The Green Brain

Chapter III

THE NIGHT was a blue-white glare from slave lights hanging in their carrier beams above the street. People in the costumes of many nations and many regions, a multicolored river of people, flowed past the A’Chigua toward the Plaza.

Martinho sped up, led his men into the stream. People made way, words of recognition followed.

“It’s Joao Martinho and some of his Irmandades.”

“…the Piratininga with Benito Alvarez.”

“Joao Martinho…”

At the Plaza, a white truck of the Hermosillo Bandeirantes played its searchlights on the fountain. There were other trucks and official vehicles across the way. The Hermosillo truck was a working rig recently returned from the interlands, by the look of it. The interleavings of its extensile wings were still streaked with dirt. The break-line of its forward pod could be distinguished clearly—a distinct crack that ran completely around the vehicle. Two of its ground-lift pods didn’t quite match the white of the others, evidence of a field repair job.

Martinho followed the pointing fingers of the searchlights. He moved forward to a line of police and bandeirantes holding back the crowd, was passed through on recognition, his men following.

“Where’s Ramon?” Martinho asked.

Vierho pressed up close beside him, said, “Ramon went for the truck with Thome and Lon. I don’t see a’chigua.”

“But look you,” Martinho said, pointing.

The crowd was being held back all around the Plaza at a distance of about fifty meters from the central fountain which rose in spooling, glistening arcs. In front of the crowd lay a tiled circle, its mosaic surface decorated with figures of the birds of Brazil. Inside this tiled ring, a ten-centimeter lip lifted to a circle of green lawn about twenty meters in diameter with the fluted cup of the fountain in the center. Between tile and fountain the lawn showed yellow splotches of dead grass. Martinho’s pointing finger picked out these patches one by one.

“Acid,” Vierho whispered.

The searchlights centered abruptly on a shifting movement within the spray at the fountain’s rim. A hissing passed through the crowd like a sudden wind.

“And there it is,” Martinho said. “Now, will the so-suspicious official of the IEO believe?”

As he spoke, a scintillant spray arched from the creature at the fountain and out onto the lawn. “Eeee-ahhhh,” the crowd said.

Martinho grew conscious of a low moaning off to his left, turned to see a doctor being directed there along the inner rim of the crowd. The doctor turned into the crowd on the other side of the Hermosillo truck, lifting his bag over his head as he entered the press of people.

“Who was hurt?” Martinho asked.

One of the police behind him said, “It is Alvarez. He tried to get that… thing, but he took only a handshield and a sprayrifle. The shield was not proof against a’chigua’s quickness. It got Alvarez in the arm.”

Vierho tugged at Martinho’s sleeve, pointed into the crowd behind the policeman. Rhin Kelly and Chen-Lhu were being passed through the onlookers there, space being made for them as people recognized the IEO insignia.

Rhin waved, called, “Senhor Martinho—that thing is impossible! It’s at least seventy-five centimeters long. It must weigh three or four kilos.”

“Do they not believe their own eyes?” Vierho asked.

Chen-Lhu came up to the policeman who’d described the injury to Alvarez, said, “Let us through, please.”

“Eh? Oh… yes, sir.” The line of guards parted.

Chen-Lhu stopped beside the bandeirante leader, glanced down at Rhin, back to Martinho. “I don’t believe it, either. I’d give a pretty to get my hands on that… thing.”

“What is it you don’t believe?” Martinho asked.

“I think it’s some kind of automaton. Not so, Rhin?”

“It has to be,” she said.

“How much of a pretty would you give?” Martinho asked.

“Ten thousand cruzados.”

“Please keep the lovely Doctor Kelly back here out of range,” Martinho said. He turned to Vierho. “What’s keeping Ramon and that truck? Find them. I want our magna-glass shield and a modified sprayrifle.”

“Jefe!”

“At once. Oh, yes—and get a large specimen bottle.”

Vierho sighed, turned away to obey.

“What do you say that thing is?” Chen-Lhu asked.

“I don’t have to say.”

“Do you imply it’s one of the things which none but bandeirantes appear to see in the interlands?”

“I don’t deny what my own eyes see.”

“Why have we never seen specimens, I wonder?” Chen-Lhu mused.

Martinho swallowed to suppress an angry outburst. This fool safe back here in the Green! He dared to question what the bandeirantes knew for fact!

“Isn’t that an interesting question?” Chen-Lhu asked.

“We’ve been lucky to get out with just our lives,” Martinho growled.

“Any entomologist will tell you that thing’s a physical impossibility,” Rhin said.

