Search the Sky

7

THEY were well within detection range of Azor's radar, if any, and yet there had been no beeping signal that the planet's GCA had taken over and would pilot them down. Another blank? He studied the surface of the world under his highest magnification and saw no signs that it had been devastated by war. There were cities—intact, as far as he could tell, but not very attractive. The design ran-to huge, gloomy piles that mounted toward central towers.

Azor was a big world which showed not much water and a great deal of black rock. It was the fifth of its system and reportedly had colonized its four adjacent neighbors and their moons.

His own search radar pinged. The signal was followed at once by a guarded voice from his ship-to-ship communicator: "What ship are you? Do you receive me? The band is 798.44."

He hastily dialed the frequency on his transmitter and called, "I receive you. We are a vessel from outside your solar system, home planet Halsey. We want to contact a family named Cavallo of the planet Azor believed to be engaged hi building machine tools. Can you help us?"

"You are a male?" the voice asked cautiously. "In command or simply the communicator?"

"I'm a male and I'm in command of this vessel."

The voice said: "Then sheer off this system and go elsewhere, my friend."

"What is this? Who are you?"

"My name does not matter. I happen to be on watch aboard the prison orbital station 'Minerva.' Get going, my friend, before the planetary GCA picks you up."

Prison orbital station? A very sensible idea. "Thanks for the advice," he parried. "Can you tell me anything about the Cavallo family?"

"I have heard of them. My friend, your time is running out. If you do not sheer off very soon they will land you. And I judge from the tone of your voice that it will not be long before you join the rest of us criminals aboard 'Minerva.' It is not pleasant here. Good-by."

"Wait, please!" Ross had no intention at all of committing any crimes that would land him aboard a prison hulk, and he had every intention of fulfilling his mission. "Tell me about the Cavallo family—and why you expect me to get in trouble on Azor."

"The time is running out, my friend, but—the Cavallo family of machine tool builders is located in Novj Grad. And the crime of which all of us aboard 'Minerva' were convicted is conspiracy to advocate equality of the sexes. Now go!"

The carrier-wave hum of the communicator died, but immediately there was another electronic noise to fill the cabin—the beep of a GCA radar taking over the sealed landing controls of the craft.

Helena had been listening with very little comprehension. "Who was your friend, Ross?" she asked.

"Where are we?"

"I think," Ross said, "he way my friend. And I think we are—in trouble."

The ship began to jet tentative bursts of reaction mass, nosing toward the big, gloomy planet.

"That's all right," Helena said comfortably. "At least they won't know I disconnected a Senior Citizen." She thought a moment. "They won't, will they? I mean, the Senior Citizens here won't know about the Senior Citizens there, will they?"

He tried to break it to her gently as the ship picked up speed. "Helena, it's possible that the old people here won't be Senior Citizens—not hi your planet's sense. They may just be old people, with no special authority over young people. I think, in fact, that we may find you outranking older people who happen to be males."

She took it as a joke. "You are funny, Ross. Old means Senior, doesn't it? And Senior means better, wiser, abler, and in charge, doesn't it?"

"We'll see," he said thoughtfully as the main reaction drive cut in. "We'll see very shortly."

The spaceport was bustling, busy, and efficient. Ross marveled at the speed and dexterity with which the anonymous ground operator whipped his ship into a braking orbit and set it down. And he stared enviously at the crawling clamshells on treads, bigger than houses, that cupped around his ship; the ship was completely and hermetically surrounded, and bathed in a mist of germicides and prophylactic rays.

A helmeted figure riding a little platform on the inside of one of the clamshells turned a series of knobs, climbed down, and rapped on the ship's entrance port.

Ross opened it diffidently, and almost strangled in the antiseptic fumes. Helena choked and wheezed behind nun as the figure threw back its helmet and said, "Where's the captain?"

"I am he," said Ross meticulously. "I would like to be put hi touch with the Cavallo Machine-Tool Company of Novj Grad."

The figure shook its long hair loose, which provided Ross with the necessary clue: it was a woman.

