Torchship (14 page)

“Well, let’s go get a truck. We can start unloading before
they get back,” said the captain. By the time everyone gathered in the cargo
hold Billy had the hatch open and the elevator platform rigged to the crane.
They were only fifteen meters off the ground but still had a wide view.

“Oh, how beautiful,” murmured Bing. The late-spring grass
rippled like ocean waves in the wind. The air smelled shockingly alive, a
thousand scents blowing the smell of hydroponic algae and lubricants out of
their noses. Mitchie pointed out a herd of antelope grazing a couple of klicks
away. Yukio beamed with proprietary pride.

The ten minute walk to the dome left them dripping with
sweat. Billy joked, “Did it ever get this hot on Old Earth?”

Yukio snapped back, “We matched the local climate to the
original biome. This is the most Earth-like part of the whole planet.”

An oversized hovercraft was in a fenced area next to the
dome. There was enough room for several more in there. “Okay, they’re doing a
survey,” said Yukio. “I’ll put an autorepeat on the dome radio asking them to
call in. Still a bit funny that nobody stayed here.” She typed a code into the
doorpad. The crew followed her into the blessedly cool shade.

The room took up a quarter of the ground floor. All the
cabinets hung open. Abandoned gear covered the floor. Billy said, “I thought
terraformers would be neater than this.”

“We are! Nobody would ever leave a compartment like this.
It’s unsafe!”

Schwartzenberger rested his hand on the pistol in his belt.
He’d handed the weapons out in case of wildlife attacks. Now it felt
comforting. “Guo, go around the outside, check for any signs of trouble. Rest
of you go through the building. See if it’s all like this.” He stayed with
their employer.

Yukio poked through the piles. “Samplers are still here. And
cameras. Looks like just the survival gear is gone. I’m going to try the radio
again.” The captain followed her upstairs to a communications room. He studied
the displays of weather patterns and solar activity while she pleaded for an
answer. After a few attempts she put it on autorepeat. “Damn.” Schwartzenberger
looked over to see her studying a map display. “All the floaters have tracking
beacons. But I’m only picking up the one here. There should be two more on the
display.”

Guo came slowly up the stairs. “Sir, ma’am . . . I found
something you ought to see.” He led them out to the north side of the dome. Two
graves had been filled in there. The dirt hadn’t been smoothed by wind or rain.
A jumble of tools had been dropped on top of each one to discourage scavengers.

Yukio, stone-faced, turned and walked back into the dome.
She came back holding a scanner. When placed between the graves it formed a
hologram. The terraformer muttered as she studied the image. “Two bodies. Less
than two weeks dead. Larger one is definitely Junde. Smaller . . . can’t tell.”

“Did an animal attack them?” asked Schwartzenberger.

“No—we have good repellants. And there’s no pieces missing.
Junde has a chunk of skull shattered so it wasn’t disease.”

“Those look like they could take off a chunk of skull.” Guo faced
the ship. He’d grabbed his pistol but hadn’t drawn it. A pride of lions had
gathered in the shade of
Five Full’s
hull. The cubs ran in circles
around the adults. A second lion limped into the group and flopped on his side.
Two cubs started wrestling over the right to climb on him.

“You’re perfectly safe as long as you wear your repellant
bracelet.” Yukio held up her left arm to display a thick copper bracelet. “Oh.
I should get you these.” She headed back into the dome without looking back at
the graves.

The rest of the crew were back in the first room. Nothing
interesting had turned up on their search. Schwartzenberger briefed them while
Yukio searched through cabinets. Billy promptly opened the door to get a look
at the lions. Bing leaned around him. “When she said ‘kitties’ I kept
visualizing bobcats or maybe leopards.”

Billy laughed. “That guy looks like he could eat a container
of meat all by himself.”

“Ha!” Yukio pulled a box of bracelets off a top shelf. “Everybody
put on one of these. If a kitty gets too close squeeze it with your other hand
and it’ll induce a fear reaction. Don’t use it on the wildebeests. Just stay
away from them.”