“The material won’t support such structure through that sort of activity,” Chen-Lhu said.

“I can see the entomologists must be correct,” Martinho said.

Rhin stared up at him. The angry cynicism surprised her. He attacked and did not remain on the defensive. He acted like a man who believed that impossibility out there at the fountain actually was a giant insect. But in the night club he’d argued the other side.

“You’ve seen such things in the jungle?” Chen-Lhu asked.

“Did you not see the scar on Vierho’s face?”

“What does a scar prove?”

“We have seen… what we have seen.”

“But an insect cannot grow that large!” Rhin protested. She turned her attention to the dark creature dancing along the fountain’s rim behind the curtain of water.

“So I’ve been told,” Martinho said. He wondered then about the reports from the Serra Dos Parecis. Mantidae three meters tall—ten feet. He knew the argument against such a thing. Rhin—all the entomologists were correct. Insects couldn’t produce living structure that large. Was it possible the things were automata? Who’d build such things? Why?

“It has to be a mechanical simulation of some kind,” Rhin said.

“The acid’s real, though,” Chen-Lhu said. “Look at the yellow spots on the lawn.”

Martinho reminded himself then that his own basic training forced him to agree with Rhin and Chen-Lhu. He’d even denied to Vierho that giant mantidae could exist. He knew how rumors pyramided. There were so few people other than bandeirantes in the Red areas these days. The Resettlement Plan had been most efficient. And there was no denying that many bandeirantes were semi-ignorant, superstitious men attracted only by the romance and money.

Martinho shook his head. He’d been there on the Goyaz track the day Vierho had suffered the acid burn. He’d seen… what he had seen. And now, this creature at the fountain.

The high-pitched roaring hiss of truck motors intruded on his awareness. The sound grew louder. The crowd parted giving a wide berth to the ground blast as Ramon backed the Irmandades truck into position beside the Hermosillo vehicle. The rear doors opened and Vierho jumped down as the motors were silenced.

“Jefe,” he called. “Why do we not use the truck? Ramon could put it almost up to the…”

Martinho waved him to silence, spoke to Chen-Lhu: “The truck does not have enough maneuverability. You saw how fast that thing is.”

“You haven’t said what you think it is,” Chen-Lhu said.

“I’ll say when I see it in a specimen bottle,” Martinho said.

Vierho came up beside him, said, “But the truck would give us…”

“No! Dr. Chen-Lhu desires an undamaged specimen. Get us some foam bombs. We go in with our hands.”

Vierho sighed, shrugged, returned to the rear of the truck, spoke briefly to someone inside. A bandeirante in the truck began passing out equipment.

Martinho turned to the policeman helping hold back the crowd, said, “Can you get a message to the vehicles across the way?”

“Of course, honorable sir.”

“I want their lights turned off. I don’t want to risk being blinded by lights in front of me. You understand?”

“They will be told at once.” He turned, relayed the message to an officer down the line.

Martinho strode to the rear of his truck, took a sprayrifle, examined the charge cylinder, extracted it, took another from a door rack. He locked in the charge, and again checked the rifle.

“Keep the specimen bottle here until we’ve immobilized that… thing,” he said. “I’ll call for it.”

Vierho rolled out the shield, a two-centimeter thickness of acid-resistant, tempered magna-glass, mounted on a two-wheeled handtruck. A narrow slot at the right accepted the rifle.

A bandeirante in the truck handed out two protective suits—silver-gray fiberglass sandwiches encased in slick acid-resistant synthetic fabric.

Martinho slipped into one, examined the seals.

Vierho donned the other.

“I could use Thome on the shield,” Martinho said.

“Thome has not as much experience, Jefe.”

Martinho nodded, began examining the foamal bombs and auxiliary equipment. He hung extra charge cylinders in a rack on the shield.

It was all done quickly and silently, with the ease of long experience. The crowd behind the truck took on some of their silence—a charged waiting. Only the faintest murmuring of conversation surrounded the truck.

“It is still there on the fountain, Jefe,” Vierho said.

He took the control handle of the shield, moved it out onto the mosaic tiles. The right wheel stopped on the patterned blue-scale neck of a condor worked into the tiles. Martinho rested his sprayrifle in its slot, said, “This’d be easier if we only had to kill it.”

“Those things are quick as O Diablo,” Vierho said. “I do not like this, Jefe. If that thing should get around our shield…” He fingered the sleeve of his protective suit. “This would be like a piece of gauze trying to stop the river.”

“So don’t let it get around the shield.”

“I will do my best, Jefe.”

