Startide Rising

64 ::: Creideiki/Sah'ot

Creideiki stared at the holo display and concentrated. It was easier to talk than to listen. He could call up the words one or two at a time, speak them slowly, shuttling them like pearls on a string.

"… neural link… repaired… by… Gillian and Makanee… but… but… speech… still… still…"

"Still gone," Sah'ot's image nodded. "You can use tools now, though?"

Creideiki concentrated on Sah'ot's simple question. You-can-use-… Each word was clear, its meaning obvious. But in a row they meant nothing. It was frustrating!

Sah'ot switched to Trinary.

* Tools to prod?

The balls

The starships -

* Is your jaw?

The player

The pilot — *

Creideiki nodded. That was much better, though even Trinary came to him like a foreign tongue, with difficulty.

* Spider walkers, walkers, walkers

* Holocomm talkers, talkers, talkers

Are my playthings, are — *

Creideiki averted his eyes. He knew there were elements of Primal in that simple phrase, in the repetition and high whistling. It was humiliating to still have an active, able mind, and know that to the outside world you sounded retarded.

At the same time, he wondered if Sah'ot noticed a trace of the language of his dreams — the voices of the old gods.

Listening to the captain, Sah'ot was relieved. Their first conversation had started off well, but toward the end Creideiki's attention had begun to wander, especially when Sah'ot had started running him through a battery of linguistic tests.

Now, after Makanee's last operation, he seemed much more attentive.

He decided to test Creideiki's listening ability by telling him about his discovery. He carefully and slowly explained in Trinary about the "singing" he had heard while linked to the robot in the drill-tree funnel.

Creideiki looked confused for a long moment as he concentrated on Sah'ot's slow, simplified explanation, then he seemed to understand. In fact, from his expression, it seemed he thought it the most natural thing in the world that a planet should sing.

"Link… link me… pl-please… I… I will… listen… listen…"

Sah'ot clapped his jaw in assent, pleased. Not that Creideiki, with his language centers burned, would be able to make out anything but static. It took all of Sah'ot's subtle training and experience to trace the refrain. Except for that one time, when the voices from below had shouted in apparent anger, the sounds had been almost amorphous.

He still shuddered, remembering that one episode of lucidity.

"Okay, Creideiki," he said as he made the connection. "Listen closely!"

Creideiki's eyes recessed in concentration as the static crackled and popped over the line.

65 ::: Gillian

"Triple damn! Well, we can't wait for her to get here to start the move. It might take Hikahi two days to circle around in the skiff: I want to have Streaker safely inside the Seahorse by then."

Suessi's simulacrum shrugged. "Well, you could leave her a note."

Gillian rubbed her eyes. "That's just what we'll do. We'll drop a monofilament relay link at Streaker's present position, so we can stay in touch with the party on the island. I'll stick a message to the relay telling her where we've gone."

"What about Toshio and Dennie?"

Gillian shrugged. "I'd hoped to send the skiff after them and Sah'ot… and maybe after Tom. But as things are, I'd better have Dennie and Sah'ot head toward your site by sled. I hate doing it. It's dangerous and I need Toshio there watching Takkata-Jim until just before we take off."

She didn't mention the other reason for wanting Toshio to stay as long as possible. They both knew that Tom Orley, if he flew the glider home, would return to the island. He ought to have someone waiting for him.

"Are we really going to abandon Metz and Takkata-Jim?" Suessi looked perplexed.

"And Charlie Dart, apparently. He stowed away on the longboat. Yes, it's their choice. They hope to make it home after the Galactics blow us to kingdom come. For all I know they may be right. Anyway, the final decision's Hikahi's, when she finally shows up and finds out she's in command."

Gillian shook her head. "Ifni sure seems to have gone out of her way to throw us curves, hasn't she, Hannes?"

The elderly engineer smiled. "Luck's always been fickle. That's why she's a lady."

"Hmmph!" But Gillian didn't have the energy to give him much of a dirty look. A light winked on the console next to the holo display.

"Here it is, Hannes. The engine room is ready. I've got to go, now. We're getting under way."

"Good luck, Gillian." Suessi held up an "O" sign, then broke the connection.

Gillian flicked a switch cutting into the comm line from Streaker to the island. "Sah'ot, this is Gillian. Sorry to break in, but would you please tell the captain we're about to move." It was a courtesy to let Creideiki know. Streaker had been his, once.

"Yesss, Gillian." There was a series of high, repetitious whistles in very Primal-like Trinary. Much of it crested over the upper range of even Gillian's gene-enhanced hearing.