Not a very attractive-looking woman, for she wore no makeup; but by the hair, by the brows and by the smoothness of her chin, a woman all the same. She said coldly, "If you're the cap-tarn, who's that?"

Helena said in a small voice, "I'm Helena, from Junior Unit Twenty-Three."

"Indeed." Suddenly the woman smiled. "Well, come ashore, dear," she said. "You must be tired from your trip. Both of you come ashore," she added graciously.

She led the way out of the clamshells to a waiting closed car. Azor's sun had an unpleasant bluish cast to it, not a type-G at all; Ross thought that the lighting made the woman look uglier than she really had to be. Even Helena looked pinched and bloodless, which he knew well was not the case at all.

All around them was activity. Whatever this planet's faults, it was not a stagnant home for graybeards. Ross, craning, saw nothing that was shoddy, nothing that would have looked out of place hi the best-equipped port of Halsey's Planet. And the reception lounge, or whatever it was, that the woman took them to was a handsome and prettily furnished construction. "Some lunch?" the woman asked, directing her attention to Helena. "A cup of tribrew, maybe? Let me have the boy bring some." Helena looked to Ross for signals, and Ross, gritting his teeth, nodded to her to agree. Too young the last time, too male this time; was there ever going to be a planet where he mattered to anyone?

He said desperately, "Madam, forgive my interruption, but this lady and myself need urgently to get in touch with the Cavallo company. Is this Novj Grad?"

The woman's pale brows arched. She said, with an effort, "No, it is not."

"Then can you tell us where Novj Grad is?" Ross persisted. "If they have a spaceport, we can hop over there hi our ship——"

The woman gasped something that sounded like, "Well!" She stood up and said pointedly to Helena,

"If you'll excuse me, I have something to attend to." And swept out.

Helena stared wide-eyed at Ross. "She must've been a real Senior Citizen, huh?"

"Not exactly," said Ross despairingly. "Look, Helena, things are different here. I need your help."

"Help?"

"Yes, help!" he bellowed. "Get a grip on yourself, girl. Remember what I told you about the planet I came from?

It was different from yours, remember? The old people were just like anybody else." She giggled in embarrassment. "They were!" he yelled. "And they are here, too. Old people, young people, doesn't matter. On my planet, the richest people were—well, never mind. On this planet, women are the bosses. Get it? Women are like elders. So you'll have to take over, Helena."

She was looking at him with a puzzled frown. She objected, "But if women are———"

"They are. Never mind about that part of it now; just remember that for the purposes of getting along here, you're going to be my boss. You tell me what to do. You talk to everybody. And what you have to say to them is this: You must get to Novj Grad immediately, and talk to a high-ranking member of the Cavallo Machine-Tool Company. Clear? Once we get there, I'll take over; everything will be under control then." He added prayerfully, "I hope."

Helena blinked at him. "I'm going to be your boss?" she asked.

"That's right."

"Like an elder bosses a junior? And it's legal?"

Ross started to repeat, "That's right," impatiently again. But there was a peculiar look in Helena's round eyes. "Helena!" he said warningly.

She was all concern. "Why, what is it, Ross?" she asked solicitously. "You look upset. Just leave everything to me, dear."

They got started on the way to Novj Grad—not in their ship (the woman had said there was no spaceport in Novj Grad), and not alone, so that Ross could not confirm his unhappy opinion of Helena's inner thoughts. But at least they were on their way to Novj Grad in the Azorian equivalent of a chartered aircraft, with Helena chatting happily with the female pilot, and Ross sitting uncomfortably on a narrow, upholstered strip behind.

Everything he saw in Azor confirmed his first impressions. The planet was busy and prosperous.

Nobody seemed to be doing anything very productive, he thought, but somehow everything seemed to get done. Automatic machinery, he guessed; if women were to have any chance of gaining the upper hand on a planet, most of the hard physical work would have to be fairly well mechanized anyhow. And particularly on this planet. They had been flying for six hours, at a speed he guessed to be not much below that of sound, and fully half of the territory they passed over was bare, black rock.

The ship began losing altitude, and the pilot, who had been curled up in a relaxed position, totally ignoring the aircraft, glanced at her instrument panel. "Coming hi for a landing," she warned. "Don't distract me right now, dear, I've got a thousand things to do."

