A moment later: "Done. Check ship comm channel three. We will talk you through it."

"I apologize again for the delay," Er'o told the gathering in the relax room. "My colleagues suggest we look at channel three."

Eric set his pocket communicator on the table. He tapped the touch screen and a hologram shone up from it. "Another tanj stellar map! What now?"

Ol't'ro explained on a secure channel.

Er'o said, "This is a view from our present coordinates toward the galactic center. Away from the enemy vanguard. The blinking dot marks a world our research has recently noticed."

"What kind of research?" Baedeker asked.

Er'o flexed several tubacles. His exoskeleton amplified the effort, raising him from the table-though no one here would recognize the confident stance. "We looked for radio signals, something to indicate a possibly better source of information."

"And you found found something?" Eric replied. "A technological civilization the enemy failed to destroy?" something?" Eric replied. "A technological civilization the enemy failed to destroy?"

"We found something." Er'o paused for them to digest the simple statement. "A very weak signal that took a great deal of signal processing to separate from the background noise. Perhaps the transmissions are shielded, or very directional, and the enemy did not notice." The modest level of atmospheric dust made it almost certain the enemy had left this world un-molested.

Baedeker stopped tugging at his mane. "How long to get there?"

Er'o hesitated. Astronomical skills had earned him and his companions their place on Don Quixote Don Quixote. Merely a clock and before-and-after navigational fixes revealed the ship's rate of travel. It should come as no surprise he could answer the question. Still, he hesitated to show any attention paid to the interstellar drive. "About ten of your light-years." Meaning thirty days, had Er'o cared to answer fully.

"Far out of our way," Baedeker said. "Sigmund, it is past time that we return home. If planet-killers are on the way, every ship will be needed for evacuation."

And where, Er'o wondered, does that leave my people? We start with no no starships. He tried to reclaim the initiative. "But the survivors on that distant world may have much to tell us." starships. He tried to reclaim the initiative. "But the survivors on that distant world may have much to tell us."

"Let me check something." Kirsten took a device from her pocket. Her fingers moved quickly over the touchpad. "As I thought. Baedeker, it's safe to check this out before heading home. The planet-killers. .h.i.t half a year or less before the enemy's leading edge pa.s.ses."

"You cannot know that," Baedeker challenged. "Yes, we saw one world just ahead of the vanguard that was already attacked. One instance proves nothing."

Kirsten shook her head. "Turbulence models of the interstellar medium reveal how long ago each wave of ramscoops pa.s.sed. To the first approximation, I a.s.sume all impacts eject similar amounts of vaporized crust. Then atmospheric models show when the impacter hit, estimated from the amount of dust that has since rained out. The answer isn't exact, because volcanism must differ from world to world. Still, the regression has pretty high confidence bounds. Call it ninety-nine percent."

Er'o marveled at the calculation Kirsten so casually offered. To have such a tool at one's tubacle mouths! How much faster progress would come then. One more secret to discover-if they had the opportunity. "Sigmund, can we afford the time to visit this world?"

Sigmund tipped back his head, staring silently for a long while at nothing. "All right," he finally said, "We'll go see whoever is transmitting."

22.

Dizzy and confused, Thssthfok struggled into awareness. Curious-he was not hungry. How long had he slept? Not long, obviously.

By the cold-sleep pod's chronometer, scarcely three Pakhome months.

Across the room, a red light flickered: his comm unit. A fiber-optic cable salvaged from his shuttle connected the comm to the cold-sleep reactivation circuit. When the Drar mastered primitive radios, it became possible to reach him safely during hibernation. Until now, no one ever had.

Wondering who dared, he put on his battle armor and checked his weapons. He ate a tree-of-life root before activating the intercom. "Who presumes to interrupt me?" he thundered.

"Koshbara, Your Excellency," came the answer, tremulous. "Something unusual has happened."

It had better be important. "Explain."

"May I enter, Excellency?"

Sensors showed only one Dra, shivering, beyond the ma.s.sive steel door. Thssthfok disarmed his defensive systems and slid aside the st.u.r.dy steel latch. He recognized Koshbara despite her lack of ceremonial garb. He pulled her inside by a slender limb and resealed the entrance. "What has occurred?"

"A ... a vessel, Excellency." She shivered, her vestigial wings rippling. "From the sky."