"The captain wantss to go outside to watch," Sah'ot said. "He promises not to get in the way."

Gillian couldn't see any real reason to refuse. "All right. But tell him to check with Wattaceti first, to use a sled, and to be careful! We won't be able to spare anyone to go chasing him if he wanders off!"

There was another high series of whistles that Gillian could barely follow. Creideiki signaled that he understood.

"Oh, by the way Sah'ot," Gillian added. "Please ask Toshio to call me as soon as the longboat arrives."

"Yes!"

Gillian cut the connection and got up to dress. There were so many things to juggle simultaneously!

I wonder if I did the right thing, letting Charlie Dart sneak away, she thought. If he or Takkata-Jim behave in a way I don't expect, what'll I do?

A tiny light shone at the corner of her console. The Niss machine still wanted to talk to her. The light didn't flash urgent. Gillian decided to ignore it as she hurried out to supervise the move.

66 ::: Akki

With aching muscles, Akki swam slowly out of the notch in which he had rested until dawn.

He took several deep breaths and dove, scattering a school of brightly scaled fish-like creatures through shafts of morning light. Without thinking, he speared through the school and snapped up a large fish, relishing its frantic struggle between his jaws. But the metal taste was bitter. He flipped the creature away, spitting.

Red clouds spread a pink glow across the east as he surfaced again. Hunger growled in his compound stomachs. He wondered if the sound was loud enough to be picked up by his hunter.

It's unfair. When K'tha-Jon finds me, he, at least, will have something to eat!

Akki shook himself. What a bizarre thought! "You're falling apart, middie. K'tha-Jon is no cannibal. He's a… a…"

A what? Akki remembered the final stretch, yesterday at sunset, when he had somehow made it to the chain of metal-mounds just meters ahead of his pursuer. The chase amidst the tiny islands had been a confusion of bubbles and surf and hunting cries. For hours after he had finally found a hiding place, he listened to staccato bursts of sonar that proved K'tha-Jon had not gone far.

Thought of the bosun sent chills down Akki's spine. What kind of creature was he? It wasn't just the irrationality of this death-chase; there was something else as well, something in the way K'tha-Jon hunted. The giant's sonar sweeps contained something malevolent that made Akki want to curl up in a ball.

Of course, Stenos gene-grafts might account for some of his size and irritability. But in K'tha-Jon there was more. Something very different must have gone into the bosun's gene splice. Something terrifying. Something Akki, raised on Calafia, had never encountered.

Akki swam close to the edge of the coral mound and stuck his jaw out beyond the northern verge. There were only the natural sounds of the Kithrup sea.

He hopped up on his tail and scanned visually. To go west, or north? To Hikahi, or Toshio?

Better north. This chain of mounds might extend to the one where the encampment lay. It might provide cover.

He dashed across the quarter-kilometer gap to the next island, then listened quietly. There was no change. Breathing a little more easily, he crossed the next channel, then the next, swimming quick bursts, then listening, then resuming his cautious passage.

Once he heard a strange, complex chatter to his right. He lay motionless until he realized that it couldn't be K'tha-Jon. He detoured slightly to take a look.

It was an underwater skirmish line of balloon-like creatures, with distended air bladders and lively blue faces. They carried crude implements and nets filled with thrashing prey. Except for a few holos sent back by Dennie Sudman and Sah'ot, this was Akki's first glimpse of the Kithrup natives, the Kiqui. He watched, fascinated, then swam toward them. He had thought himself still far south of Toshio, but if this group was the same…

As soon as they caught sight of him the hunters squeaked in panic. Dropping their nets, they scrambled up the vine covered face of a nearby island. Akki realized that he must have encountered a different tribe, one which had never seen dolphins before.

Still, seeing them was something. He watched the last one climb out of sight. Then he turned northward once more.

But when he passed the northern shore of the next mound, a sharp beam of sound passed over him.

Akki quailed. How! Had K'tha-Jon duplicated his logic about an island chain? Or had some demon instinct told him where to hunt his prey?

The eerie call passed over him once more. It had mutated further during the night into a piercing, falling cry that set Akki shivering.

The cry pealed again, nearer, and Akki knew he couldn't hide. That cry would seek him out in any cleft or cranny, until the panic took hold. He had to make a break for it, while he still had control over his mind!

67 ::: Keepiru

The fight had begun in the predawn darkness.

A few hours ago Keepiru realized that his pursuer's sled was showing no sign of failing. The engine screamed, but it would not die. Keepiru notched his own upward well beyond the red line, but it was too late. A short time later, he heard the whine of a torpedo homing in on him from behind. He zigged leftward and down, blowing ballast to leave a cloud of noisy bubbles in his wake.