She didn't seem to be doing any of them, Ross thought disapprovingly; all she did was watch varicolored lights blink on and off. But no doubt the ship landing, too, was as automatic as the piloting.

Helena turned and leaned back to Ross. "We're coming in for a landing," she relayed.

Ross said sourly, "I heard."

Helena gave him a look of reprimand and forgiveness. "I'm hungry," she mused.

The pilot turned from her controls. "You can get something at the airport," she offered eagerly.

"I'll show you."

Helena looked at Ross. "Would you like something?"

But the pilot frowned. "I don't believe there's any place for men," she said disapprovingly.

"Perhaps we can get something sent out for him if you like. Although, really, it's probably against the rules, you know."

Ross started to say with great dignity, "Thank you, but that won't be necessary." But he didn't quite get it out. The ship came in for its landing. There was an enormous jolt and a squawk of alarm bells and flashing lights. The ship careened crazily, and stopped.

"Oh, darn," complained the pilot mildly. "It's always doing that. Come on, dear, let's get something to eat We'll come back for him later."

And Ross was left alone to stare apprehensively at the unceasingly flashing lights and to listen to the strident alarms for three-quarters of an hour.

His luck was in, though. The ship didn't explode. And eventually a pallid young man in a greasy apron appeared with a tray of sandwiches and a vacuum jug.

"Up here, boy," Ross called.

He gaped through the port. "You mean come in?"

"Sure. It's all right."

The young man put down the tray. Something in the way he looked at it prompted Ross to invite him:

"Have some with me? More here than I can handle."

"Thanks; I believe I will. I, uh, was supposed to take my break after I brought you this stuff."

He poured steaming brew into the cup that covered the jug, politely pushed it to Ross and swigged from the jug himself. "You're with the starship?" he asked, around a mouthful of sandwich.

"Yes. I—the captain, that is—wants to contact an outfit called Cavallo Machine-Tool. You know where they are?"

"Sure. Biggest firm on the south side. Fifteen Street; you can't miss them. The captain—is she the lady who was with Pilot Breuer?"

"Yes."

The youngster's eyes widened. "You mean you were in space—alone—with a lady?"

Ross nodded and chewed.

"And she didn't—uh—there wasn't—well—any problem?"

"No," said Ross. "You have much trouble with that kind of thing?"

The boy winced. "If I've asked once I've asked a hundred times for a transfer. Oh, those jet pilots! I used to work in a roadside truck stop. I know truckers are supposed to be rough and tough; maybe they are. But you can't tell me that deep down a trucker isn't a lady. When you teil them no, that's that. But a pilot—it just eggs them on. Azor City today, Novj Grad tomorrow—what do they care?"

Ross was fascinated and baffled. It seemed to him that they should care and care plenty. Back where he came from, it was the woman who paid and he couldn't imagine any cultural setup which could alter that biological fact.

He asked cautiously: "Have you ever been—in trouble?" The boy stiffened and looked disapproving.

Then he said with a sigh: "I might as well tell you. It's all over the station anyway; they call me 'Bernie the Pullover.' Yes. Twice. Pilots both times. I can't seem to say no——" He took another long pull from the jug and a savage bite from a second sandwich.

"I'm sure," Ross said numbly, "it wasn't your fault." "Try telling that to the judge," Bernie the Pullover said bitterly. "The pilot speaks her piece, the medic puts the blood group tests hi evidence, the doctor and creche director depose that the child was born and is still living. Then the judge says, without even looking up, 'Paternity judgment to the plaintiff, defendant ordered to pay one thousand credits annual support, let this be a warning to you, young man, next case.' I shouldn't have joined you and eaten your sandwiches, but the fact is I was hungry. I had to sell my meal voucher yesterday to meet my payment. Miss three payments and——" He jerked his thumb heavenward.

Ross thought and realized that the thumb must indicate the orbiting prison hulk "Minerva." It was the man who paid here.

He demanded: "How did all this happen?" Bernie, having admitted his hunger, had stopped stalling and seized a third sandwich. "All what?" he asked indistinctly.