Martinho studied the creature waiting behind the water curtain at the rim of the fountain, said, “Bring a handlight. Perhaps we can dazzle it.”

Vierho set the shield stand, returned to the truck. He was back in a moment with the light hanging from his belt.

“Let’s go,” Martinho said.

Vierho released the handtruck stand, activated its motors. A faint humming issued from it. He turned the driver handle two notches. The shield crept forward, levered its way over the raised ring of the Plaza onto the lawn.

A stream of acid arched outward from the creature at the fountain, splashed onto the grass ten meters in front of them. Oily white smoke boiled from the lawn, was dispersed to their left by a light breeze. Martinho noted the direction of the breeze, signaled for the shield to be turned upwind. They circled right.

Another stream of acid arched toward them, fell short about the same distance.

“It is trying to tell us something, Jefe,” Vierho joked.

Slowly they approached it, crossed one of the yellowed patches of grass.

Again the stream lifted from the fountain rim. Vierho leaned the shield backward. Acid splashed onto the glass, ran down the front. A biting smell filled their nostrils.

A murmurous “Ahhhhhhhh” lifted from the crowd around the Plaza.

“They are fools to stand that close, you know,” Vierho said. “If that thing should charge…”

“Someone would shoot it with a hard-pellet,” Martinho said. “Fini a’chigua.”

“Fini Dr. Chen-Lhu’s specimen,” Vierho said. “Fini ten thousand cruzados.”

“Yes,” Martinho said. “We must not forget why we run this risk.”

“I hope you don’t believe I’d do this for love,” Vierho said. He inched the shield forward another meter.

A foggy area began to form where the acid had hit.

“Etched the magna-glass!” Vierho said, astonishment filling his voice.

“Smelled something like Oxalic,” Martinho said. “Must be stronger, though. Take it slow now. I want a sure shot.”

“Why don’t you try a foam bomb?”

“Vierho!”

“Ahhh, yes: the water.”

The creature began sliding to their right along the fountain. Vierho turned the shield to cover this new approach. The creature stopped, retraced its steps.

“Wait a bit,” Martinho said. He found a clear place in the glass, studied the thing.

The creature shifted back and forth, plainly visible on the fountain rim. It resembled its tiny namesake the way a caricature might. Its sectioned body appeared to be supported on ribbed legs that bowed outward to terminate in strong, gripping hairs. The antennae were stubby and glistened wetly at the ends.

Abruptly, it lifted a tubular nose, squirted a hard stream directly at the shield.

Martinho ducked involuntarily. “We must get closer,” he said. “It must not have time to recover after I stun it.”

“With what have you charged the rifle, Jefe?”

“Our special mix—dilute sulphur and corrosive sublimate in air-coagulating butyl carrier. I want to tangle its legs.”

“I wish you had also brought something to plug its nose.”

“Come along, old gray head,” Joao said.

Vierho urged the shield closer, bent to peer past the acid fogging.

The giant chigger danced sideways, turned, darted off to the right along the fountain rim. Abruptly, it whirled, arched a stream of acid at them. The liquid glistened under the searchlights like a high curve of jewels. Vierho barely had time to swerve the shield into the new attack.

“By the blood of ten thousand saints,” Vierho muttered. “I do not like working in this close to such a thing, Jefe. We are not fighters of bulls.”

“This is no bull, my brother. It hasn’t the horns.”

“I think I would prefer the horns.”

“We talk too much,” Martinho said. “Closer, eh?”

Vierho urged the shield ahead until a bare two meters separated them from the creature on the fountain. “Shoot it,” he hissed.

“We will get only one shot,” Martinho said. “I must not damage the specimen. The Doctor wishes a whole specimen.”

And he thought: So do I.

He swung the rifle toward the creature, but the chigger leaped to the lawn, back to the fountain rim. A scream lifted from the crowd.

Martinho and Vierho crouched, watching as their prey danced back and forth.

“Why doesn’t it stand still for just a second?” Martinho asked.

“Jefe, if it comes under the shield, we are cooked. Why do you wait? Pick it off.”

“I must be certain of it,” Martinho said.

He swung the sprayrifle back and forth with the motions of the darting, dancing insect. It dodged away from the line of sight each time, moving farther and farther to the right. Suddenly, it turned, scuttled on around the fountain’s rim to the opposite side. Now the entire water curtain separated them from it, but the searchlights had followed the retreat and they could still see it there.

Martinho entertained the odd suspicion then that the thing was trying to maneuver them into some special position. He lifted his suit’s face shield, wiped his forehead with his left hand. He was perspiring heavily. It was a hot night, but here by the fountain there was cool mist in the air—and the bitter smell of the acid.