The torpedo streaked past him and into the gloom beyond. An amplified squawk of disappointment and indignation echoed amongst the rills and seamounts. Keepiru was used to hearing Primal obscenities from his pursuer.

He had almost reached the line of metal-mounds behind which the two swimming dolphins had disappeared a few hours back. As he had drawn nearer, Keepiru had listened to the distant hunt cries, and been chilled by a gnawing association that he couldn't bring himself yet to believe. It made him dread for Akki.

Now Keepiru had his own problems. He wished Akki luck holding out until he could get rid of this idiot on his own tail.

It was growing light overhead. Keepiru dove his sled behind a lumpy ridge, then throttled the engine back and waited.

Moki cursed as the tiny torpedo failed to detonate.

# Teeth, teeth are — are -

Better, better than -

# Things! #

He swung his jaw left and right. He had abandoned the sled's sensors, and was controlling the machine purely by habit.

Where was the smart-aleck! Let him come out and get it over with!

Moki was tired and cranky and unutterably bored. He had never imagined that being a Great Bull could be so tedious. Moki wanted the hot, almost orgasmic rage back. He tried to call up the bloodlust again, but kept thinking about killing fish, not dolphins.

If only he could emulate the savagery he had heard in K'tha-Jon's hunt-cry! Moki no longer hated the frightening bosun. He had begun to think of the giant as a spirit creature of pure and evil nature. He would kill this smart-aleck Tursiops and bring its head to K'tha-Jon as proof of his worthiness as a disciple. Then he, too, would become elemental, a terror that none would ever dare thwart.

Moki brought the machine about in a circle, keeping close to the seafloor to take advantage of shadows of sound. The Tursiops had turned left at high speed. His turn had to be wider than Moki's, so all Moki had to do was hunt in the correct arc.

Moki had been on guard duty when this chase began, so his sled had torpedoes. He was sure the smartass didn't have any. He whistled in eager anticipation of an end to the tedious chase.

A sound! He turned so quickly he banged his snout against the plastic bubble-dome. Moki gunned the sled forward, readying another torpedo. This one would finish his enemy off.

A sheer drop opened into a broad ocean canyon. Moki took ballast and fell, hugging the wall. He throttled back and stopped.

Minutes passed as the sound of muffled engines grew louder from his left. The oncoming sled was staying close to the cliff face, at a greater depth.

Suddenly, it was below him! Moki chose not to fire right away. This was too easy! Let the smart-aleck hear death suddenly fall upon him from behind, too close to evade. Let him writhe in panic before Moki's torpedo tore his body into pieces!

His sled growled, then dropped in pursuit. His victim could never turn in time! Moki crowed,

# A herd bull is! -is!

# A Great Bull… #

Moki interrupted his chant. Why wasn't the smart-aleck fleeing?

He had been relying entirely upon sound. Only now did he turn his eye on his intended victim.

The other sled was empty! It drove along slowly, unpiloted. But then where… ?

* Hunting ears

Can make a bull -

*But eyes

And brains

Make spacefen — *

The voice was above him! Moki cried out, trying to turn the sled and fire a torpedo at the same time. With a despairing wail the engines screamed and then died. His neural link went dead just as he came about into sight of a sleek, gray Tursiops dolphin, two meters above him, white teeth shining in the light from the surface.

* And fools

Make only

Corpses — *

Moki screamed as the cutting torch on the pilot's harness exploded into laser-blue brilliance.

68 ::: Tom Orley

Where did they all come from?

Tom Orley hid behind a low weed mound and looked about at the various alien parties on the horizon. He counted at least three groups, all converging from different directions on the floating eggshell-shaped wreck.

About a mile behind him, the volcano still rumbled. He had left the crashed Thennanin scoutship at dawn, leaving a pan of precious fresh water under the dying pilot's mouth, within reach if he should ever awaken.

He had set out soon after sighting the party of Tandu, testing his newly woven "weed-shoes" on the uneven slimy surface. The splayed, snowshoe-like devices helped him walk cautiously across the slick carpet of vines.

At first he moved much faster than the others. But soon the Tandu developed a new technique. They stopped floundering in the mire, and came on at a brisk walk. Tom kept low and worried about what would happen if they caught sight of him.