Ross thought hard and long. He realized first that he could probably never explain what he meant to Bernie, and second that if he did they'd probably both wind up aboard "Minerva" for conspiracy to advocate equality. He shifted his ground. "Of course everybody agrees on the natural superiority of women," he said, "but people seem to differ from planet to planet as to the reasons. What do they say here on Azor?"

"Oh—nothing special or fancy. Just the common-sense, logical thing. They're smaller, for one thing, and haven't got the muscles of men, so they're natural supervisors. They accumulate money as a matter of course because men die younger and women are the beneficiaries. Then, women have a natural aptitude for all the interesting jobs. I saw a broadcast about that just the other night. The biggest specialist on the planet in vocational aptitude. I forget her name, but she proved it conclusively."

He looked at the empty platter before them. "I've got to go now. Thanks for everything."

"The pleasure was mine." Ross watched his undernourished figure head for the station. He swore a little, and then buckled down to some hard thinking. Helena was his key to this world. He'd have to have a long skull-session or two with her; he couldn't be constantly prompting her or there would be serious trouble. She would be the front and he would be the very inconspicuous brains of the outfit, trailing humbly behind. But was she capable of absorbing a brand-new, rather complicated concept? She seemed to be, he told himself uncomfortably, in love with him. That would help considerably. . . .

Helena and Pilot Breuer showed up, walking with a languor that suggested a large and pleasant meal disposed of. Helena's first words disposed with shocking speed of Ross's doubts that she was able 1o acquire a brand-new sociological concept. They were: "Ah, there you are, my dear. Did the boy bring you something or other to eat?"

"Yes. Thanks. Very thoughtful of you," he said pointedly, with one eye on Breuer's reaction. There was none; he seemed to have struck the right note.

"Pilot Breuer," said Helena blandly, "thinks I'd enjoy an evening doing the town with her and a few friends."

"But the Cavallo people——"

"Ross," she said gently, "don't nag."

He shut up. And thought: wait until I get her out into space. I get her out into space. She'd be a damned fool to leave this wacked-up culture. . . .

Breuer was saying, with an altogether too-innocent air, "I'd better get you two settled in a hotel for the night; then I'll pick up Helena and a few friends and we'll show her what old Novj Grad has to offer in the way of night life. Can't have her batting around the universe saying Azor's sidewalks are rolled up at 2100, can we? And then she can do^her trading or whatever it is with Cavallo bright and early tomorrow, eh?"

Ross realized that he was being jollied out of an attack of the sulks. He didn't like it.

The hotel was small and comfortable, with a bar crowded by roistering pilots and their dates. The glimpses Ross got of social life on Azor added up to a damnably unfair picture. It was the man who paid. Breuer roguishly tested the mattress in their room, nudging Helena, and then announced, "Get settled, kids, while I visit the bar."

When the door rolled shut behind her Ross said furiously: "Look, you! Protective mimicry's fine up to a point, but let's not forget what this mission is all about. We seem to be suckered into spending the night, but by hell tomorrow morning bright and early we find those Cavallo people—"

"There," Helena said soothingly. "Don't be angry, Ross. I promise I won't be out late, and she really did insist."

"I suppose so," he grumbled. "Just remember it's no pleasure trip."

"Not for you, perhaps," she smiled sweetly.

He let it drop there, afraid to push the matter.

Breuer returned hi about ten minutes with a slight glow on. "It's all fixed," she told Helena.

"Got a swell crowd lined up. Table at Virgin Willie's—oops!" She glanced at Ross. "No harm to it, of course," she said. "Anything you want, Ross, just dial service. It's on my account. I fixed it with the desk."

"Thanks."

They left, and Ross went grumpily to bed.

A secretive rustle in the room awoke him. "Helena?" he asked drowsily.

Pilot Breuer's voice giggled drunkenly, "Nope. Helena's passed out at Virgin Willie's, kind of the way I figured she would be on triple antigravs. Had my eye on you since Azor City, baby. You gonna be nice to me?"

"Get out of here!" Ross hissed furiously. "Out of here or I'll yell like hell."

