The Cause of Death (9 page)

Some humans had been known to run screaming from the sight of Stannlar subcomponents emerging from a Stannlar's body, going about their independent duties, then returning, but Marta was used to all that. What made her lose her temper was the sight of Moira crouched over a sort of toy farm made out of bits of old packing cases and spare parts. Six or seven subcomponents were corralled into it, inside a miniature paddock. The subs were diligently trying to escape and get back to work, but Moira was catching them and putting back the ones that got too close to getting away.

Neither Stannlar was making the slightest effort to get Moira to stop. Either the subs were out on low-priority tasks, or else one or both of the Stannlar had sent the subs out with the express purpose of entertaining Moira so she wouldn't bother them.

But that was beside the point, and Marta was furious.

"Moira! Let those subs get back to work this instant! You know perfectly well you're not supposed to bother Allabex and Cinnabex when they're working!"

"But Mommy--"

"Really, colleague Marta, it is all right--" Allabex began, her voice booming a bit at first before she adjusted her speech membrane properly.

"No it isn't!" Marta snapped. "Moira! Outside! Now!"

"But--"

"Now!"

Moira scowled, then shrugged, turned, and ran outside.

"Marta," said Cinnabex, shifting about to face her sensory cluster direct at the human, "Allabex released those subcomponents specifically for Moira to play with."

"Moira shouldn't be disturbing your work by asking you to make games for her, or interfering with components that have other duties."

"She--she didn't ask," Allabex said. "I released them and prepared the little holding area for them before she arrived."

Marta opened her mouth--and forced herself to close it again before she said something unwise. There was something so absurd about it all. Her husband arrested, recaptured after escaping, convicted, and condemned. The whole project--and likely the fate of this planet--imperiled. The endless delays in getting their facilities up and running. Labor problems. Contract problems. Technical glitches. All that, and much more, had been stress that she could handle, if only just barely.

And then she had to go and snap--because she saw her daughter playing with the subs--and it turned out that
she
, herself, Marta, was in the wrong. It was frustrating, humiliating. She felt like a fool for being so angry--but she was angry all the same.

She glared at Allabex, then at Cinnabex. Her hands balled into fists. All the waiting, all the fear, all the uncertainty of the past days seemed to bubble up inside her, eager to burst out. "Now I'll have to go apologize to Moira," she said, barely managing to control the frustration in her voice. She turned and walked out of the high-bay, in search of her daughter.

* * *

The two Stannlar watched the human female Marta Hertzmann depart, then turned to face each other. They communicated, using a pseudoetheric frequency, rather than by means of anything as awkward as speech centers.

Cinnabex began:
"You are more skilled than I at dealing with humans. You must go to her at once and speak the things that are required."

Allabex:
"That would not be wise. Better to wait a brief time period for her emotional intensity to diminish."

Cinnabex:
"My detectors show that an aircar with an official designation of the type used by couriers is on an approach vector. It is likely we are about to receive an update on Georg's case. We must obtain Marta's consent to send the agreed message before she receives this latest report."

Allabex:
"I confirm the aircar's approach. But you assume that the courier will bring bad news."

Cinnabex:
"Has there been any other sort since we arrived on this benighted planet? I will leave it to your judgment how long to wait until Marta Hertzmann will be rational enough for the needed conversation--but do not delay a moment longer than you must. Obtain her agreement before the courier's news injects additional variables that might alter the case."

Allabex:
"I signal reluctant agreement."

Allabex summoned in all of her subcomponents--including the playthings she had generated for Moira--and settled in to wait for the length of time she had computed as appropriate.

* * *

Shortly thereafter, Allabex found herself moving about the grounds of the lab complex next to a moody and largely silent Marta Hertzmann. "There is no change in his status, then, friend Marta?" Allabex asked, once she judged that the silence had lasted long enough.

"No! Why should there be? How
could
there be, when he hasn't changed his mind, and the Pavlats haven't changed theirs?"