“I think we are in trouble,” Vierho said. “If it keeps the fountain between us, how will we capture it?”

“Come along,” Martinho said. “If it stays across the fountain from us, I’ll order out another team. It cannot dodge two teams.”

Vierho began maneuvering the shield sideways around the fountain. “I still think we should’ve used the truck,” he said.

“Too big and clumsy,” Martinho said. “Besides, I think the truck might frighten it into attempting a break through the crowd. This way, it may feel it has a chance against us.”

“Jefe, I feel that same thing.”

The giant chigger took this moment to dart toward them, stop and crawl backwards. It kept its nose aimed at the shield and presented a steady target, but too much of the water curtain fell between it and Martinho for a safe shot.

“The wind is at our backs, Jefe,” Vierho said.

“I know. Let’s hope that thing hasn’t the wit to shoot over our heads. The wind’d drop acid onto our backs.”

The chigger backed into an area where the fountain’s upper structure shadowed it from the searchlights. It shifted back and forth in the shadow area, a dark wet movement.

“Jefe, that thing is not going to stay there for long. I can feel it.”

“Hold the shield here a moment,” Martinho said. “I think you’re right. We ought to clear the Plaza. If it took it into its mind to rush the crowd, people would be hurt.”

“You say a true thing, Jefe.”

“Vierho, use the handlight. Try to dazzle its eyes. I’ll break away from the shield to our right and try a long shot.”

“Jefe!”

“You have a better idea?”

“At least let us pull the shield farther out there into the lawn. You would not be so close if…”

Still in the shadows, the chigger hopped sideways off the fountain rim onto the lawn. Vierho jerked up the handlight, bathed the creature in a blue-white glare.

“O, Dios, Jefe! Shoot it!”

Martinho swung the sprayrifle around to bear on the new position, but the shield slot prevented a full swing. He cursed, grabbed for the control handle, but before he could swing the shield, a section of lawn the size of a street manhole lifted like a trapdoor behind the chigger and in the full glare of the handlight. A black shape with what appeared to be a triple-horned head emerged partly from the hole, sounded a rasping call.

The chigger darted past the shape and into the hole.

The crowd was screaming now, a noise compounded of rage, fear and feral excitement that filled the air of the plaza. Through it all, Martinho could hear Vierho praying in a low voice—almost a chant: “Holy Mary, Mother of God…”

Martinho tried to push the shield around toward the creature in the hole, was stalled by Vierho trying to pull the structure backward. The shield twisted around on its wheels, exposing them to the black shape there as the thing lifted another half meter onto the lawn. Martinho had a full, clear look at it there bathed in the beam of the handlight. The thing looked like a gigantic stag beetle—taller than a man and with triple horns.

Desperately, Martinho wrestled the sprayrifle from its shield slot, swung it toward the horned monster.

“Jefe, Jefe, Jefe!” Vierho pleaded.

Martinho brought his weapon to bear, squeezed off a two-second charge, counting to himself: “One butterfly, two butterfly.”

The poison-butyl mixture slammed into the creature, enveloped it.

The creature, its shape distorted by the spray-mix, hesitated, then lifted farther out of the hole with a rasping, grunting sound heard clearly above the crowd screams.

The crowd fell abruptly silent as the thing towered there, a shell-backed monster—green, black, glistening—at least a meter taller than a man.

Martinho could hear a sucking, rasping sound from it, an odd wet noise like the sound of the fountain with which it competed.

Carefully, he again aimed the sprayrifle at the horned head—point blank range—and emptied the charge cylinder: ten seconds. The creature appeared to dissolve backward into its hole with eerie extensions and protrusions fighting the sticky butyl.

“Jefe, let us go away from here,” Vierho pleaded. “Please, Jefe.” He swung the shield around until it again stood between them and the giant insect. “Please,” Vierho said. He began forcing Martinho back with the shield.

Martinho grabbed another charge cylinder, slammed it into his rifle, took a foamal bomb in his left hand. He felt emptied of every emotion except the need to attack that monster and kill it. But before he could draw his arm back to throw the bomb, he felt the shield buck. He looked up to a solid stream of liquid driving down on the shield from the black creature in the hole.

He needed no urging as Vierho screamed, “Run!”

They fled backward, dragging the shield.

The attack stopped as they drew out of range. Martinho stopped, looked back. He felt Vierho trembling beside him. The dark thing in the hole sank slowly backward. It was the most menacing retreat Martinho had ever seen. The movement radiated a willingness to return to the attack. It sank from sight. The section of lawn closed behind it.