And now there were other parties as well, one approaching from the southwest and one from the west. He couldn't make them out clearly yet, just dots bobbing slowly and with difficulty on a low, serrated horizon. But where the hell had they all come from

The Tandu were closest. There were at least eight or nine of them, approaching in a column. Each creature splayed its six spindly legs wide apart to spread its weight. In their arms they cradled long, glistening instruments that could only be weapons. They marched forward rapidly.

Tom wondered what their new tactic was. Then he noticed that the lead Tandu did not carry a weapon. Instead, it held the leash of a shaggy, shambling creature. The keeper leaned forward over its charge, as if coaxing it to keep at a given task.

Tom risked raising his head a couple of feet above the mound.

"Well, I'll be damned."

The hairy creature was creating land — or at least solidity — in a narrow causeway in front of the party! Just before and on both sides of the trail, there was a faint shimmering where reality seemed to struggle against a noxious intrusion.

An Episiarch! Momentarily Tom forgot his predicament, grateful for this rare sight.

As he watched, the causeway failed in one spot. The luminous band around the edges of the trail snapped together with a loud bang. The Tandu warrior standing there flailed and thrashed as it fell into the weeds. By fighting it merely tore the carpet and opened the hole wider until, finally, it sank like a stone into the sea.

None of the other Tandu seemed to take notice. The two behind the gap leaped across to the temporarily solid "ground" beyond. The party, diminished by one, continued to advance.

Tom shook his head. He had to reach the wreck first! He couldn't afford to let the Tandu pass him.

Yet if he did anything, even resumed his own march, they'd certainly spot him. He didn't doubt their efficiency with those weapons they carried. No human warrior ever underestimated the Tandu for long.

Reluctantly, he knelt and untied the fastenings on his weed-shoes. Discarding them, he crawled carefully to the edge of an open pool.

He counted slowly, waiting until he could hear the column of Galactics approaching. He rehearsed his moves in his mind.

Taking several deep breaths, he pulled his diving mask over his face, making certain it was snug and the collecting fins were clear. Then he pulled his needler from its holster, holding it in two hands.

Tom set his feet on two firm roots and checked his balance. The pool was just in front of him.

He closed his eyes.

* Listen

For the swishing tail

Of the tiger shark — *

His empathy sense pinpointed the powerful psi emissions of the mad ET adept, now only some eighty meters away.

"Gillian…," he sighed. Then, in one sudden fluid motion, he stood up and extended his weapon. His eyes opened and he fired.

69 ::: Toshio

Against Toshio's objections, they had used the last of the longboat's energy to lift it to a landing site on top of the island. He had offered to blast a wider opening into the chamber below the metal-mound, but Takkata-Jim had turned his suggestion down cold.

That meant two hours of backbreaking work, heaping chopped foliage over the small ship to camouflage it. Toshio wasn't sure even that would do any good if the Galactics finished their battle and turned their full attention to the planet's surface.

Metz and Dart were supposed to help him. Toshio had set them to work cutting brush, but found that he had to tell them to do each and every thing. Dart was sullen and angry at being commanded by a middie he had ordered around only days before. He obviously wanted to get to the supplies he had excitedly dropped by the drill-tree pool before being drafted into the work crew. Metz had been willing enough, but was so anxious to be off talking to Dennie that he was distracted and worse than useless.

Toshio finally sent them both away and finished the job by himself.

At last the boat was covered. He slumped to the ground and rested against the bole of an oli-nut tree.

Damn Takkata-Jim! Toshio and Dennie were supposed to see the encampment secure, report their findings on the Kiqui to Metz, and then climb on their sleds and get out of here! Gillian expected them to set out in a few hours, and yet almost nothing was accomplished!

To top it all off, Streaker had only warned him an hour or so in advance that he could probably expect a stowaway. Gillian decided not to have Charlie arrested for violation of orders, even though it appeared he had stolen equipment from at least a dozen labs aboard the ship. Toshio was glad to be spared the added chore. There wasn't much of anything hereabouts to use as a jail, anyway.

Foliage rustled to Toshio's left. A series of mechanical whirrings accompanied the sound of crushing vegetation. Then four "spiders" pushed through the brush to enter his tiny clearing. A Stenos dolphin lay on the flotation pad of each armored mechanical, controlling the four high-jointed legs with neural-link commands. Toshio stood up as they approached.

Takkata-Jim passed by, eyeing him coolly, silently. The other three spiders followed him across the clearing and back into the forest. The Stenos piped to each other in gutter-Trinary.

Toshio stared after them. He discovered that he had been holding his breath.

"I don't know about Takkata-Jim, but those fen with him are crazier than Atlast pier-nesters," he said to himself, shaking his head. He had met few so-called Stenos on Calafia. Some had displayed quirks, positive and negative, like Sah'ot. But none had ever had the look that the former vice-captain's followers had in their eyes.

