Lyon's Pride (32 page)

“Theories?” The captain leaned forward with obvious interest.

Flavia smiled and dismissed the question. “Right now, let us pass the immediate danger point, keeping the
KVS with
the Squadron. I am obliged to inform you that this sort of maneuver is not specifically mentioned in the parameters of my assignment to Squadron B.”

“I didn't think it was. I'd call it ‘bending' to exigencies, myself, and it will be noted in my log as a means to the end of saving a planet. I'll hope we can do without too much such ‘bending' but…”

“I would consider any reasonable request, Captain.”

“I appreciate that, Prime. So let this 'portation be duly authorized and executed. I'd rather explain this than how a valuable Alliance ship defected. How soon before you can effect this…bypass?”

“Within the hour.”

Vestapia Soligen regarded Flavia with open admiration and a genuine relief dominated her public mind. So, the captain had entertained the same notions Rhodri had voiced.

“The sooner the better!”

Transferring the Talents to their designated ships, revving generators to their highest effective performance level and alerting every talent on the Human ships was all done within the specified hour.

First, Flavia sent her mind ahead to locate the identifiable pulsations and small mass of the beacon. Then she called for each of her Talents to gather the lesser ones into the individual merges before she integrated first Rhodri, then Jesper, Mallen, and Asia and finally the fine strong blaze of Talent that was Zara.

Let's get there!
Flavia said, seizing the exact peak of the generated power for the gestalt.

We've got here!
was Zara's exultant response a second later.

When Zara was 'ported back on the
Columbia
, she made straight for Vestapia's ready room and requested an interview.

“Ma'am, Captain Klml definitely would've defected. It's a bit upset at being where it never expected to arrive in the first place and in the second place, isn't too happy to have been denied ‘honorable action.' Klml's words. My 'Dinis say that it's raging that it has been assigned to such a…well, there isn't really a Basic equivalent but…” Zara shrugged her inadequacy.

“Bunch of spineless slugs?” Vestapia suggested.

“That's close,” she replied though there was little levity in her tone. “So I took the liberty of reminding Klml that this planet had the priority. I get the distinct impression its orders differ from yours.”

“In that, Prime, you demonstrate an astute understanding of a classified situation. Do I make myself clear?”

“You do, Captain.”

“See that it remains classified. And, by the way, Flavia has seen the matter clearly but I would rather the others do not.”

“They already may but they won't talk about it.”

“We should make an appropriate orbit in three days max. I shall require Captain Klml to make the initial landing, hopefully defusing a lot of pent-up resentment. I don't think there's a chance there're any Hivers left alive down there but you never know. And since Klml is so eager to meet the enemy, let us give him first go.”

Zara hesitated, then grinned. “You did know that your marines would prefer to claim that distinction?”

“They can gain ancestral merit by guarding the scientists everywhere they need to go.”

“Yes, ma'am. Did you wish me to convey your orders to Captain Klml?”

“Please, since I can barely manage ‘good morning and do you require supplies.' But even that much is progress for me.”

“Dis and Pal remark most favorably on your progress.”

“Well, they're the only ones. You know, I'd've sworn Mrdinis were pessimists.”

“Only those raised on Clarf. Can I leave now?”

“Yes, but if your 'Dinis can, keep in touch with our wily Captain Klml.”

“You just bet they will.”

*   *   *

By dint of careful compliments and skillful innuendo—not easy in the straightforward 'Dini language—Rhodri managed to imply that Klml would be the first Mrdini captain to ever set foot on a Hive colony planet. That fact alone helped soothe Klml's wounded pride and damaged honor.

“Smart thinking, Rhodri,” Flavia as well as Vestapia Soligen told him when he reported on that successful interview. “I hope Major Keiser-Tau will not feel his prerogative has been usurped.”

The captain smiled. “Keiser-Tau will keep his thoughts to himself—fortunately. He is not looking forward to keeping tabs on scientists.”