That would appear to be one of the questions that Marta Herztmann asked without expecting an answer. "I see," said Allabex. Her English-language module advised her that this was an appropriate neutral response meaning "I understand," frequently used by humans when they did not understand at all.

"The situation cannot remain as it is, friend Marta," Allabex went on. "And, I would submit, it is incumbent upon us to change it, as I greatly doubt the Thelm's people will do so."

"That much is obvious," Marta said. "The next obvious point is that we have precious few options for changing it."

Georg could fulfill his obligation as the eldest son of the Thelm
, Allabex told herself, but she dared not make that suggestion to Marta again. Allabex--ten times Marta's size, twenty times her weight, all but indestructible, all but immortal, felt greatly intimidated by Marta's temper, her outbursts, her passionate
anger
.

"Moira!" Marta called out. "Settle down! And don't get so far ahead." Moira was her usual fifty meters in front, and showing no more signs than usual of needing to settle down. It had not taken Allabex long to note that Marta tended to speak harshly to her child whenever she herself was upset.

"She'll be all right," Allabex said reassuringly. "There is nothing dangerous up ahead."

"That's not the point," Marta said. "She needs to know to obey me, for when there
is
something dangerous."

Why should Moira rely on the danger-sensing skill of a being that has gotten her into a situation this perilous
? Allabex asked herself.

Moira turned around and raced back toward them. The little girl laughed as she ran, but even someone as nonhuman as Allabex could tell there was something forced about the laughter.

She pitied Moira, and even felt something approaching empathy for the little girl. From her studies, she knew that human children, given the chance, were herd animals. But Moira Hertzmann had grown up shuttling from one off-planet project to another, on worlds at the far fringes of human civilization, with almost no human contact beyond her parents, let alone with any other children.

Her loneliness even drove her to try to recruit Allabex, of all beings, as a playmate. It had been humbling indeed to discover that thousands of years of personal and stored experience, effortless access to infinities of information, left Allabex wholly incompetent to manage imaginary tea parties or travel via nonexistent propulsion systems to entirely notional planets where events that contravened physical law were easily accommodated as being caused by magic.

Moira stopped a meter or two in front of her mother and Allabex and stood up straight, holding her hands behind her back. "Can I saddle up, Allabex?" Moira asked. "Please?"

"Not again, Moira," her mother protested, with a sidelong glance at Allabex.

"It's all right, Marta," the Stannlar said. It was one of her best child-entertaining tricks. She lowered her body to the ground, and set one section of exomuscle shifting, rippling, re-forming itself into a set of child-sized steps, leading to a newly created saddle-shaped depression about midway along Allabex's length. She extruded two knoblike handles, just forward of the saddle, for the little girl to hold on to. Moira scrambled up and plopped herself down into the saddle almost before it had finished forming.

"Now Allabex and I were just going for a nice, quiet walk," said Marta. "Don't start wheedling for her to gallop with you or anything. Just a nice, gentle ride this time, all right?"

"All right, Mother," said Moira, a hint of disappointment in her voice.

It occurred to Allabex that Marta was more likely to control her temper with Moira close enough to listen. Allabex decided to take advantage of the girl's presence and risk returning to the subject at hand.

"Getting back to what we were discussing," she said, "we are agreed that things cannot stay as they are, that the Thelm's people are not going to alter the situation, and that it is therefore up to us to alter it."

"I suppose that's all true," Marta conceded, with none too good a grace.

"Then the only issue is how we are to change things. Perhaps merely shifting location would be something useful."
In other words, it would be a very fine idea to get yourself and your child off-planet before things go utterly wrong
.

"We're staying here," Marta said, her voice hard and flat, ending all possible discussion. "We are going to go on with our work."

