The Nitrogen Fix

XI Experiment, Educational

The spear hurt, and pulling it out hurt a good deal more. Bones expected another flight of the weapons as the process was tried, but the human beings watched with interest as the handling tentacles pulled the long shaft on through and dropped it on the floor. The flow of nearly colorless blood ceased quickly. The Observer body was by no means either immortal or invulnerable, but most of the organs which would be vital to a human being were decentralized. There was no single heart, but hundreds of far smaller pump muscles along the blood vessels; nerve cells used internal information storage instead of the human method of coding connections, and travelled freely though the body both in the circulatory system and among the cells of the other tissues. Even muscles were not connected groups of tissue-forming cells but protean structures which could change their shapes and regroup as needed. The Observer muscle could actually push.

Bones, therefore, was extremely uncomfortable, but not incapacitated. The fact that such major damage usually stimulated the long body to a budding reaction was a nuisance, but not a catastrophe; buds were sometimes even convenient, if they actually duplicated properly. Usually, of course, they didn’t.

The fishlike form’s failure to fall down startled the human witnesses, and a buzz of conversation broke out.

Bones could not, as usual, understand enough of the syllables to make any sense, and human facial expressions had never been very meaningful to the Observer. It was necessary to wait for overt actions before the thoughts of these people could be guessed. The one they had made so far was mystifying, butwas at least a datum to remember.

Until they made another, it seemed reasonable to eat some more. This would be useful even if it did not stimulate the witnesses to some informative reaction. Bones removed the bubble from another planter and reached for the contents. The reaction, unfortunately, was too quick to allow a taste of the material; there was a single, sharp syllable barked by one of the tallest of the people, and six more spears were poised for throwing.

Bones did not have combat-type reflexes, but was a reasonably intelligent being. The basic idea of throwing things at beings whose actions were undesirable was new, but not essentially difficult Actual execution of it might take practice — Bones suspected that making the spear which had already been thrown return point first to its senders would be more difficult than it appeared; but some things could be thrown without knowing about their travel attitude.

The planter was heavy, but not too heavy. Two strong tentacles lashed out, and the box of dirt and plants went flying toward the spearsmen.

Two of them had time to launch their weapons, while the other four dropped theirs and ducked, in one case too slowly. More spears were raised.

Bones, who had had no trouble dodging the pair just thrown once it was obviously the thing to do, reached for and raised another planter.

The voice which had given orders before sounded again, this time in a monosyllable that Bones was able to understand.

“Stop!”

Bones stopped, not because of the word but because of its effect on the others. Spears were lowered, and their holders were looking at the speaker; even the Observer could tell that they were waiting for more instructions — that the one who had called out was for some reason the controlling mind of the group.

The speech went on, but lapsed into incomprehensibility as far as Bones was concerned. How much information was being conveyed, why the leader had stopped the violence — there was no way to tell. If only Earrin or Kahvi, or even little Danna, had been there. No use in wishing; it was less useful than inference, or even than guessing. Watching what the people did was all that could be done now.

The speaker finished. His listeners seemed relaxed, and divided their attention between him and the Observer; they showed no signs of further violence as far as the latter could judge.

Only two of the human beings were doing anything. These moved slowly and steadily toward a table not very far from Bones. Neither carried a weapon or anything else. Their slow, very controlled actions captured the Observer’s attention more and more completely as the seconds passed.

Both the people were much smaller than usual, though not nearly as small as Danna — they were about the height of the other Observer unit which had been in the prison. Earrin or Kahvi would have guessed them as being thirteen or fourteen years old; Bones had no basis for judgment. Both were males, another fact unknowable and unimportant to the nonhuman.

They stopped two or three tables away from the tall watcher, and removed a light cover from a glass tank which covered most of the top of the furnishing. One of them dipped in with a fabric net which interested Bones greatly; it was the first woven material the Observer remembered seeing.