As though that were the signal, the crowd sounds picked up all around the Plaza, but Martinho could hear the fear in the voices even when he couldn’t make out the words.

He threw back his face shield, listening to the words like sharp cries, the snatches of sentences—“Like a monster beetle!” “Have you heard the report from the waterfront?” “The whole region could be infested!” “…at the Monte Ochoa Convent… orphanage…”

Through it all came the same question repeated from all sides of the Plaza: “What was it?” “What was it?” “What was it?”

Martinho felt someone at his right, jerked around to see Chen-Lhu standing there, eyes intent on the place where the beetle shape had disappeared. There was no sign of Rhin Kelly.

“Yes, Johnny,” Chen-Lhu said. “What was it?”

“It looked like a giant stag beetle,” Martinho said, and he was surprised at how calm his voice sounded.

“It was taller than a man by half,” Vierho muttered. “Jefe… those stories about the Serra dos Paresis…”

“I heard the crowd talking about Monte Ochoa and the waterfront, something about an orphanage,” Martinho said. “What was that?”

“Rhin has gone to investigate,” Chen-Lhu said. “There are some disturbing reports. I’m having the crowds cleared out of the Plaza. People are being ordered to disperse and go to their homes.”

“What are the disturbing reports?”

“That there has been some sort of tragedy at the waterfront and again at the Monte Ochoa Convent and orphanage.”

“What sort of tragedy?”

“That is what Rhin’s investigating.”

“You saw that out there on the lawn,” Martinho said. “Now will you believe what we’ve been reporting to you these many months?”

“I saw an acid-shooting automaton and a man in the costume of a stag beetle,” Chen-Lhu said. “I’m curious to know if you were party to this deception.”

Vierho cursed under his breath.

Martinho took a moment to put down his sudden anger, said only, “It didn’t look to me like a man in costume.” He shook his head. This was no time to let emotion cloud reason. Insects could not possibly grow that large. The forces of gravity… Again, he shook his head. Then what was it?

“We should at least get samples of the acid off the lawn there,” Martinho said. “And that hole will have to be investigated.”

“I’ve sent for our Security Section,” Chen-Lhu said. He turned away, thinking of how he would have to compose the reports on this—the one for his superiors in the IEO and the special report for his own government.

“Did you see how it appeared to dissolve downward into the hole when I hit it with the spray?” Martinho asked. “That poison can be painful, Travis. A man would’ve screamed.”

“A man in protective clothing,” Chen-Lhu, speaking without turning. But he began to wonder about Martinho. The man seemed genuinely puzzled. No matter. This whole incident was going to be useful. Chen-Lhu saw that now.

“But it came back out of the hole,” Vierho said. “You saw that. It came back.”

An abrupt growling sound came from the people being pushed out of the Plaza. It passed through them like a wind—voice to voice to voice.

Martinho turned, studied them. “Vierho,” he said.

“Jefe?”

“Get blast-pellet carbines from the truck.”

“At once, Jefe.”

Vierho trotted across the lawn toward the truck which stood now in an open area with only a scattering of bandeirantes around it. Martinho recognized some of the men—those of Alvarez seemed most numerous, but there were bandeirantes also of the Hermosillo and Junitza.

“What do you want with blast-pellet weapons?” Chen-Lhu asked.

“I am going to look in that hole.”

“My Security men will be here soon. We’ll wait for them.”

“I am going now.”

“Martinho, I’m telling you that…”

“You are not the government of Brazil, Doctor. I am licensed by my government for a specific task. I am pledged to carry out that task wherever…”

“Martinho, if you destroy evidence of…”

“You were not out here facing those things, Doctor. You were safe back there at the Plaza’s edge while I was earning the right to look in that hole.”

Chen-Lhu’s face grew rigid with anger, but he held himself silent until he knew he could control his voice, then said, “In that case, I will go with you now.”

“As you wish.”

Martinho turned away, stared across the Plaza to where the carbines were being handed out of the rear of his truck. Vierho collected them, headed back across the lawn. A tall, bald-headed Negro with his right arm in a sling fell into step beside Vierho. The Negro wore a uniform of plain bandeirante white with the golden spray emblem of a band leader at his left shoulder. His craggy, Moorish features were drawn into a scowl of pain.

“There’s Alvarez,” Chen-Lhu said.

“I see him.”

Chen-Lhu faced Martinho, assumed a rueful smile to match his tone. “Johnny—let us not fight. You know why the IEO assigned me to Brazil.”

