Downbelow Station (56 page)

Whisper nodded, suddenly enthusiastic, a quick bob of her whole body on her haunches. She pointed back in the direction of the plain. “They… they… they,” she said, and snatched the stick, waved it at the sky with the nearest thing to menace she had ever seen in a hisa. “Bad they,” she said, and hurled the stick at the sky, bounced several times, clapped her hands and struck her breast with her palms. “I friend Bounder.”

Bounder’s mate. Miliko stared at the young female’s intense expression, suddenly understanding, and Whisper seized her hand, patted it. Quickfoot patted her shoulder. There was a quick sputtering of conversation among all the hisa, and they suddenly seemed to take a decision, separated by pairs and each seized a human by the hand.

“Miliko,” Ito protested.

“Trust them; let’s go with it. Hisa won’t get lost; they’ll keep us in touch and get us back again when we have to. I’ll send a message to you. Wait on it.” The hisa were anxiously urging them apart, each a separate way. “Take care,” Ernst said, looking back; and trees came between. She, Ernst, and Ito had guns, half the guns there were on all of Downbelow, except the troops’ and the other three were coming. Six guns and a little of the blasting materials for moving stumps—that was their whole arsenal. Go quietly, no more than three together, she had urged the hisa constantly, trying to keep their movements ordinary in human scan; and by threes the hisa had taken them, by their curious logic: she and Whisper and Quickfoot, three humans and six hisa, and now three units of three headed apart in haste.

No more pranks. Suddenly Quickfoot and Whisper were very serious indeed, slipping through the brush, turning this time to caution her when she made what their sensitive ears thought too much noise. The hiss of the breather she could not help, but she took care to break no branch, imitating the hisa’s own gliding steps, their stop and start swiftness, as if—the thought reached her finally—as if they were teaching her.

She rested when she must, and only then; once fell, hard, from walking too long, and the hisa scrambled to pick her up and to pat her face and stroke her hair.
 
They held her as they did each other, tucked her up with their warmth, for the sky was clouding and the wind was chill. It started to rain.
 
She rose as soon as she could, insisted on their pace. “Good, good,” they said.
 
“You good.” And by afternoon more met them, more females and two males. There was no sign of them one moment and then they came from a little hill within the woods, and from out of the trees and leaves like brown shadows in the misting rain, the water beading like jewels on their pelts. Whisper and Quickfoot spoke to them, their arms about her, and had an answer.

“Say… far walk they place. Hear. Come. Many come. They eyes warm see you, Mihan-tisar.”

There were twelve of them. One by one they came and touched Miliko’s hands and hugged her, and bobbed and bowed in solemn courtesy. What Whisper said was long, and drew long answers from one and the other.

“They see,” Quickfoot said, listening while Whisper talked. “They see human place. Hisa there hurt. Human hurt.”

“We’ve got to go there,” Miliko said, touching her heart “All my humans, go there, sit on hills, watch. You understand? Hear good?” “Hear,” Quickfoot said, and seemed to translate.

The others started walking, leading the way; and what they should all do when they got there she did not know. Ito’s madness and that of the others frightened her. Six pistols could not take a shuttle, nor the rest of them when they should come… unarmed and by no means able to go against armored, heavy-armed troops.
 
They could only watch, and be there, and hope.

They walked throughout the day, with rain sifting cold through the leaves and the wind shaking drops down on them when it was not actually raining. Streams were up, bubbling freely; they passed into wilder and wilder thicket.
 
“Human place,” she reminded them finally, despairing. “We have to go to the human camp.”

“Go human place,” Whisper confirmed, and in the next moment she was gone, slipping through the brush with such speed she tricked the eyes.
 
“Run good,” Quickfoot assured her. “Make Bounder walk far get she. Many he fall, she walk.”

Miliko frowned, perplexed, as much of hisa chatter was perplexing. But Whisper was off about sober business, that much seemed likely, and she struggled to keep moving.

At long last she saw a break in the trees, staggered toward it with the last of her strength, for there was smoke, the smoke of the mills, and soon after that she could make out the twilit glimmer of a dome. She sank to her knees at the edge of the woods, took a moment to realize where she was. She had never seen the camp from this angle before, high in the hills. She leaned there with Quickfoot patting her shoulder, for she was gasping and her vision kept clouding. She felt after the three spare cylinders she had in her left pocket and hoped she had not ruined the one in the mask. She had reckoned they could live out here for weeks; they could not be using them up like that.
 
