Authors: Robert E. Vardeman
Steorra came and joined them. Her voice was small and choked with emotion. “I understand what Daddy meant by this being the crowning achievement of his career. Nothing has ever been found like …
this!
”
“Why don’t you lead the way?” asked Slayton. “You probably know more about archeological thinking than we do. Where would your old man set up a camp? Where would he leave notes, things like that?”
“Oh, he wouldn’t leave notes. Those must have been with him when he was killed — murdered. N — Nightwind’s p — probably got them.” Her voice cracked, and Slayton saw tears running down her cheeks, phosphorescent in the dim glow from the walls.
“It doesn’t much matter, then, where we go. First, let me do a little checking around.” He unlimbered the heavy blasterifle and switched on the ‘scope. The crackling of the high-voltage discharge filled the air as he studied the streets below. He scanned up one, down another. Nothing moved.
It was a shame. At this range, he could have gotten off three or four easy shots before anyone below would realize what was happening. It meant he would have to find Nightwind and the other two later. A minor problem, but still one to be reckoned with. Nightwind obviously could take care of himself — that meant he would have to be removed soon and, preferably, from behind.
Never give a sucker an even break. Especially if the sucker can shoot back.
For an instant, Slayton thought he saw movement. He quickly zeroed in on the area finding nothing. He continued his careful search, his finger lightly resting on the trigger, longing for a clean shot. Again came a flash. A brownish blur crossed his field of vision. It was moving too fast for him to ever hope for a killing shot.
What he saw chilled him. It was a sandcat. Only through extreme will power did he prevent himself from firing wildly at the beast. He knew he couldn’t hit it, not with it moving so fast. Warning Nightwind at this point in the hunt would be foolhardy. Slayton was anything but foolish when hunting a man. This was why he survived. And others didn’t.
“What is it, Slayton?” Steorra’s voice sounded steadier than before.
“Nothing. I must be imagining things. Let’s move out. I’m anxious to find Nightwind.”
Dhal shot him a questioning look. Slayton impatiently motioned the other man to be silent. If Dhal didn’t know about sandcats in the city, this was another trump card in his own hand. And Slayton smelled sweet victory — and wealth — below.
The Guardian stopped, head held high. Turning, it picked up the diamond-hard thoughts from the Watcher. Another group of humans was entering the Ancient Place. The sandcat acknowledged the warning, sent new instructions to companions outside. Attack at this moment was not possible, not with the humans receiving reinforcement from outside.
Another thought brought immediate response. The group of humans following the first would find themselves caught between two prides of sandcats. The Guardian was a master of tactics. The Old Ones dictated strategy; the Guardian carried it out with the precision of any great general.
The sandcat checked the deployment of its minions inside. Satisfied, a quick thought brought added speed from the pride outside the Ancient Place. In a short while, the jaws of the vise would close on the humans. Until all the sandcats were in position, the Guardian could play a waiting game.
The sandcat reached under its fleecy belly with tiny arms and pulled out a device the size of an old-fashioned pocket watch. Fingers more like tendrils pulled hair-fine wires free. The Guardian fastened the wires to either side of its head where ears should have been for symmetry. The delicate hand pressed the disc down onto the pavement. Vibrations transmitted to its skull combined with telepathic input told the Guardian exactly where the humans were.
Pushing the listening device back into its pouch, the Guardian wondered why the humans seemed to have built-in exterior listening devices. The Old Ones said the semi-circular flaps on each side of the head could detect vibrations much like the device furnished by the Scientists. It was ridiculous. Why should any creature have more exterior openings than necessary when the sand would clog them?
The Guardian wondered about too many things. The Old Ones cautioned again and again, but still it persisted in questioning. Perhaps one day the sandcat would become an Old One. Many claimed the Guardian had the necessary telepathic skill. Others congratulated him for the handling of prior human intrusions.
To be an Old One! The Guardian gurgled deep in its throat, not even realizing a sound was being made.
The sandcat knew the best way to such an elevation in rank depended on expeditious handling of the six humans. Or was it six? Was it only five — and something else? The Guardian felt the same nagging tug at its mind that the Watcher had reported sensing.