“I know. China’s already completed the realignment of its insects. You’re a big success.”

“We’ve nothing but the mutated bees now, Johnny—not a single creature to spread disease or eat food intended for humans.”

“I know, Travis. And you’re here to make our job easier.”

Chen-Lhu frowned at the tone of patient disbelief in Martinho’s voice. He said, “Exactly.”

“Then why won’t you let our observers or those from the U.N. go in and see for themselves, Doctor?”

“Johnny! You certainly must know how long my country suffered under the white imperialists. Some of our people believe the danger’s still there. They see spies everywhere.”

“But you’re more a man of the world, more understanding, eh, Travis?”

“Of course! My great grandmother was English, one of the Travis-Huntingtons. We have a tradition of broader understanding in my family.”

“It’s a wonder your country trusts you,” Martinho said. “You’re part white imperialist.” He turned to greet Alvarez as the Negro stopped in front of them. “Hi, Benito. Sorry about your arm.”

“Hullo, Johnny.” Alvarez’s voice was deep and rumbling. “God protected me. I will recover.” He glanced down at the carbines in Vierho’s hands, returned his attention to Martinho. “I heard the Padre here asking for blast-pellets. You could only want them for one reason.”

“I have to look in that hole, Benito.”

Alvarez turned, gave a stiff little bow to Chen-Lhu. “And you have no objections, Doctor?”

“I’ve objections, but no authority,” Chen-Lhu said. “Is the arm severely injured? I will have my own physicians see to it.”

“The arm will recover,” Alvarez rumbled.

“He really wants to know if it was actually injured,” Martinho said.

Chen-Lhu turned a startled look at Martinho, masked it quickly.

Vierho handed one of the carbines to his chief, said, “Jefe, we have to do this?”

“Why would the good Doctor doubt that my arm was injured?” Alvarez asked.

“He has heard stories,” Martinho said.

“What stories?”

“That we bandeirantes don’t want to see a good thing end, that we’re reinfesting the Green, breeding new insects in secret laboratories.”

“That rot!” Alvarez growled.

“Which bandeirantes are supposed to be doing this?” Vierho demanded. He scowled at Chen-Lhu, gripped the carbine as though ready to turn it on the IEO official.

“Easy, Padre,” Alvarez said. “The stories never say. It’s always they or them—never names.”

Martinho looked toward the place in the lawn where the giant figure of a beetle had disappeared. He found this dalliance with talk far more alluring than the walk across the lawn to that place. The night air carried a sense of lowering menace and… hysteria. And the oddest thing of all was the reluctance to take action that could be seen all around him. It was like the lull after a terrible battle in a war.

Well, it is a kind of war, he told himself.

Eight years they’d been fighting this war here in Brazil. The Chinese had taken twenty-two years, but they’d said it could be done here in ten. The thought that it might take twenty-two years here—fourteen more years—momentarily threatened to overwhelm Martinho. He felt a monstrous fatigue.

“You must admit odd things are happening,” Chen-Lhu said.

“That we admit,” Alvarez said.

“Why does no one suspect the Carsonites?” Vierho asked.

“A good question, Padre,” Alvarez said. “They have big support, the Carsonites—all the holdout nations: the U.S. of A., Canada, the United Kingdom, Common Europe.”

“All the places where they’ve never had any real trouble with the insects,” Vierho said.

Oddly, it was Chen-Lhu who protested. “No,” he said. “The holdout nations don’t really care—except that they’re happy to see us occupied with this fight.”

Martinho nodded. Yes—that was what all the companions of his schooldays in North America had said. They couldn’t care less.

“I am going over now and look in that hole,” Martinho said.

Alvarez reached out, took Vierho’s carbine. He hung it on his good shoulder by the sling, took the control handle of the shield. “I will go with you, Johnny.”

Martinho glanced at Vierho, saw the look of terrified relief in the man’s face, returned his attention to Alvarez. “Your arm?”

“I still have one good arm. What more do I need?”

“Travis, you stay close behind us,” Martinho said.

“My Security men have just arrived,” Chen-Lhu said. “Delay a moment and we’ll ring that place. I will tell them to bring shields.”

“It is wise, Johnny,” Alvarez said.

“We will go slowly,” Martinho said. “Padre, return to the truck. Tell Ramon to bring it around the Plaza and up onto the edge of the lawn over there. Have the Hermosillo truck direct all its lights onto that place.” He nodded ahead of him.

“At once, Jefe.”

Vierho headed back for the truck.

“You will not disturb anything there?” Chen-Lhu asked.

“We’re as anxious as you to find out what that is,” Alvarez said.