“How close is too close?” asked Guo. He’d snapped it onto
his left wrist.

“It’s effective for at least ten meters. Most of them have
learned to stay away from humans by now. It’s just the cubs you need it for.”
The crew all took the gadgets. No one looked reassured.

Yukio had clipped a small radio to her belt. It had been
turned down to whisper-level as it repeated her emergency call. Now a new voice
came on. “Are you there?”

She grabbed it off her belt. “Yes! Jisi, where are you?”

“I’m safe. You’re in danger. Turn that repeater off. Is that
ship by the dome yours?”

“Yes. What’s hap—?”

The other terraformer cut her off. “We’ll meet you at the
ship. Stop transmitting before they hear you. Out.”

“Jisi? Jisi!” No answer. Yukio lowered her radio. “I guess
I’ll turn the transmitter off.”

***

The crew clustered behind Yukio as they walked back to the
ship. The cubs were fascinated by the approaching creatures and tried to bounce
out to investigate. The youngest lioness cuffed them back into the shade. The
other adults stared at the humans without getting up.

“I feel like I’m on a platter,” muttered Mitchie.

“Oh, they’re just being lazy,” replied Yukio. “When we get
close enough they’ll leave.”

Sure enough, once the people were close enough there was no
pretending they might turn and go someplace else the pride stood and began to
saunter off. The cubs kept dashing back and forth until they all activated
their bracelets.

“Poor things,” said Bing. The cubs whimpered as they
scurried away. “What’s wrong with that one?” One lion lagged behind the pride,
favoring a foreleg.

Yukio pulled a ‘scope from the survival harness she’d donned
in the dome. “Obviously injured. Bleeding’s stopped. A lot of blood stained
fur. Can’t make out the wound itself, must be small.”

“Bullet hole?” asked the captain.

The terraformer looked puzzled. “It could be. But your
people are the only ones with guns here. We only have dart-throwers and some
stunners.”

“Damn strange then,” said Schwartzenberger.

Mitchie called, “Company coming.” A pair of hovercraft approached
from the south.

Yukio lifted her ‘scope again. “It’s Jisi and . . . Roark.”
She drooped. “So that’s Wang in the other grave.” The terraformer stared at the
ground for a few moments then shook herself. When her face came up she wore a
cool professional expression again. “They better be able to explain what the
hell’s been going on around here.”

Bing took the captain aside. “Do we want to be out in the
open like this? If those two murdered the others they might not want to leave
witnesses.”

Schwartzenberger contemplated a vision of violence among the
famously rational terraformers. “Murder over what? Who gets to gene-tweak the
cheetahs?”

“They’re probably just as crazy about sex as anybody.”

“Maybe. But Yukio knows these people. She’s not worried. And
we’re probably better-armed than them.” Bing still looked worried. “Hide behind
a landing leg if you want.”

“Hmph.” The first mate picked a leg on the shady side of the
ship. She leaned on it as if she was tired but kept peeking around it at the oncoming
floaters.

Mitchie was surprised by how quiet the hovercraft were. The
TFS put a lot of work into muffling the sound of the airjets—or their AI did.
Maybe they were afraid of disturbing their pets? The air cushion was unusually
wide, reducing the pressure on the ground. “They don’t want to leave
footprints,” said the pilot.

Guo was the only one who heard her. “It’s a work of art for
them. Don’t want to scuff it up.” Mitchie nodded.

The floaters killed their motors just short of the ship. The
drivers hopped across the collapsed skirts. Yukio met them with a joint hug.
The three terraformers stood clasped together for a long moment.

Mitchie studied the new arrivals. The living quarters in the
dome had been prissily neat. These two were a mess. Jumpsuits muddy, hair
unwashed for more than a week, the man unshaven for at least that long.

Yukio broke the embrace to make introductions. “This is the
crew of the
Fives Full
. They’re hauling a load of kitty chow for us.”
After listing the crew she introduced Jisi (Asian, female, exhausted) and Roark
(blond, male, wary).