"So yell," she giggled. "I got the house dick fixed. They know me here, baby——"

He fumbled for the bedside light and snapped it on. "I'll pitch you right through the door," he announced. "And if you give me any more lip I won't bother to open it before I do."

She hiccupped and said, "A spirited lad. That's the way I like 'em." With one hand she drew a nasty-looking little pistol. With the other she pulled a long zipper and stepped out of her pilot's coveralls.

Ross gulped. There were three ways to play this, the smart way, the stupid way, and the way that all of a sudden began to look attractive. He tried the stupid way.

He got the pistol barrel alongside his ear for his pains. "Don't jump me," Pilot Breuer giggled.

"The boys that've tried to take this gun away from me are stretched end to end from here to Azor City. By me, baby."

Ross blinked through a red-spotted haze. He took a deep breath and got smart. "You're pretty tough," he said admiringly.

"Oh, sure." She kicked the coveralls across the room and moved hi on him. "Baby," she said caressingly, "if I seem to sort of forget myself in the next couple of minutes, don't get any ideas. I never let go of my gun. Move over."

"Sure," Ross said hollowly. This, he told himself disgustedly, was the damnedest, silliest, ridiculousest. . .

There was a furious hiccup from the door. "So!" Helena said venomously, pushing the door wide and almost falling to the floor. "So!"

Ross flailed out of the bed, kicking the pistol out of Pilot Breuer's hand in the process. He cried enthusiastically, "Helena, dear!"

"Don't you 'Helena-dear' me!" she said, moving in and kicking the door shut behind her. "I leave you alone for one little minute, and what happens? And you!"

"Sorry," Pilot Breuer muttered, climbing into her coveralls. "Wrong room. Must've had one antigrav too many." She licked her lips apprehensively, zipping her coveralls and sidling toward the door. With one hand on the knob, she said diffidently, "If I could have my gun back——?

No, you're right! I'll get it tomorrow." She got through the door just ahead of a lamp.

"Hussy!" spat Helena. "And you, Ross——"

It was the last straw. As Ross lurched toward her he regretted only one thing: that he didn't have a hairbrush. Pilot Breuer had been right. Nobody paid any attention to the noise.

"Yes, Ross." Helena had hardly touched her breakfast; she sat with her eyes downcast.

" 'Yes, Ross'," he mimicked bitterly. "It better be 'Yes, Ross.' This place may look all right to you, but it's trouble. You don't want to find yourself stuck here all your life, do you? Then do what I tell you."

"Yes, Ross."

He pushed the remains of his food away. "Oh, the hell with it," he said dispiritedly. "I wish I'd never started out on this fool's errand. And I double damn well wish I'd left you in the dye vats."

"Yes, Ro——— I mean, I'm glad you didn't, Ross," she said in a small voice.

He stood up and patted her shoulder absently. "Come on," he said, "we've got to get over to the Cavallo place. I wish you had let me talk to them on the phone."

She said reasonably, "But you said——"

"I know what I said. When we get there, remember that I do the talking."

They walked through green-lit streets, filled with proud-looking women and sad-eyed men. The Cavallo Machine-Tool Corporation was only a few intersections away, by the map the desk clerk had drawn for Helena; they found it without trouble. It was a smallish sort of building for a factory, Ross thought, but perhaps that was how factories went on Azor. Besides, it was well constructed and beautifully landscaped with the purplish lawns these people seemed to prefer.

Helena led him through the door, as was right and proper. She said to the busy little bald-headed man who seemed to be the receptionist, "We're expected. Miss Cavallo, please."

"Certainly, Ma'am," he said with a gap-toothed smile, and worked a combination of rods arid buttons on the desk beside him. In a moment, he said, "Go right in. Three up and four over; can't miss it."

They passed through a noisy territory of machines where metal was sliced, spun, hacked, and planed; no one seemed to be paying any attention to them. Ross wondered who had built the machines, and had a sudden flash of realization as to where those builders were now: On "Minerva," staring at the unattainable free sky.

Miss Cavallo was a motherly type with a large black cigar. "Sit right down," she said heartily.