"It is impossible for us to go on with our work with Georg in his current situation," Allabex replied, trying to make her voice just as firm. "Leaving aside the fact that, should he gain power, the High Thelek would like nothing better than to be rid of us. Even ignoring the great inconvenience to Cinnabex and myself if our present bodies were destroyed, there are other issues. We require not only Georg's expertise and experience to do the research work itself, we also need his legally binding approval in order to get funds released, to disburse payments, to order equipment, and so forth. We are not even clear whether Stannlar law, human law, or Reqwar Pavlat Thelm-word would apply to the case--and plainly it would be unwise to risk any appeal to the Thelm's justice at this juncture. Furthermore--"

"All right!" Marta snapped. She paused, and then spoke again, in a tone of voice that was more tired, more sorrowful than Allabex had ever heard from her. "All right. Your point is taken. The Reqwar Pavlat will not move. Georg will not move. I will not move. But someone
must
move, and soon, if we are to avoid absolute disaster and the wreck of all our work."

"Then we must continue our search for an outside force, of some sort, that will break up the present impasse." Allabex chose not to tell her of the Kendari agent that she had confirmed was working with the High Thelek. She saw no reason to inflame the situation further until it was absolutely necessary.

"I agree," said Marta. "But I haven't the slightest idea where to start."

"I think I do," said Allabex. "I think it is time to contact Pax Humana and reverse your previous instruction advising them not to attempt any intervention."
Indeed, it is long past time
. Allabex had never fully understood why Marta had insisted that the PH not involve itself. She had given her reasons, but Allabex did not find them convincing. "I grant that, as members of PH, you and Georg must be most careful to avoid involving them in a dispute over a mere business venture. But I would submit that is now moot. An innocent man--a man who is a member of Pax Humana, and who represents all that is best, most noble--"
and, perhaps, most foolish and foolhardy
"--about the organization is facing execution. Even if, as seems likely, it would embroil us all in a whole series of legal and political controversies, those controversies, and the publicity they would produce, offer us the best chance of breaking things open, of forcing the other parties to modify their positions."

Marta frowned, even scowled, then, at last, nodded. "All right," she said. "I've been holding on, hoping for something to change. I agree that bringing PH in will cause no end of turmoil. But now, short of a miracle dropping out of the sky, Pax Humana is the only chance we have."

"Agreed," said Allabex, far from happy to have won her argument. Allabex dreaded the Paxers. They were sure to create endless trouble. Georg had once said the Paxers worked from the heart, not the head, reacting with emotion, not with rationality or logic. Also according to Georg, the PH tended to listen closely to themselves and not much to anyone else. A request for help or a warning or a query from an outsider was likely to be ignored or explained away. A call for help from a member would be regarded in an altogether different light. If Marta sent a message, Pax Humana HQ would listen and respond--indeed, they would likely overreact.

Allabex couldn't help but wonder if the Paxers would all be like Georg, or, perhaps, all like Marta--a most alarming idea.

"If I have your final consent, then," Allabex said to Marta, "I will use my internal signaling system for the job and contact the Reqwar QuickBeam sender."

Marta grunted in a noncommittal fashion. "I take it you have already composed a suitable message?" she asked, seemingly taking offense at Allabex being prepared ahead of time.

But Marta would have to try harder than that to pick a fight. "Yes I have," Allabex said placidly. "A brief and factual report of the full situation, requesting assistance in your name." She quite deliberately did not offer to let Marta review it.

Marta did not respond for a moment, but Allabex resisted the urge to ask again. Silence, she judged, would be more effective.

It took a few seconds, but at last Marta gave in. "Very well," she said at last. "Send it."

"I shall," Allabex said. She stopped walking, both to allow her to concentrate more fully on the task, and also to make it easier for her internal signaler to lock on to the appropriate relays. She had just started to bring the signaler online when Cinnabex linked to her on a pseudoetheric link.

Cinnabex:
"Alert! Data scan from incoming aircar shows it is military. Transponder data request refused. Identity, affiliation, and mission of person or persons aboard unknown. Vehicle appears to be bypassing landing field and going for direct vertical landing near your location. Intention uncertain."