“Oh, I'm supposed to be down testing those locator buttons with Asia and Lieutenant Ismail,” Flavia said. “If you'll excuse me…” and she departed without waiting for permission.

“Talking 'Dini makes my throat very dry,” the captain said, rising from her desk and going to the dispenser.

“Mine, too,” Rhodri said, in the circumstances not above confirming the reason behind her hospitality.

*   *   *

Zara reported hearing the major swear by several god figures she didn't know existed in Alliance space, but he desisted the moment he was aware of her presence in the repairs shop.

“He's been briefing his men with every single tape available in the
Columbia
's library on what they might expect, landing on a Hiver planet,” she went on.

Rhodri grinned. “That was predictable,” was all he said. “Captain said he doesn't like escorting scientists about. They tend to get themselves lost or in dangerous situations which ‘sensible' people would avoid.”

“We'll have locator buttons,” Asia said with quiet pride. “Sadler…I mean, Lieutenant Ismail…has set up a very efficient assembly line of off-duty personnel.”

“Like you?” Rhodri grinned affectionately. “No wonder we never see much of you, sis,” he added kindly, ruffling her hair.

“I do wish you'd stop that, Roddie,” she said with far more exasperation than she had ever displayed.

“Sure, sure!” Rhodri snatched his hand away as if it burned. “Don't get your knickers in a twist!”

“Mine aren't!” she retorted with such a sly look that Rhodri unaccountably flushed, causing Zara to demand whom he fancied.

“None of your damned business,” he said and, going into his room, slammed the automatic door forcefully across the opening.

No speculations at this time
, Flavia told Zara firmly. “When will we get these locator buttons, Asia?”

“They're being distributed now to everyone who's to be landed,” Asia said, having retreated to her customary unassuming behavior.

“Well, it'll be a relief to get on with what we were sent here for,” Flavia said, and no one in the lounge disagreed.

*   *   *

The actual landing was somewhat of an anticlimax although the state of the planet caused immediate uproar in the scientific corps. Sensor readings had indicated that the ozone layer was undamaged, which had been a major concern to the ecologists and added to the puzzle of its barrenness. Rivers and lakes, as well as several large seas, seemed to be in good order, life forms visible if unidentifiable. There was still topsoil, but unless plants could be coaxed to grow, it would sift away in the winds. On the higher ground, erosion was already obvious.

Avidly watched on remote relays, the 'Dinis landed in smart array and secured the main Hive installation. Its huge expanse, covering over three acres, was found to be empty of everything save windblown debris. Klml had its crew mapping the site and measuring both interior and exterior, plotting the different levels and sections and sending the results up to the waiting teams. When the tunnels were discovered, Klml itself led the exploratory team. Flavia was asked to 'port down more supplies and was very glad that she would not be included in this Operation Illuminate. All but one tunnel dead-ended and the completed one was connected with the smaller building ten kilometers from the original—and probably headquarters—building.

Between the two there were signs of attempts to cultivate the land: even plastic-lined reservoirs for water and several hundred meters of irrigation channel.

When Captain Klml was satisfied that no living enemy was apparent, it allowed “others,” meaning the Humans, to come down. Despite Flavia's offers of teleportation, multipurpose shuttles were used as these would provide ground transport, not best accomplished by 'portation, which tended to go from Point A to any designated Point B. The Talents were asked to 'port down sensitive instrumentation once the base camp was established.

Where the Talents were undeniably indispensable was to see if the panels in the queens' quarters which Klml had located were still operational. Flavia, Rhodri and Zara slid down the connecting links in the main building while Asia, assiduously accompanied by Lieutenant Ismail and a detachment of marines, went off to the second building. Mallen and Jesper Ornigo went with whichever group thought it might require Talented help.

“They really don't alter their structures much,” Flavia said when the three Talents picked themselves up off the
dusty floor of chambers that so closely resembled the queens' quarters on Refugee. Dust had filtered in a thin film over the “foot” panels but the upper ones had been installed high enough to be covered by only a light layer. Rhodri and Flavia were tall enough to brush this off.