“Let’s go,” Martinho said.

Chen-Lhu trotted off to the right where an IEO field truck could be seen making its way through a side street. The crowd appeared to be giving trouble there, resisting efforts to expel them from the Plaza area.

Alvarez turned the control handle and the shield began crawling across the lawn.

In a low voice, Alvarez said, “Johnny, why doesn’t the doctor suspect the Carsonites?”

“He has a spy system as good as anything in the world,” Martinho said. “He must know.” He kept his gaze on the disturbed patch of lawn ahead of them, that mysterious place beside the fountain.

“But what better way to sabotage us than to discredit the bandeirantes?”

“True, but I don’t think Travis Huntington Chen-Lhu would make such a mistake.” And he thought: It is strange how that patch of lawn both attracts and repels.

“You and I have been rivals at the bid many times, Johnny. Perhaps we forget sometimes that we have a common enemy.”

“Do you name that enemy?”

“It’s the enemy in the jungles, in the grass of the savannahs and under the ground. The Chinese took twenty-two years…”

“Do you suspect them?” Martinho glanced at his companion, noting the glower of concentration of Alvarez’s face. “They will not let us inspect their results.”

“The Chinese are paranoid. They leaned that way before they ever collided with the Western world and the Western world merely confirmed them in this sickness. Suspect the Chinese? I don’t think so.”

“I do,” Martinho said. “I suspect everyone.”

A feeling of gloom overtook him at the sound of his own words. It was true—he suspected everyone, even Benito here, and Chen-Lhu… and the lovely Rhin Kelly. He said, “I think often of the ancient insecticides, how the insects grew ever stronger in spite of—or because of—the insect poisons.”

A sound behind them caught Martinho’s attention. He put a hand on Alvarez’s arm, stopped the shield, turned.

It was Vierho followed by a slave-cart piled with gear. Martinho identified a long pry bar there, a large body hood that must have been intended for Alvarez, packages of plastic explosive.

“Jefe… I thought you would need these things,” Vierho said.

A feeling of affection for the Padre swept through Martinho and he spoke bruskly: “Stay close behind and out of the way, you hear?”

“Of course, Jefe. Don’t I always?” He held the body hood towards Alvarez. “This I brought for you, Jefe Alvarez, that you might not suffer another hurt.”

“I thank you, Padre,” Alvarez said, “but I prefer freedom of movement. Besides, this old body has so many scars, one more will make little difference.”

Martinho glanced around him, noted that other shields were advancing across the lawn. “Quickly,” he said, “we must be the first there.”

Alvarez rotated the control handle. Again their shield ground its way toward the fountain.

Vierho came up close beside his chief, spoke in a low voice: “Jefe, there are stories back there at the truck. It is said that some creature ate the pilings from under a warehouse at the waterfront. The warehouse collapsed. People were killed. There is much upset.”

“Chen-Lhu hinted at this,” Martinho said.

“Is this not the place?” Alvarez asked.

“Stop the shield,” Martinho said. He stared at the grass ahead of them, searching out the place—the relationship to the fountain, the grass marked by the previous passage of their shield.

“This is the place,” he said. He passed his carbine to Vierho, said, “Give me that prybar… and a stun charge.”

Vierho handed him a small packet of plastic explosive with detonator, the kind of charge they used in the Red areas to break up an insect nest in the ground. Martinho pulled his head shield down tight, took the prybar. “Vierho, cover me from here. Benito—can you use a handlight?”

“Of course, Johnny.”

“Jefe… you are not going to use the shield?”

“There isn’t time.” He stepped around the shield before Vierho could answer. The beam of a handlight stabbed down at the ground ahead of him. He crouched, slid the tip of the prybar along the grass, digging, pushing. The bar caught, then slipped down into emptiness. Something touched it down there, and an electric tingle shot all through Martinho.

“Padre, down here,” he whispered.

Vierho leaned over him with the carbine. “Jefe?”

“Just ahead of the bar—into the ground.”

Vierho aimed, squeezed off two shots.

A violent scrabbling noise erupted under the lawn ahead of them. Something splashed there.

Again, Vierho fired. The blast pellets made a curious thumping sound as they exploded under the ground.

There came the liquid sound of furious activity down there—as though there was a school of fish feeding at the surface.

Silence.

More handlights glared onto the lawn ahead of him. Martinho looked up to see a ring of shields around them—IEO and bandeirante uniforms.

Again he focused on the patch of lawn.

“Padre, I’m going to pry it up. Be ready.”

“Of course, Jefe.”