The sound of the procession faded away. Toshio got up to his feet.

He wondered why Gillian had let Takkata-Jim go at all. Why not just throw him and his cohorts in the brig and have done with it?

Granted, it was a good idea to leave a party with the longboat, to try to sneak back to Earth if Streaker was lost trying to escape. Gillian probably couldn't spare any of the reliable members of the crew. But…

He turned toward the village of the Kiqui, thinking as he walked.

Of course, the longboat was stopped. Theoretically, Takkata-Jim couldn't contact the Galactics even if he wanted to. And Toshio couldn't imagine a reason he'd want to.

But what if he had a reason? And what if he found a way?

Toshio almost bumped into a tree in his worried concentration. He looked up and corrected his path.

I'll just have to make sure, he decided. Tonight I'll have to find out if he can cause trouble.

Tonight.

The tribe's adults squatted around a circle in a clearing in the center of the village. Ignacio Metz and Dennie Sudman sat to one side. The Nest-Mother squatted across from them, her bright green-and-red-striped puffer sacks fully inflated. The elders on either side of her billowed and chuffed like a chain of gaily painted balloons in the forest-filtered sunshine.

Toshio stopped at the edge of the village clearing. The sunshine filtered through the trees, revealing a conclave of races.

The Kiqui Nest-Mother chattered, waving her paws in a queer up-and-down pattern that Dennie had said connoted happy emphasis. If the oldest female had been angry, her gestures would have been crosswise. It was a blissfully simple expression pattern. The rest of the tribe repeated her sounds, sometimes anticipating her in a rising and falling chant of consensus.

Ignacio Metz nodded excitedly, cupping one hand over an earphone as he listened to the translation computer. When the chant died down he spoke a few words into a microphone. A long series of high-pitched repetitive squeaks came out of the machine's speaker.

Dennie's expression was one of relief. She had dreaded the uplift specialist's first meeting with the Kiqui. But Metz had not, apparently, muffed her long and careful negotiations with the pre-sentients. The meeting seemed to be coming to a satisfactory conclusion.

Dennie caught sight of Toshio, and smiled brilliantly. Without ceremony she stood up and left the circle. She hurried over to where he waited at the edge of the village clearing.

"How's it going?" he asked.

"Wonderfully! It turns out he's read every word I sent back! He understands their pack protocol, their physical manifestations of sex and age, and he thought my behavioral analysis was 'exemplary'! Exemplary!"

Toshio smiled, sharing her pleasure.

"He's talking about getting me an appointment as a fellow at the Uplift Center! Can you imagine that?" Dennie couldn't help bouncing up and down excitedly.

"What about the treaty?"

"Oh they're ready any time. If Hikahi makes it here in the skiff we'll take a dozen Kiqui back to Streaker with us. Otherwise a few will go back to Earth with Metz in the longboat. It's all settled."

Toshio looked back at the happy villagers and tried not to show his misgivings.

Of course, it was for the good of the Kiqui as a species. They would fare far better under the patronage of Mankind than under almost any other starfaring race. And Earth geneticists had to have living beings to examine before any sort of adoption claim could be made.

Every attempt would be made to keep the first group of aboriginals healthy. Half of Dennie's job had been to analyze their bodily requirements, including needed trace elements. But it was still unlikely any of the first group would survive. Even if they did, Toshio doubted the Kiqui had a notion of the strangeness they were about to embark upon.

They're not sentients yet, he reminded himself. By Galactic law they're still animals. And, unlike anyone else in the Five Galaxies, we'll at least try to explain to their limited understanding, and ask permission.

But he remembered a stormy night, with driving rain and flashing lightning, when the little amphibians had huddled around him and an injured dolphin who was his friend, keeping them warm and warding off despair with their company.

He turned away from the sun-washed clearing.

"Then there's nothing keeping you here any longer?" He asked Dennie.

She shook her head. "I'd rather stay a while longer, of course. Now that I'm finished with the Kiqui I can really work on the problem of the metal-mound. That's why I was so grouchy a couple of days ago. Besides being so tired trying to do two major jobs, I was also frustrated. But now we're a step closer to solving that problem. And did you know the core of the metal-mound is still alive? It's…"

Toshio had to interrupt to stop the flow of words. "Dennie! Stop it for a minute, please. Answer my question. Are you ready to leave now?"

Dennie blinked. She changed tracks, frowning. "Is it Streaker? Has something gone wrong?"