Not real telepathic contact, no firm thoughts, just a light mental wind blowing, a zephyr of the mind.
The Guardian discarded such thoughts. This was out of its realm of expertise. The sandcat was entrusted with preventing unwanted intrusion into the Ancient Place.
The Guardian was expert. The Guardian would not betray the memory of the Rulers.
“Well, Rod, what’s left? This place is just too much for me to take in with a single sightseeing tour.” Heuser sat cross-legged in the middle of the golden strip of pavement. He idly stroked back and forth over the velvety surface looking like a small child lost in Wonderland.
“There’s plenty left to figure out, Heuser. Do you have any idea what the original inhabitants looked like?”
“No, not with those screwy doors.” He pointed to a triangular door barely tall enough to allow him to enter. “Look at that one. Was it for their kiddies? And is that one for their giants?” He motioned toward another door tall enough for him to climb on Nightwind’s shoulders and still go through without bumping his head.
“There’s no doubt this is a showplace. As far as I can tell, there is only one thing all the doors have in common — and that makes sense with the furniture in the rooms. The city dwellers couldn’t have been much taller than half a meter.”
“Huh?”
“They had an overdeveloped sense of art, maybe, but all the doors up to about three quarters of a meter are the same width. I think they were all about the same height. But no race is built in the diversity indicated by the doors. It had to be for decoration. And remember all the low couches throughout the city.”
Nightwind sat down beside Heuser and stroked the street’s pavement. “They might even have dragged themselves along on their bellies. Why else have a fuzzy street? Can you think of a more sybaritic delight for a snake?”
Heuser laughed, a little too loudly. “Don’t tell me you think the people who built this city were snakes. Snakes don’t have arms.”
“I was speaking figuratively. But don’t forget those snakelike things we came across a couple years ago.” Nightwind still had nightmares about that experience. He didn’t care for snakes; these had been a thousand times worse. Tendrils like a Medusa emanating from the tops of their skulls were used instead of hands. And the snake-creatures were naturally vicious. It took a lot of blasting to burn one of them to the point where it wouldn’t continue attacking.
“I doubt they were snakelike, Rod. Doors are
too
broad for them. And the rooms would have been far too huge. The more I think on it, the more I like your idea that the beings who lived here were about a half-meter tall. The huge rooms wouldn’t be
that
large for them. Merely spacious. And a race used to living outdoors might get attacks of claustrophobia more easily than burrow dwellers. Who can say what goes through an alien’s brain?”
“Speaking of alien creatures, where’s that tame desert rat of ours? I haven’t seen PR in almost an hour.”
“Aw, let him run his fingers through all those jewels, Rod. I have to admit it felt good the first time I did it. And Richards has been living a pretty spartan life on Rhyl. I wonder what he’ll do with his cut of the take?”
“I’ll tell you, little feller. I’m goin’ to get the best clothes money can buy, maybe go out and see some of those wet-worlds and enjoy the hell out of living. Never seen a mud-ball up close. The tri-vids just don’t seem real, you know what I mean?” Richards pockets bulged. Nightwind guessed the man was stuffing the finest of the gems into them until his desert suit looked tumorous.
“The galaxy’s a wide-open place, once you get off Rhyl, PR. Think you can handle it? There are a lot of sharp operators out there just waiting to take all you’ll give and then some.”
“Like you two?” he observed shrewdly. “You didn’t just happen to stumble across all this. Did you have to kill to get the secret? Never mind. Don’t tell me. I’ll be satisfied with whatever I can cart off from this place!”
“We were just trying to figure out a few things about the city,” said Nightwind. “Have you found any statues or paintings or pictures of any kind? I’m curious about the former residents.”
The man scratched his stubbly chin and shook his head. “Can’t say I was payin’ attention to that kind of thing, but I’d've probably noticed a picture of some kind of bug king. Figure the creatures to be low-slung from the looks of the chairs.”
Nightwind knew Richards had been doing more than just sating his own greed. He was giving the city a thorough examination, as thorough as Nightwind’s own. The old desert rat might have been born and raised on a backwater planet, but he was nobody’s fool.