The pocket of the tool went into a layer of milky-looking, thin mud which filled the lowest third of the tank; it was withdrawn, held to drain for a moment, and brought toward Bones.

The latter wondered whether food were being offered, but as the net continued to drip the upper part of its contents cleared to a snowy white; and when it came close enough the nature of the substance was clear — too clear. It was a fluffy pile of the glass splinters which had made so effective a trap back at the fire site.

For the first time, Bones noticed that all the human beings were wearing sandals. Evidently satisfied that the material had been recognized, the small human being walked toward a nearby door and began to spread the stuff over the floor in its area. The other youngster had dipped up another load, and was doing the same at another door. It took no great deductive power to see what was happening, but there wasnothing obvious the Observer could do about it.

The larger beings still held their spears. Within five minutes, every door in the room was unapproachable, as far as Bones or any bare-footed human being was concerned.

The Observer was interested, but not worried. This was certainly a better method of restraint than the bars, except for one factor. It was fascinating that the people seemed not to have considered that factor; unless and until they did, other matters could be studied.

The tank from which the glass had come, for example. There were several more like it, some containing layers of gray mud like the first, others with lumps of spongy tissue in various stages of solution. It was obvious enough that the glass spicules were being grown in some form of pseudolife, and the supporting tissue was merely dissolved away when mature. Earrin would be interested, though he would probably have no use for the material.

Now the human beings put their spears down, except for half a dozen who left the room with theirs.

Those who remained set frantically to work. Some collected the fragments of the planter Bones had thrown, others picked up, very carefully, the bits of tissue from the growths it had contained. The people who had been hit by the missile were among those who had left, some of them still limping. The tissue was carefully placed in soil in several trays which were brought in from another room. Some of these were set up on empty tables, others carried through one of the doors out of sight. The planters from which Bones had eaten were examined carefully, and their covers replaced. All this was fairly obvious in purpose; Bones had seen Earrin and Kahvi carry out similar routine hundreds of times in the past few years. The culture, whatever it was, in the planter which had been smashed was being salvaged; the others were being checked for possible infection. There were always nitro-life spores in the air, even in a well-sealed environment like a city.

Important plants such as air and food producers had to be kept protected, and divided as far as possible so that no single infection would destroy an entire resource. The trays Bones had uncovered would be watched with special care for some days.

During all this, the small individuals who had spread the glass simply stood and watched the nonhuman. Bones suspected that they were much younger than the rest, and had begun to wonder whether a communication effort might be worth while. Danna had apparently found it much easier than her parents to learn Bones’ tentacle gestures while the code was being perfected; her signal vocabulary was not as great as her parents’ — so far, but what she knew she had learned much faster.

Perhaps this was a quality which went with the more recently budded of the species. It seemed worth trying.

The youngsters were cooperative, watching the motions of Bones’ tentacles and, after a while, seeming to get the basic idea and trying to imitate them with waving and posturing of their own arms and fingers. No real transfer of information was accomplished, however; the primary result was the total focussing of Bones’ attention on the two beings. This, it turned out, was an error — though the results might have been the same even if the Observer had really been observing.

Even the pain of the spear wound had been forgotten for the moment, when suddenly two nooses settled over Bones’ head and tightened below the eyes. They could not get lower than the upper handling tentacles, and these appendages reacted at once, whipping upward and trying to flip the loops of fiber away; but the human crews pulled hard from opposite directions until the ropes were cutting painfully into the tough, rubbery flesh. Bones could not, of course, have been strangled, and the major parts of the circulatory system of the fishlike body were too deeply located to be blocked this way; but the long form could and did feel pain. For the time the Observer was completely helpless.

The youngsters, apparently as startled as Bones, uttered cries of surprise and what the Fyns would have recognized as indignation; they had been getting interested in the embryonic conversation. There was a sharp argument between them and one of the older beings, which ended with the youngsters leaving the room sulkily.