"They began the move a few hours ago. I want you to gather all of your notes and samples and secure them to your sled. You and Sah'ot are leaving in the morning."

She looked at him, his words slowly sinking in. "You mean you, me, and Sah'ot, don't you?"

"No. I'm staying for another day. I have to."

"But why?"

"Look, Dennie, I can't talk about it now. Just do as I ask, please."

As he turned to walk back toward the drill-tree pool she grabbed his arm. Holding on, she was forced to follow.

"But we were going to go together! If you have things to do here, I'll wait for you!"

He walked along without answering. He couldn't think of anything to say. It was bitter to win her respect and affection at last, only to lose her within hours.

If this is what being grown up means, they can have it, he thought. It sucks.

As they approached the pool, sounds of loud argument came from that direction. Toshio hurried. Dennie trotted alongside until they burst into the clearing.

Charles Dart screamed and clutched at a slender cylinder that was gripped at the other end by the manipulator arm of Takkata-Jim's spider. Charlie strained against the pull of the waldo-machine. Takkata-Jim grinned open-mouthed.

The tug of war lasted for a few seconds as the neochimp's powerful muscles strained, then the cylinder popped out of his hands. He fell back to the dust and barely stopped before rolling into the pool. He hopped up and shrieked his anger.

Toshio saw three other Stenos-controlled spiders trooping off toward the longboat. Each carried another of the thin cylinders. Toshio stopped in his tracks when he got a good look at the one Takkata-Jim had taken. His eyes went wide.

"There is no longer any danger," Takkata-Jim told him. His voice carried insouciance. "I have conflssscated these. They'll be kept safe aboard my boat, and there will be no harm."

"They're mine, you thief!" Charles Dart hopped angrily, and his hands fluttered. "You criminal!" he growled. "You think I don't know you tried to m-murder Creideiki? We all know you did! You wrecked the buoys to destroy the evidence! And n-now you steal the tools of m-my trade!"

"Which you stole from Streakers armory, no doubt. Or do you wish to call Dr. Baskin for confirmation that they truly are yoursss?"

Dart growled and showed an impressive display of teeth. He whirled away from the neo-dolphin and sat down in the dust in front of a complex diving robot, freshly unpacked on the verge of the pool.

Takkata-Jim's spider started to turn, but the fin noticed Toshio looking at him. For just a moment, Takkata-Jim's cool reserve broke under the youth's fierce gaze. He looked away, and then back at Toshio.

"Don't-t believe everything you hear, boy-human," he said. "Much I have done, and will do, and I'm convinced I am right. But it wasss not I who hurt Creideiki."

"Did you destroy the buoys?" Toshio could sense Dennie standing close behind him, watching the large dolphin silently over his shoulder.

"Yesss. But it was not I who ssset the trap. Like King Henry with Beckett-t, I only found out about it after. Tell this, on Earth, if by some strange chance you should escape and I don't. Another took the initiative."

"Who did it, then?" Toshio's fists were tight balls.

A long sigh escaped Takkata-Jim's blowmouth.

"Our Dr. Metz wrung from the Survey Board berths for some who shouldn't have been on this voyage. He was impatient. A few of his Stenos had… unusual family trees."

"The Stenos…"

"A few Stenos! I am not one of Metz's experiments! I am a starship officer. I earned my place!" The dolphin's voice was defiant.

"When the pressure built to the breaking point, some of them turned to me. I thought I could control them. But there was one who turned out to be more than even I could manage. Tell them if you get home, Toshio Iwashika. Tell them on Earth that it'sss possible to turn a dolphin into a monster. They should be warned."

Takkata-Jim gave him one long, intent look, then his spider turned away and followed his crew back to the longboat.

"He's a liar!" Dennie whispered after he had gone. "He sounds so reasonable and logical, but I shiver when I listen to him!"

Toshio watched the spider disappear down the trail.

"No," he said. "He is ambitious, and maybe crazy too. He's probably a traitor, as well. But for some reason I think everything he said was explicitly true. Maybe a surface honesty is what he clings to now, for pride's sake."

He turned, shaking his head. "Not that that makes him any less dangerous."

He approached Charles Dart, who looked up with a friendly smile. Toshio squatted near the chimp planetologist.

"Dr. Dart, how big were they?"

"Were what, Toshio? Say! Have you seen this new robot? I made it up special. It can dive to the base of the shaft, then dig laterally to those big magma tunnels we detected…"

"How big were they, Charlie?" Toshio demanded. He was tense, and ready to throttle the chimpanzee. "Tell me!"