A scout ship, Thssthfok guessed, surprised the last wave of evacuees had not already pa.s.sed him. Looking for bioma.s.s, surely. Landed here, specifically, because this dirty, pathetic city was its world's sole source of radio signals. Had he somehow pushed the Drar ahead only a little faster, a planet-buster, not a scout, would have come.

His own clan long gone, Thssthfok was, by definition, a threat to the newcomers. They would kill him without a second thought.

Unless he killed them first.

"You did well to awaken me," Thssthfok said. "Go. Tell the emperor that the visitors are to be welcomed and my presence kept secret. And inform her that I will require the army."

FLYING SQUIRRELS.

Sigmund had to shake his head. More than anything, the aliens he had come so far to meet looked like flying squirrels. Not that there weren't differences....

The creatures were hairless, skeletally thin, and walked upright. They were much larger than any earthly rodent, about five feet tall and-when they spread their arms-ten feet in wingspan. They had an extra arm in the middle of each wing. When they got down on all sixes and ran they were as fast as cheetahs. Hull sensors revealed that much of the sound they made was ultrasonic, well above the human audible range.

Local gravity was forty percent above New Terran standard; the atmosphere was thick as soup. With those great wings and gaunt builds, it was easy to picture them soaring among the local version of trees.

Don Quixote sat in an open field near this world's only radio transmitters. Nearby, paddlewheel steamers, their pipes belching black smoke, plied a broad river. The boats, apart from their oddly bulbous, backward tilted smokestacks, looked like something Mark Twain might have piloted. Across the river stood a city like nothing Sigmund had ever seen, part adobe and stone, part steel and gla.s.s. Pyramids and turreted castles rubbed shoulders with squat offices and warehouses, a bit like nineteenth-century London and ancient Egypt brought together. sat in an open field near this world's only radio transmitters. Nearby, paddlewheel steamers, their pipes belching black smoke, plied a broad river. The boats, apart from their oddly bulbous, backward tilted smokestacks, looked like something Mark Twain might have piloted. Across the river stood a city like nothing Sigmund had ever seen, part adobe and stone, part steel and gla.s.s. Pyramids and turreted castles rubbed shoulders with squat offices and warehouses, a bit like nineteenth-century London and ancient Egypt brought together.

Outside Don Quixote Don Quixote's main hatch waited a delegation of the natives, ornately garbed. They talked and gestured a lot, to the point that Jeeves made steady progress translating. The invitation to a palace came through clearly enough.

Eric paced outside the bridge. "Sigmund, Jeeves will learn the language faster once some of us go outside. Then we we can point and gesture, too, and maybe teach them some English." can point and gesture, too, and maybe teach them some English."

From the pilot's seat, Kirsten nodded. "We're here to talk, Sigmund. Let's do it."

The natives seemed surprisingly calm. You would think a s.p.a.ceship landed every day, setting aside that the planet was tidally locked to its sun so that this city experienced only day. But Sigmund knew Eric was right. They had had come to talk. come to talk.

Sigmund said, "All right, everyone, it's time to meet the natives. For now we'll stay near the ship, in range of the external stunners." And in reach of every precaution he had been able to devise. "No excursions yet, not even to the palace." excursions yet, not even to the palace."

Kirsten stood. "Finally. I'll get my-"

"No, you won't," Sigmund insisted. "You're pilot and navigator, and we're far from home. I'll go with Eric. While I'm outside, you are in command."

She sat, disappointment plain on her face.

"Baedeker," Sigmund called. The Puppeteer was in his cabin. Cowering, no doubt.

"Yes, Sigmund?"

"Please come to the bridge. I need someone cautious at the weapons console."

"How can we help?" a Gw'o sent from their tank. Sigmund recognized Er' o's voice.

"Keep watch through the external sensors," Sigmund answered. "And stay put. We may need to leave fast. If so, it would be better that you all be in the tank."

The Gw'oth had been valuable a.s.sets for the entire trip. Sigmund had no reason to believe they might try to capture this ship-and no confidence that they wouldn't. If they meant to try, the ideal moment was when he and Eric went outside.

"Eric, meet me at the air lock," Sigmund said. "No armor. We don't want to look hostile."

"I'm on my way."