The sun was going. She saw the lights go on in the camp, and as she worked out on the edge of an eroded overhang, she could see figures moving out there under the lights, a burdened line toiling back and forth, back and forth between the mill and the road.

“She come,” Quickfoot told her suddenly; Miliko looked back, suddenly missed the others, who had been behind them in the trees and now were nowhere in sight; blinked again as the brush parted and Whisper dropped to her haunches panting.
 
“Bounder,” Whisper breathed, rocking with her breaths. “He hurt, he hurt work hard. Konstantin-man hurt. Give, give you.”

She had a bit of paper clenched in her wet, furry fist. Miliko took it, smoothed out the sodden scrap very carefully, with the drizzle soaking it afresh and making it fragile as tissue. She had to bend very close and angle it to read it in the twilight… crabbed words and twisted.

“It’s pretty… bad here. Won’t pretend not. Stay out. Stay away. Please. I told you what to do. Scatter and keep out of their hands… fear… they… maybe won’t… maybe want… want more workers… I’m all right. Please… go back… stay out of trouble.”

The two hisa looked at her, dark eyes perplexed. Marks on paper—it was confusing to them. “Did anyone see you?” she asked. “Man see you?” Whisper pursed her lips. “I Downer,” she said scornfully. “Many Downer come here. Carry sack, Downer. Bring mill, Downer. Bounder there, human see I, don’t see. Who I? I Downer. Bounder say you friend hurt work hard; mans kill mans; he say love you.”

“Love him too.” She tucked the precious note within her jacket, crouched within the leaves with her hood pulled over her head and her hand within her pocket on the butt of the pistol.

There was no action they could take that might not make things worse… that might not mean the lives of everyone down there. Even if they could take one of the ships… it would only bring reprisals down on them. Massive strike. Here. Back at the shrine. Lives for lives. Emilio worked down there to save Downbelow… to save what of it they could. And the last thing he wanted was some quixotic move from them.

“Quickfoot,” she said, “you run, find Downers, find all humans with me, understand. Tell them… Miliko talks with Konstantin-man; tell all wait, wait, make no trouble.”

Quickfoot tried to repeat it, muddled, not knowing all the words. Quietly, patiently, Miliko tried again… and finally Quickfoot bobbed assent. “Tell they sit,” Quickfoot said excitedly. “You talk Konstantin-man.” “Yes,” she said. “Yes.” And Quickfoot fled.

The Downers could come and go. Mazian’s men did not, as Whisper said, see any difference in them, could not tell them apart. And that was the only hope they had, to keep communication between them, to let the men down there know that they were not alone. Emilio knew she was there. Maybe, for all he wished her elsewhere, that was some comfort.

« ^ »

i

Pell: green sector nine; 1/8/53; 1800 hrs.

Rumors floated all of green, but there was no sign of a shutdown, no searches, no imminent crisis. Troops came and went to the usual places. The dock-front bars rocked to loud music and troops on liberty relaxed, drank, some even openly intoxicated. Josh took a cautious look out the doorway of Ngo’s and ducked back in again as a squad of more businesslike troops headed up the hall, armored, sober, and with definite intentions. It made him somewhat nervous, as all such movements did when Damon was out of his sight. He endured the waiting under cover, his turn to sweat out the day in Ngo’s storeroom, haunting the front room only at mealtimes… but it was suppertime, and late, and he was beginning to worry intensely. Damon had insisted on going yesterday and this day, following up leads, hunting a contract—talking to people and risking trouble.
 
Josh paced and fretted, realized he was pacing and that Ngo was frowning at him from the bar. He tried to quiet himself, finally walked casually back to the alcove, leaned his head into the kitchen and asked Ngo’s son for dinner.
 
“How many?” the boy asked.

“One,” he said. He needed the excuse to stay out in the front room. Reckoned when Damon got back he could order a refill and another helping. Their credit was good, the one comfort of their existence. Ngo’s son waved a spoon at him, wishing him to get out.