Dart glanced briefly, guiltily, at Toshio, then looked down at the pool wistfully.

"Only about a kiloton each," he sighed. "Hardly big enough to set off decent crust waves, really." He looked up with large, innocent brown eyes. "They were really only teeny little A-bombs, honest!"

70 ::: Hikahi

The need to run quietly kept her speed to little more than it might have been with a sled. It was frustrating.

Cut off from contact with anyone for more than a day Hikahi studied the seascape around her to avoid thinking about the possible fate of Creideiki and Streaker. She would find out what had happened sooner or later. Until then worry would only wear her out.

The morning light filtered down to the canyon bottoms as she swung east and then northward. Clots of dangle-weed drifted overhead, and copper-backed fish darted briefly alongside, until the driving skiff left them behind.

Once she caught sight of something long and sinuous that quickly slithered into a sea-cave as she approached. There was no time to stop and explore, but she did take the monster's picture as she passed.

What will I do if I find Streaker destroyed? The thought came unwanted.

I'll go back to the Thennanin wreck as an intermediate step. They'd need me there. But I'd be commander, then. And hiding at the bottom of the ocean wouldn't be a long term solution. Not on this deadly world.

Can I bring myself to negotiate a surrender?

If she did, she wouldn't let the Galactics take her personally. She was one of the few who, with the right notes, could plot an accurate course back to the derelict fleet.

Maybe I'd see the crew safely interned and then make a break for it in the skiff, she thought. Not that the skiff could ever make it all the way home, even if it could run a Galactic blockade. But someone had to try to get word back to Earth. Perhaps there would be a way to punish the fanatics… make their behavior so costly to then that they'd think twice before bullying Earthlings again.

Hikahi knew she was dreaming. In a few thousand years humans and their clients might have that kind of power, maybe.

Hikahi listened. There was a sound…

She turned up the gain on the ship's hydrophones. Filters removed the background growl of the engines and the tide. She heard the soft scurrying sounds of the ocean creatures.

"Computer! Filter for cetacean output!"

The patterns of sound changed. The sea became quiet. Still, there was a trace of something.

"Increase gain!" The noise level rose. Above the static hiss she heard the faint but distinguishable cries of swimming dolphins! They were desperate sounds of combat.

Was she picking up the echoes of straggling survivors of a disaster? What to do? She wanted to rush to the aid of the distressed fen. But who was pursuing them?

"Machine soundsss!" She commanded. But the detector winked a red light, indicating that there were none within range. So, the dolphins were sledless.

If she attempted a rescue, she risked the only hope of the crew back at the Seahorse. Should she make a detour around the refugees, and hurry toward Streaker as planned? It was an agonizing choice.

Hikahi cut her speed to run still quieter, and sent the skiff due north, toward the dim cries.

71 ::: Charles Dart

He waited until everyone had left before he unscrewed the back of the new robot and checked its contents. Yes, it was still there. Safely concealed. Ah, well, he thought. I'd hoped to repeat the experiment. But one bomb should be enough.

72 ::: Streaker

FROM THE JOURNAL OF GILLIAN BASKIN

We're on our way. Everyone aboard seems relieved to be moving at last.

Streaker lifted off the ocean floor late last night, impellers barely ticking over. I was on the bridge, monitoring reports by the fen outside, and watching the strain gauges until we were sure Streaker was okay. In fact, she sounded positively eager to be off.

Emerson and the crew in the engine room should be proud of the job they've done, though, of course, it's the coils Tom and Tsh't found, that made it possible. Streaker hums like a starship once again.

Our course is due south. We dropped a monofilament relay behind to keep us in touch with the party on the island, and left a message for Hikahi when she shows up.

I hope she hurries. Being a commander is more complicated than I'd ever imagined. I have to make sure everything is done in the right order and correctly, and all as unobtrusively as possible, without making the fen feel "the old lady" is hovering over them. It makes me wish I had some of the military training Tom got while I was away in medical school.

Less than thirty hours and we'll reach the Thennanin shell. Suessi says they'll be ready for us. Meanwhile, we have scouts out, and Wattaceti paces us overhead in a detection sled. His instruments show very little leakage, so we should be safe for now.

I'd give a year's wages for Hikahi or Tsh't, or even Keepiru right now. I'd never understood, before, why a captain treasures a good executive officer so much.

Speaking of captains. Ours is a wonder.

Creideiki seemed to be in a daze for a long time, after getting out of sick bay. But his long conversation with Sah'ot appears to have roused him. I don't know what Sah'ot did, but I would never have believed a person so severely damaged as Creideiki could be so vigorous, or make himself so useful.