“First left-hand panel's exactly the same,” Rhodri said, peering at what his hand light revealed. “But these—are different.”

“You'd expect that, wouldn't you,” Zara asked with some asperity. “This is a ground operation. So what do we do now?”

“Try to start it up: that panel's the same and I brought mock-ups,” Rhodri said, removing from his thigh pocket a handful of triangular-tipped wands which approximated the shape of a queen's palps. He handed some to Flavia and Zara.

“I'm not damned tall enough,” Zara muttered.

“Nor am I,” Flavia said with some disgust.

“There're plenty of boxes the right size…” and Rhodri pilfered rigid crates from the supply depot for the two women.

“D'you remember the sequence that started the ship, Flavia?”

“Engraved on my retina,” Flavia said, arranging three wands in her fingers on each hand in a triangular pattern. When she got them right, by using a light application of telekinesis, she inserted them in the apertures in the sequence she remembered.

A flickering illumination started—and also a near riot from the unprepared 'Dini crewmen still exploring the facility. The light, if one could call it that, lasted long enough for the power source to be found, and the dessicated remains of one queen and nine attendants.

When the corpses had been examined—such pieces as
permitted examination of any kind because most disintegrated into dust at the lightest touch—the generally accepted opinion was that death was caused by starvation. Then the arguments began: had only one queen been installed on the planet? That wasn't the usual procedure. Or had only this one been left by others which had escaped to a more hospitable planet? Had she died before or after their leaving? But fields had been plowed and seeds sown: a second building had been prepared and a tunnel connecting it to the first, a tunnel large enough for a queen to traverse. The enigmas quite outweighed the matters confirmed.

Only the queens seemed to have special quarters, though tubes and tunnels connected with what appeared to be large spaces where harvests were processed and stored. Egg tubes opened into each of the queens' quarters.

“Work, work, work, work,” Zara muttered under her breath when the xenob Yakamasura went into a long explanation of the possible societal structure of the Hivers. “No other ethic but work.”

“And conquest,” Rhodri murmured back. “Don't forget conquest!”

“A change is as good as a rest!”

Continuing an orderly investigation, the scientists sampled and examined everything from the dust, to the underlying layers of clay and stone, to the dessicated fragments of vegetation that were found and brought in. Then they moved further away from the now sizable base camp, inspecting the dying vegetation, tree-like as well as ground-cover. Bushes, shrubs, hedges, plants, large vines, grassoids: all were dead or dying right up to the snow level on the mountain ranges of the continental mass. It was on the higher slopes that scattered piles of skeletals, the remains of various species, were found, as if the creatures—whatever they had been—had sought sanctuary
in the highest place away from the predators, and whatever means was used to destroy the planet's indigenous life forms.

The large preliminary Reformation dome was constructed over what ecologist Rovenery Mordmann considered to be a suitable site for an ecological jump-start. When both Human and 'Dini airborne investigations returned from the borders of the continental mass, he could be heard bewailing the fact that no life forms, not so much as ground-burrowing insects, beetles or worms, however insignificant, could be found. His wails took on the form of constant cursings of the Hivers for the murder of this world.

“All right, so the land's dead, but what about the seas?” Captain Soligen asked during an evening session which had consisted of too many Mordmann dirges and nothing of a positive nature whatsoever.

“The seas?” Mordmann regarded her with utter astonishment. “It's the
land
that the Hivers infest, ma'am.”

“And it's the
seas
they never bother with,” Zara reminded him. “Nor any water. We're drinking river water, although there's a rather noxious sulphuric aftertaste…”

“The seas…the waters…” Without a single backward glance at the meeting he was precipitously leaving, Mordmann departed and very shortly all heard an airsled taking off.

“I kept trying to tell him,” the xeno, Yakamasura, said sorrowfully, “but he said it was the land that mattered.”