“There’s something I been thinkin’ hard on. You see anything to show that there might be sandcats in the city?” Richards looked hard at both the other men.
“No,” said Heuser. “I didn’t see anything of the sort. Why?”
“Maybe it’s nothin'. I got this feeling. Like I get when one of them’s lookin’ over my shoulder.” He paused, looking up and down the deserted street. “Do you think the original inhabitants of this city were the ‘cats?”
Nightwind shook his head. “From what you tell us, the sandcats couldn’t handle the tools needed to build something like this.” He pointed to a gracefully soaring arch that vanished into the dimness of the vault high above. “There’s a possibility they might have been pets, though. That seems to be one universal trait of civilized beings — the desire to cage other creatures for their own purposes.”
“Humph,” snorted Richards. “Can’t see a ‘cat ever bein’ a pet for any kind of creature, no matter how alien. Those bastards are too nasty to ever make like a Terran kitty cat.”
“Maybe they were nastier than the city builders, nasty enough to survive when the planet started to get hot,” observed Heuser. “Maybe they outlived the original citizens of this lovely place.”
Nightwind thought about the possibilities inherent in what Heuser said. It was conceivable the sandcats were allied in some way with the city builders; perhaps a degenerate or mutated stock. They stood about the right height, and the couches would accommodate their obvious bulk. But the lack of hands, fingers, operational digits, precluded that.
Another count against this theory was the city’s deserted condition. While it seemed well tended, it possessed the air of an unlived-in place. Show homes had that feeling. Nightwind had once been invited by the Suzerain of Dhorma for a little illicit fun. Her palace was filled with room after room of fine sculpture, carpets from the perimeters of the galaxy, the most expensive of furnishings — and it all had that unlived-in feeling. Her private quarters, where few ever went, were cluttered slightly, pictures almost imperceptibly askew, a myriad things pointing to the room’s occupant
living
there.
Nightwind didn’t believe — quite — that a being’s aura was transmitted to its surroundings. But in this city, it seemed to be the case. It was deserted, and the aura had died with its inhabitants. The city simply was not
alive
anymore.
And yet the buildings with their furnishings seemed cared for.
On impulse, Nightwind asked, “Either of you see anything looking like a mechanism? A robot cleaner, perhaps? Some sort of machine that would tend to the dusting?”
Heuser shook his head. Richards shrugged.
“There must be something mechanical still operating in this place. The air is cool and circulating. I can feel a light breeze against my face when I turn in certain directions.”
“Which way, Rod? That might lead us to a circulating fan. If we could find a system that cooled this efficiently and did it silently — hear any noise? — we’d make millions just off that.”
Heuser’s voice trailed off. He seemed enthralled by the soft golden strip of pavement. He continued, “Hell, I’d love to know how this stuff is made. I could sit here all day rubbing my hands along it.”
Nightwind stroked gently on the paving. A tiny electric tingle surged into his arm and a feeling of bliss and contentment passed through him. In addition to the well-being he felt, the sensation was similar to petting a cat and receiving a purr in return. There was an emotional comfort to even touching the pavement.
He took his hand away. “I think the inhabitants must have been very low slung to get their kicks out of that. They’d drag bottom or have big feet if we’re right about their height.” Nightwind restrained himself from touching the golden paving again. It seemed addicting, something he should avoid but didn’t want to.
“I been thinkin’ on that, too,” opined Richards. “How do we know the city builders felt anything like peace and contentment when they scooted or skipped or hopped along the streets? Maybe they were wired up a lot different. It could have been intoxicating for them. Can you picture a city of belly-draggin’ drunks?” He laughed at the thought.
Nightwind knew he underestimated Richards once again. The man continually made insightful observations. Outwardly interested in nothing but filling his pockets with jewels, he had been producing some less-than-obvious conclusions. Of course there was no way of telling what emotion — if any — was aroused in the original inhabitants of the city. That it was soothing to a human wouldn’t make it soothing to any other creature. Such a thing was apparent — if it was carefully thought out as Richards had done.