When we lifted off he asked to be allowed to supervise the scouts and flankers. I was desperate for a reliable fin to put in charge out there, and thought that having him visible could help morale. Even the Stenos were excited to have him about. Their last bitterness over my "coup" — and Takkata-Jim's exile — seem to have dissipated.

Creideiki is limited to the simplest calls in Trinary, but that seems to be enough. He's out there now, zipping about in his sled, keeping things orderly by pointing, nudging, and setting an example. In only a few hours Tsh't should rendezvous with the scouts we sent ahead, and then Creideiki can come back aboard.

There's a tiny light on my comm that's been flashing since I returned. It's that crazy Tymbrimi Niss machine. I've been keeping the damned thing waiting.

Tom wouldn't approve, I guess. But a fem has only so much strength, and I've got to take a nap. If the matter were urgent it would have broken in and spoken by now.

Oh, Tom, we could use your endurance now. Are you on your way back? Is your little glider even now winging home to Toshio's island?

Who am I fooling? Since the first psi-bomb we've detected nothing, only noise from the space battle, some of it indicating fighting over his last known position. He's set off none of the message globes. So either he's decided not to send an ambiguous message or worse…

Without word from Tom, how can we decide what to do, once we enter the Seahorse? Do we take off and try our luck, or hide within the hulk as long as we can?

It will be Hikahi's decision when the time comes.

Gillian closed the journal and applied her thumbprint to the fail-safe self-destruct. She got up and turned off the light.

On her way out of the lab, she passed the stasis-bier of the ancient cadaver they had reclaimed at such cost from the Shallow Cluster. Herbie just lay there grinning under a tiny spotlight, an ancient enigma. A mystery.

A troublemaker.

Battered, battle-scarred, Streaker moved slowly along the valley floor, her engines turning over with gentle, suppressed power. A dark, foamy mist rose below her where impellers kicked up the surface ooze.

The nubby cylinder slid over gloomy black rills and abysses, skirting the edges of seamounts and valley walls. Tiny sleds paced alongside, guiding the ship by sonar-speak.

Creideiki watched his ship in motion once again. He listened to the clipped reports of the scouts and sentries, and the replies of the bridge staff. He couldn't follow the messages in detail; the sophisticated technical argot was as out of reach to him as last year's wine. But he could sense the under-meaning; the crew had things well in hand.

Streaker couldn't really shine in this light, dim and blue, fifty meters down, but he could listen — his own sonar clicked softly in accompaniment as he savored the deep rumble of her engines, and he imagined he could be with her when she flew again.

: Never Again Creideiki : You Shall Never Fly With Her Again :

The spectre, K-K-Kph-kree, came into being gradually alongside him, a ghostly figure of silver and sonic shadows. The presence of the god did not surprise, or even bother Creideiki. He had been expecting It to come. It swam lazily, easily keeping pace alongside the sled.

: You Escaped Us : Yet Now You Purposely Sculpt Me Out Of Song : Because Of The Old Voices You Heard? : The Voices From Below? :

: Yes :

Creideiki thought not in Anglic or Trinary, but in the new language he had been learning.

: There is ancient anger within this world : I have heard its song :

The dream-god's great brow sparkled starlight. Its small jaw opened. Teeth shone.

: And What Do You Plan To Do? :

Creideiki sensed that It already knew the answer.

: My Duty : He replied in Its own speech.

: What Else Can I Ever Do? :

From the depths of the Whale Dream, It sighed approval.

Creideiki turned up the gain on his hydrophones. There were faraway excited echoes from up ahead — joyous sounds of greeting.

Creideiki looked at his sled's sonar display. At the far edge of its range was a small cluster of dots coming inward. They joined the specks that were Streaker's scouts. The first group had to be Tsh't's party from the Seahorse.

Making sure no one was nearby to take note, he turned his sled aside into a small side canyon. He slipped behind the shadows of a rock outcrop and turned off his engine. He waited then, watching Streaker pass below his aerie, until she vanished, along with the last of her flankers, around a curve in the long canyon.

"Good-bye…" He concentrated on the Anglic words, one at a time. "Good-bye… and… good luck…"

When it was safe, he turned on his sled and rose out of the little niche. He swung about and headed northward, toward the place they had left twenty hours before.

: You Can Come Along If You Like : he told the god — part figment of his mind, part something else. The ghostly figure answered in un-words made up from Creideiki's own sonar sounds.

: I Accompany You : I Would Not Miss This For The Song of the World :