"You, too, young man. Tell me what we in Cavallo Company can do for you."

Helena opened her mouth, but Ross stopped her with a gesture. "That's enough," he said quietly.

"I'll take over. Miss Cavallo," he declaimed from memory, "what follows is under the seal."

"Is it indeed! What do you know," she said.

Ross said, "Wesley."

Miss Cavallo slapped her thigh admiringly. "Son of a gun," she said admiringly. "How this takes me back—those long-ago childhood days, learning these things at my mother's knee. Let's see. Uh—the limiting velocity is C."

"But C2 is not a velocity," Ross finished triumphantly. And, from the heart, "Miss Cavallo, you don't begin to know how happy this makes me."

Miss Cavallo reached over and pumped his hand, then Helena's. To the girl she said, "You've got a right to be a proud woman, believe me. The way he got through it, without a single stumble! Never saw anything like it in my life. Well, just tell me what I can do for you, now that that's over."

Ross took a deep, deep breath. He said earnestly, "A great deal. I don't know where to begin. You see, it all goes back to Halsey's Planet, where I come from. This, uh, this ship came in, a longliner, and it got some of us a little worried because, well, it seemed that some of the planets were no longer in communication. We—uh, Miss Cavallo?" She was smiling pleasantly enough, but Ross had the crazy feeling that he just wasn't getting through to her.

"Go right ahead," she boomed. "God knows, I've got nothing against men in business; that's old-fashioned prejudice. Take your time. I won't bite you. Get on with your proposition, young man."

"It isn't exactly a proposition," Ross said weakly. All of a sudden the words seemed hard to find.

What did you say to a potential partner hi the salvation of the human race when she just nodded and blew cigar smoke at you?

He made an effort. "Halsey's Planet was the seventh alternate destination for this ship, and so we figured—— That is, Miss Cavallo, it kind of looked like there was some sort of trouble. So Mr. Haarland—he's the one who has the F-T-L secret on Halsey, like you do here on Azor—he passed it on to me, of course—well, he asked me to, well, sort of take a look around." He stopped. The words by then were just barely audible anyhow; and Miss Cavallo had been looking furtively at her watch.

Miss Cavallo shrugged sympathetically to Helena. "They're all like that under the skin, aren't they?" she observed ambiguously. "Well, if men could take our jobs away from us, what would we do?

Stay home and mind the kids?" She roared and poked a box of cigars at Helena.

"Now," she said briskly, "let's get down to cases. I really enjoyed hearing those lines from you, young man, and I want you to know that I'm prepared to help you in any possible way because of them. Open a line of credit, speed up deliveries, send along some of our technical people to help you get set up—anything. Now, what can I do for you? Turret lathes? Grinders? Screw machines?"

"Miss Cavallo," Ross said desperately, "don't you know anything about the faster-than-light, secret?"

She said impatiently, "Of course I do, young man. Said the responses, didn't I? There's no call for that itsm, though."

"I don't want to buy one," Ross cried. "I have one. Don't you realize that the human race is in danger? Populations are dying out or going out of communication all over the galaxy. Don't you want to do something about it before we all go under?"

Miss Cavallo dropped all traces of a smile. Her face was like flint as she stood up and pointed to the window. "Young man," she said icily, "take a look out there. That's the Cavallo Machine-Tool Company. Does that look as if we're going under?"

"I know, but Clyde, Cyrnus One, Ragansworld—at least a dozen planets I can name—are gone. Didn't you ever think that you might be next?"

Miss Cavallo kept her voice level, but only with a visible effort.

She said flatly, "No. Never. Young man, I have plenty to do right here on Azor without bothering my head about those places you're talking about. Seventy-five years ago there was another fellow just like you; Flarney, some name like that; my grandmother told me about him. He came bustling in here causing trouble, with that old silly jingle about Wesley and C-square and so on, with some cock-and-bull story about a planet that was starving to death, stirring up a lot of commotion.

Well, he wound up on 'Minerva,' because he wouldn't take no for an answer. Watch out that you don't do the same."

She marched majestically to the door. "And now," she said, "if you've wasted quite enough of my tune, kindly leave."