They looked back as they went, watching as the tall form was dragged over to a door, the floor in the neighborhood swept carefully, and the prisoner moved through it. Bones did not see them again.

Once in the corridor outside, travel stopped briefly. The nooses were loosened a little, Bones’eyeballs relaxed into their proper shape, and their vision began to come back. Another noose was applied near the other end of the fishlike form, at the narrowest part just above the flukes. Two more followed at the same place; then the upper ones were removed completely. Bones, analyzing the situation, could recognize that there was no immediate chance of escape. The three ropes were held by three men, standing in three different directions; any one of them could jerk the support from under the Observer with no trouble at all.

Untying one of the nooses, even if it could be managed, would be futile, and there certainly was no way to work on all of them at once. It appeared that the men this time felt it would be easier to let their captive provide his own transportation.

Of course, the Observer was in no great hurry to escape, though choosing and managing one’s own actions was always preferable. Food needs had been supplied for the time being, and unless the same prison as before were on the schedule there should be new things to learn.

Since there was a fair chance that it would be the same prison, however, Bones gave thought to methods of escape as the party resumed its journey.

Ropes were slow to untie, but they could be cut quickly. Did any of these people have a knife? The light was poor for human vision, but not for the Observer’s great eyeballs. Outdoor workers, like Nomads, always carried tools; but this might not be so usual inside the city.

Apparently it wasn’t. Of the ten people in the party, eight were carrying nothing; indoor garments were scanty enough to leave no doubt about this. Of the two with cases or bags which might possibly contain knives, both were at the far ends of ropes attached to Bones, and seemed determined that the slack in those ropes be kept at an absolute minimum. Once, experimentally, the Observer made a sudden move as though to spring into an intersecting tunnel. The resulting horizontal position, achieved with no perceptible delay, was no surprise. The people provided no help in getting up, but did not interfere; carrying that weight was still no part of their plan if it could be helped. Bones did nothing more which might be construed as an effort to leave, but filed some data very carefully. One of the men had been noticeably slower than the other two in putting tension on his rope, though he had coordinated well with the others in controlling the direction of Bones’ fall.

They did not, after all, go back to the original prison. To Bones’ surprise the party finally came to an air lock. After donning outdoor equipment from open shelves which lined the walls near the pool, they took their captive outdoors. For the moment, this completely baffled Bones.

About three hundred meters east and slightly downhill from the air lock was a clearings real clearing, with the ground almost completely bare. Not even the usual nitro slime was present, except in a few patches. The people led Bones to the center of this area.

Then one of them approached, taking from her belt one of the bags which the Observer had hoped might contain a knife. As the youngsters had done, she brought it close to her captive and made it obvious that it contained more of the hellish bits of glass. Then, accompanied by another member of the group with the other bag, she began walking around the edge of the clearing scattering the stuff over the ground. They made several circuits, and when the bags were empty the soil in a ring fully three meters wide was, as far as Bones was concerned, untouchable. The sandalled people now walked out of the clearing. The three who were holding the ropes dropped the ends and started off with the rest, but a sharp voice uttered several syllables. They came back, detached the ropes from Bones, and took them away.

It was close to midday; many hours had passed since the two Observers had fled the cell. Bones wondered what had become of the other unit — not the other one; no Observer could think of another as a different entity. They were all parts of one Self.

There were plenty of other things to wonder about, too, and only inferences for answers — better than nothing, but not much better.

Certainly not to be compared with Knowledge. Bones was very much in the position of a human being of the Age of Pleasure, surrounded by attractive and complaisant members of the opposite sex, but restrained from all action. The Tantalus legend was also appropriate, though different appetites were involved.The tentacular legs under the long body were capable of far more rapid running than would have seemed possible to their incredible slenderness, but jumping was another matter. Bones did consider this briefly, but decided that landing on the glass would be enough worse than walking on it to make the risk unacceptable. The ropes were gone — some people obviously thought more rapidly than others — and the slow-reacting person was gone too; the native regretfully filed what had seemed a promising plan.

