?” Vinson said with a princely gesture. “You name it, we have it.” He was Vega-born, and proud of it.

"We've just got to get Skereth into the Federation,” said Durin, and closed his eyes, sighing in anticipation of the myriad Vegan girls.

The pale-green stuff he had been drinking was beginning to make Horne's head buzz just a trifle. The warm scented air began to be oppressive. He stretched and got up.

"Thanks for the drinks,” he said, “and good luck to you. Who knows, maybe you'll be serving with one of us on a ship sometime.” He turned to Vinson. “I'm going out for some air. I'll just remind you again that the nights are long here, and you can take it from there."

"I'm happy right here,” said Vinson. “Now, I've got both the girls."

The two boys jumped up. “We'll go with you. There's a place down in the Nightbirds’ Quarter. You ever been there?"

Horne said he hadn't.

"Well,” said Durin, “you can't really say you've been to Skereth if you haven't been there.” He added, “You can get plenty of fresh air on the way."

"What's the Nightbirds’ Quarter?” Vinson wanted to know.

"Where the Nightbirds live."

"Logical enough. Now what are Nightbirds?"

"Just what they sound like. An avian race from the far north where the nights go on forever, and they don't care much for daylight. There's a lot of them on the night shifts at the spaceport, and the pleasure spots down in their quarter really swing."

"I'm game,” said Horne. “Let's go.'

Vinson hesitated, torn between present pleasures and the thought of being left alone while there was a party going on somewhere else. After a moment he kissed the girls good-bye and caught up with Horne and the two boys in the doorway.

The night air smelled good, fresh and cool. The gaudy streets were cheerfully noisy, populous without being crowded. The boys chattered away, pointing out this or that or making some comment on the local life and customs. The buzzing in Horne's head went away and was replaced by a buoyant sense of well-being.

"That green stuff,” he said to Vinson, “is the greatest drink in the galaxy, if you handle it right."

Vinson smiled. They walked along a narrow street into the quarter of the Nightbirds. The lights were softer here, more subdued and blue-tinted so that the shoddiness of the buildings was concealed as though by moonlight. Strains of very odd music filtered out, through doors and louvered windows.

"It's just a little way ahead,” said Mica.

A company of creatures moved across the blue-lighted street, going with light gliding steps and a rustle of white plumage. Vinson's eyes followed them, huge with wonder, and Horne thought, I know how he feels. I still can get a lifting of the heart and a gladness that I was born now when men are not chained to one little planet but can go from star to star.

"Just there,” said Mica, pointing.

A group of men were standing in front of the place, four or five of them, talking together as though they had just come out and were wondering where to go next. Horne went to pass them, with Vinson and the boys behind him.

He found his way blocked, and one of the men had reached out and was fingering his shoulder-patch.

"Federation."

It was a statement, not a question. Horne felt a hot twinge shoot down his spine and through his belly. “Yes,” he said, and felt all his muscles tightening against the sudden electric sense of trouble in the air.

He smiled and tried again to pass.

"Federation,” said the man again, in a louder tone, and other’ voices took it up and sent the word on into the dim recesses of the building.

"Listen,” said Mica nervously from behind Horne. “Listen, we don't want any trouble…"

More men came out of the building. Horne had already begun to move backward, his shoulder butting against Vinson's and feeling the obstinacy of it.

"Listen,” said Mica again, his voice cracking.

One of the men reached out and slapped him hard. “If you were just a little older I'd break your neck for a traitor.” He slapped him again. “Go on, run!"

Horne heard Mica's feet going away. Durin had been muttering something about anti-Federation people and bad feeling, and then Horne didn't hear Durin any more, only another pair of feet going quickly away. For him and Vinson it was far too late to run, though he would have been willing to. But the men had him penned in against the wall. Horne was astonished and shaken. There had been a lot of feeling on Skereth the last time he had been here, against and for the Federation, but nothing like this.

He said evenly, still hoping against hope, “Would you mind letting us through?"

"When we're through talking,” said the man who had spoken first. He pushed Horne gently against the wall. “If you don't want trouble, mister, then stay off of other peoples’ worlds and out of other peoples’ business."

Vinson said, “I take it you're unhappy about the delegation going to Vega.” The answer was obvious, and nobody bothered to give it. Vinson continued, “Then why don't you take it up with them?"

"Because,” said the leader, “they're not here, and you are."

Vinson said, “Well, in that case…” and hit him.