Martinho put a foot under the bar as fulcrum, leaned on his end. The trapdoor lifted slowly. It appeared to be sealed with a gummy mixture that came up in trailing sheets. A whiff of sulphur and corrosive sublimate told Martinho what the sealant must be—the butyl carrier he’d fired from the sprayrifle. With a sudden giving, the door swung up, flopped back onto the lawn.

Handlights were beside Martinho now, probing downward to reveal oily black water. It had the smell of the river.

“They came in from the river,” Alvarez said.

Chen-Lhu came up beside Martinho, said, “The masqueraders appear to have escaped. How convenient.” And he thought: I was correct to give Rhin her orders when I did. We must get a line into their organization. This is the enemy: this bandeirante leader who was educated among the Yankee imperialists. He is one of those who’re trying to destroy us; there can be no other answer.

Martinho ignored Chen-Lhu’s jibe; he was too weary even to be angry with the fool. He stood up, looked around the Plaza. The air held a stillness as though the entire sky awaited some calamity. A few watchers remained beyond the expanded ring of guards—privileged officials, probably—but the mob had been cleared back into adjoining streets.

A small red groundcar could be seen coming down an avenue from the left, its windows glittering under the slavelights as it scuttled toward the Plaza. Its three headlights darted in and out as it skirted people and vehicles. Guards opened a way for it. Martinho recognized the IEO insignia on its tonneau as it neared. The car jerked to a fast stop at the edge of the lawn and Rhin Kelly jumped out.

She had changed to coveralls of IEO working green. They looked almost like sun-bleached grass under the yellow lights of the Plaza.

She strode across the lawn, her attention fixed on Martinho, thinking: He must be used and discarded. He’s the enemy. That’s obvious now.

Martinho watched her approach, admiring the grace and femininity which the simple uniform only accented.

She stopped in front of him, spoke in a husky, urgent voice: “Senhor Martinho, I’ve come to save your life.”

He shook his head, not quite believing he’d heard her correctly. “What…”

“All hell is about to break loose,” she said.

Martinho grew aware of distant shouting.

“A mob,” she said. “Armed.”

“What the devil’s going on?” he demanded.

“There’ve been some deaths tonight,” she said. “Women and children among them. A section of the hill collapsed behind Monte Ochoa. There’re burrows all through that hill.”

Vierho said, “The orphanage…”

“Yes,” she said. “The orphanage and convent on Monte Ochoa were buried. Bandeirantes are blamed. You know what is being said about…”

“I’ll talk to these people,” Martinho said. He felt outrage at the thought of being threatened by those he served. “This is nonsense! We’ve done nothing to…”

“Jefe,” Vierho said, “you do not reason with a mob.”

“Two men of the Lifcado band already have been lynched,” Rhin said. “You have a chance if you run now. Your trucks are here, enough for all of you.”

Vierho took his arm. “Jefe, we must do as she says.”

Martinho stood silently, hearing the information being passed among the bandeirantes around them—“A mob… the blame on us… orphanage…”

“Where could we go?” he asked.

“This violence appears to be local,” Chen-Lhu said. He paused, listening: the mob sounds had grown louder. “Go to your father’s place in Cuiaba. Take your band with you. The others can go to your bases in the Red.”

“Why must I…”

“I will send Rhin to you when we’ve devised a plan of action.”

“I must know where to find you,” Rhin said, picking up her cue. And she thought: The father’s place, yes. That must be the center of it… there or the Goyaz as Travis suspects.

“But we’ve done nothing,” Martinho said.

“Please,” she said.

Vierho tugged his arm.

Martinho took a deep breath. “Padre, go with the men. It’ll be safer out there in the Red. I’ll take the small truck and go to Cuiaba. I must discuss this with my father, the Prefect. Someone must get to the seat of government and make the people there listen.”

“Listen to what?” Alvarez asked.

“The… work must be halted… temporarily,” Martinho said. “There must be an investigation.”

“That is foolish!” Alvarez barked. “Who will listen to such talk as that?”

Martinho tried to swallow in a dry throat. The night around him felt cold, oppressive… and the mob sounds had grown louder. Police and military guards wouldn’t be able to hold back that angered, many-celled monster much longer.

“They cannot afford to listen,” Alvarez muttered. “Even if you’re right.”

The mob sounds punctuated the truth in those words, Martinho knew. The men in power couldn’t admit failure. They were in power because of certain promises. If those promises weren’t kept, someone would have to be found to take the blame.

Perhaps someone’s already been found, he thought.

He allowed Vierho to lead them toward the trucks.