Sigmund had one stop to make first: his cabin, for a welder. Standing so that the corridor security camera saw only his back, Sigmund spot-welded shut the interior hatch from the main cargo hold. If the Gw'oth tried to come out, he would have some warning.

"Where are are you?" Eric radioed impatiently. you?" Eric radioed impatiently.

"On my way," Sigmund replied. Now Now I've taken every precaution I can think of. I've taken every precaution I can think of.

THE CRAFT WAS OF AN UNFAMILIAR CONFIGURATION, larger than Thssthfok's ruined shuttle, without visible exhausts. He had not seen it land; he inferred its nozzles were out of sight beneath. The absence of scorch marks puzzled him.

His handpicked team took up positions near the obvious air lock and made welcoming speeches. Finally the air lock opened and Thssthfok's eyes bulged. Those two were no Pak!

"Now!" he radioed. Capture the ship!

The commandos flung off their cloaks, dropped to all sixes, and swarmed.

FINAGLE, THOSE THINGS WERE FAST!.

The aliens were halfway to the air lock before Sigmund's mind even registered the holsters that had been concealed by billowy cloaks. "Back inside!" he shouted to Eric.

Too slow. Eric vanished from sight beneath a pile of the natives. More grabbed at Sigmund. They weighed next to nothing and he flung them off-only they swarmed even faster. The weapons remained holstered; the aliens wanted prisoners.

Why did Baedeker not open fire?

Two aliens. .h.i.t Sigmund's knees from behind. He toppled like a rag doll, glimpsing as he fell more of the rail-thin aliens at the controls at the inner hatch. The safety override had intuitive controls ill.u.s.trated with a bold graphic. Any child could understand it.

Or any industrial-age alien.

The inner hatch began to cycle. Now Now weapons appeared in alien hands. weapons appeared in alien hands.

"Launch, Kirsten!" Sigmund ordered. "Shake them off!"

The air, already thick, turned almost solid. He had stripped the crash couches of their emergency protective force-field generators. Within the air lock and for a short distance outside, they reasonably approximated a police restraint field.

Sigmund knew to lie still, and the field around him eased enough to allow him to breathe. "Don't fight it," he hissed to Eric.

The aliens panicked. The more they struggled, the more the field restricted them. Those distant enough to break free of the force field ran.

From the inner hatch, still opening, the frying-bacon sizzle of sonic stunners. Sigmund cautiously craned his neck to see Kirsten with a gun in each fist. She was methodically stunning every immobilized alien. Finally, the weapons turrets let loose, stunning anything that moved.

Best guess, thirty seconds had pa.s.sed since the ambush.

The force field vanished. Sigmund struggled to his feet and helped Kirsten clear the air lock and pry stunned natives off Eric. Eric limped a bit and bled from lots of superficial cuts but made it into the ship under his own power.

Sigmund punched the emergency-close b.u.t.ton. The hatch slammed shut. "I ordered you to take off!"

Kirsten shrugged. "Yes, but first you put me in charge."

BOARDERS! WAVES OF ALIENS inrushing from nearby buildings. On the river, ships opening hatches in their sides to reveal large metal tubes. The ships were coming about, bringing to bear what must be weapons.

Baedeker's heads whipped from display to display. "Take off!" he shrieked at Kirsten.

Instead she keyboarded feverishly at her console before standing. "You have the weapons console. Use it." She dashed from the bridge.

This was madness! He must flee!

Even Sigmund agreed. "Launch, Kirsten! Shake them off!" But Kirsten was not here to obey.

Baedeker grabbed the copilot controls. They had been designed for hands and were awkward in his mouths. Nothing happened. "Jeeves!" Baedeker screamed. "Get us out of here! Shake off the intruders and close the air lock."

"I'm afraid I can't do that, Baedeker," the AI said calmly.

In the corridor, the sound of handheld stunners. They had to get away! "Why not?"

"Kirsten's orders. Only human crew may fly the ship."

Her last-minute typing. And in the tactical display, more more aliens swarmed. A second wave of attackers. aliens swarmed. A second wave of attackers.

Because they could not flee, the only option was to fight. Baedeker shook off the paralysis of fear. He put his mouths to the weapons console and began zapping anything nearby that moved.

On the river, out of range of Baedeker's stunners, ships continued turning into firing position.