By this time the whole situation was starting to make sense. These people were, simply and rationally, trying to find out more about Bones. It was a perfectly sensible thing — just what an Observer would have done. Cooperation was obviously in order. It was too bad the communication effort with the young ones had been interrupted, and it was hard to see why. Did the people have some quicker method than the sound code, after all, for getting information? If not, why were they so willing to delay? Tantalizing mystery again, and again with nothing but inference possible for a solution so far. Unsatisfactory. Best to assume that this was a test, presumably of Bones’ ability to get out of this situation, and pass it as quickly as possible.

Digging is very difficult with tentacles, but not impossible. The soil covering the bedrock here was shallow, but might suffice. Bones began to scrape it together and carry it to the narrowest part of the glass barrier. The splinters were easy enough to see by daylight, though the native would not have noticed them without experience.

The original idea was to cover a pathway a meter or so wide across the danger strip, but it quickly became clear that there was not enough dirt for this. The Observer changed the plan to a better and quicker one, that of covering only a few small patches and being careful to step exactly on these while departing. It worked perfectly.

Six human beings were waiting just inside the glass. One of them carried a broom, with which she scattered the dirt from the protected areas. Another person had a bag of the splinters, and renewed the places which Bones and broom had made safe.

Without thinking, the Observer snatched the broom from its wielder, dashed across the clearing, and began to sweep a path to the outside. If the people had had to go around, this might have worked; but their feet were protected, and they could run across the glass without having to clear a way. Once more Bones was carried back, and the swept area restored to deadliness.

So far the contest had been conducted very politely, with neither side using violence. Bones was more than ever convinced that the whole thing was a test, and still felt cooperative if slightly impatient.

This attitude was modified on the second carry when one of the people, accidentally or otherwise, dropped the heavy end of his load onto the glass area. Once again the Observer felt agony much too great to be compatible with sympathy. For a moment the temptation to hurl the nearest human beings off their feet and onto the glass almost won out; but the realization that they were intelligent beings in some ways comparable to Observers, however different in detail, throttled the impulse.

The glass this time was at the upper end of a fin and adjacent body, and could be reached with handling tendrils, so Bones ignored the test for a while and concentrated on removing the stuff.

The injuries already sustained had, as expected, started the budding reaction, and nothing could be done about that; but there was no reason to suffer more pain than necessary.

By the time the glass was gone and the pain reduced to a dull ache, the sun was well down in the west. Bones had decided to make no more attempts by daylight, in spite of the risk that people might take their test subject indoors for the night. This might even be helpful, if the same individuals held the ropes. Even if they didn’t, a chance of using the earlier plan might present itself; if this happened before they reached the air lock, the situation would be perfect. The moon would not rise for some hours after sunset, and the comet of course would be four hours later still.

So Bones let night fall without giving the experimenters the pleasure of another contest. For some time after dark it looked as though the experiment were to run through the night — quite reasonably, the Observer considered — but at last there came a sound of human conversation from the direction of the air lock. Bones got “afoot” — the great body did need rest at times — and waited tensely.

This silhouetted the tall form against the starlit sky, and there was more sound from the opposite direction. It was the quick intake of a human breath, followed by the exclamation, “Bones!” in a voicewhich even the native could recognize.

“Bones!” Kahvi repeated. “Come on, quickly! The Hillers are coming, and they plan to hurt you — to kill you if they can! Come this way!”

Bones, unfortunately, could do nothing of the sort. The glass was in the way. This was bad enough, though it seemed unlikely that the Hillers could actually kill the rather resilient Observer body; but there was something worse. The woman was approaching. With her unshod feet she would be as vulnerable to the glass as Bones — perhaps more so, considering the thin human skin. The Observer gestured frantically for her to keep back, but the detailed signals simply could not be made out in the darkness. She would be into the-splinters in a few seconds; and now it could be seen that little Danna was with her.