He went to the accustomed table and sat down, looked toward the door again. Two men had come in, nothing unusual. But they were looking around too, and they started coming toward the back. He ducked his head and tried to camouflage himself in the shadow; market types, perhaps… some of Ngo’s friends—but the move alarmed him. And they paused by his table, pulled a chair back. He looked up in apprehension as one of them sat down and the other kept standing.
 
“Talley,” the seated man said, young, hard-faced with a burn scar across the jaw. “You’re Talley, aren’t you?”

“I don’t know any Talley. You’re mistaken.”

“Want you to come outside for a moment. Just come to the door.”

“Who are you?”

There’s a gun on you. I suggest you move.“

It was the long expected nightmare. He thought of what he could do, which was to get himself shot. Men died in green every day, and there was no law except the troops, which he did not need either. These were not Mazianni. It was something else.

“Move.”

He rose, walked clear of the table. The second man took his arm and guided him to the door, to the brighter light of the outside.

“Look over there,” the man at his back said. “Look at the doorway directly across the corridor. Tell me if I’ve got the wrong man.” He looked. It was the man he had seen before, the one watching him. His vision blurred and nausea hit his gut, conditioned reflex.

He knew the man. The name would not come to him, but he knew him. His escort took him by the elbow and walked him in that direction, across the corridor and as the other went inside, took him into the dark interior of Mascari’s, into the mingled effluvium of liquor and sweat and floor-jarring music. Heads turned, of those in the bar, who could see him better than his unadjusted eyes could see them for the moment, and he panicked, not alone at being recognized, but knowing that there was something in this place which he recognized, when he ought to know nothing on Pell, not after that fashion, not across the gulf he had crossed.

He was pushed to the leftmost corner of the room, to one of the closed booths.
 
Two men stood there, one a hangdog middle-aged man who rang no alarms with him… and the other… the other… Sickness hit him, conditioning assaulted. He groped for the back of a cheap plastic chair and leaned there.

“I knew it was you,” the man said. “Josh? It is you, isn’t it?”

“Gabriel.” The name shot out of his blocked past, and whole structures tumbled.
 
He swayed against the chair, seeing again his ship… his ship, and his companions… and this man… this man among them… “Jessad,” Gabriel corrected him, took his arm and looked at him strangely.
 
“Josh, how did you get here?”

“Mazianni.” He was being drawn into the curtained alcove, a place of privacy, a trap. He half turned, found the others barring the way out, and in the shadow when he looked back he could hardly make out Gabriel’s face… as it had looked in the ship, when they had parted company—when he had transferred Gabriel to Blass, on Hammer, near Mariner. Gabriel’s hand rested gently on his shoulder, pushing him into a chair at a small circular table. Gabriel sat down opposite him and leaned forward.

“My name here is Jessad. These gentlemen—Mr. Coledy and Mr. Kressich—Mr.
 
Kressich was a councillor on this station, when there was a council. You’ll excuse us, sirs. I want to talk to my friend. Wait outside. See we get privacy.” The others withdrew, and they were alone in the dim light of a fading bulb. He did not want to be alone with this man. But curiosity kept him seated, more than the fear of Coledy’s gun outside, a curiosity with the foreknowledge of pain in it, like worrying at a wound.

“Josh?” Gabriel/Jessad said. “We’re partners, aren’t we?” It might be a trick, might be truth. He shook his head helplessly. “Mindwipe. My memory—” Gabriel’s face contracted in seeming pain, and he reached out and caught him by the arm. “Josh… you came in, didn’t you? You tried to make the pickup. Hammer got me out when it went wrong. But you didn’t know that, did you? You took Kite in and they got you. Mindwipe… Josh, where are the others? Where are the rest of us, Kitha and—

He shook his head, cold inside, void. “Dead. I can’t remember clearly. It’s gone.” He was close to being sick for a moment, freed his hand and rested his mouth against it, leaning on the table, trying to subdue the reactions.
 
“I saw you,” Gabriel said, “in the corridor. I didn’t believe it. But I started asking questions. Ngo won’t tell whom you’re with… but it’s someone else they’re after, isn’t it? You’ve got friends here. A friend. Haven’t you? It’s not one of us… it’s someone else. Isn’t it?”