“Great, a ship,” said Roark. “Let’s get on it and get out of
here before that maniac kills us.” The crew turned to survey the horizon. Some
grazing antelope. Annoyed lions sharing a lone tree’s inadequate shade. No
maniacs any closer than the hills to the north.

Yukio gently asked, “What maniac, Roark?” The blond
terraformer cursed and looked around, afraid his enemy might be sneaking up.

Jisi answered the question. “He’s a hunter. He’s here to kill
the animals. When Junde and Wang tried to stop him he killed them. Shot them
with his rifle. So we buried them and ran.” She sat on the ground, exhausted by
her little speech.

Yukio sat next to her. “Where did he come from?”

“A ship landed in those hills.” Jisi pointed north. “We saw
him the next day on a four-wheeler, skinning a lion. Well, one of his flunkies skinned
it. He’s got a bunch for the dirty work.”

“How did they try to stop him?”

“Junde confronted him. Said he wasn’t allowed here and the
animals were protected. Hunter just laughed at him. So Junde waited for him the
next day and tried to tranq him. Missed. The hunter shot him. And Wang too.
Just left them there.” Bing handed her a handkerchief. The terraformer wiped
her tears away. “We came and got the bodies. Buried them by the dome. Then we
went south to hide. We were afraid he’d kill us next. We saw your ship come
down but it wasn’t TFS so we thought it was more hunters. But it’s you and we
can escape now.” Jisi broke down in sobs. Yukio wrapped her arms tightly around
her.

Roark was still trying to look in all directions at once.
The captain asked him gently, “So where’s this hunter’s base?”

“Don’t know,” he answered. “Probably near where their ship
landed.” Roark pointed to a dip in the line of northern hills. “He has a couple
of ATVs he uses to roam the savannah. That’s the only times we’ve seen him.”

“Let’s go get him, then!” said Billy. He was eager to pitch
in on his girlfriend’s side.

The captain gave him a weary look. “Billy, do you have any
idea how much a good hunting rifle outranges our little popguns?”

“Um . . . three times the range?”

“Try ten times. More if he has modern ammo and sights.”
Illegal off-network on Fusion worlds, but military surplus did get out. Billy
frowned, then brightened up. “And he might have a night scope, which we don’t,”
said Schwartzenberger. Frown again.

“The hunter had a long gun. He had a couple of bodyguards
with different guns,” added Roark. Schwartzenberger drew out some more details,
enough to convince him the bodyguards carried automatic weapons.

“Not anything we want to tangle with,” he explained to
Billy.

“Sir,” asked Mitchie, “what exactly does our contract
require us to do for the TFS?”

Schwartzenberger drew his crew aside. “Well, we don’t have a
contract as such. The Fusion’s rule is what the TFS wants, the TFS gets, and
planetary government picks up the tab. So they can ask for anything. I’m going
to say no to anything suicidal. That said, I don’t want to let a murderer get
away with it if we can do something about it.” Disconnected Worlds law enforcers
relied on volunteers to back them up against dangerous criminals. None of the
crew batted an eye at the prospect of being deputized.

Yukio stood up. “I want to talk to this hunter.”

“He’ll shoot you!” shouted Roark.

“I doubt it. He didn’t bother the dome. He didn’t go look
for you two. And he hasn’t bothered us since we landed. Junde was never good at
inter-personal communications. Obviously that confrontation went badly. It
doesn’t mean there’s no rational agreement possible. I’m going to talk to him.”

Yukio overruled their protests and ordered Jisi and Roark to
steer their floaters north. Yukio sat up front in Jisi’s, Billy and the captain
sitting behind her. The rest of the crew rode with Roark. Schwartzenberger had
vetoed the idea of leaving someone to watch the ship. Bringing the crane remote
kept her safe from anyone without a ten-meter ladder.

A bit of casting about found a clearing at the edge of the
hills cut through with multiple tire tracks. The terraformers complained that
their vehicles were unsafe on the slopes. Schwartzenberger, fearing an ambush,
supported them. Yukio led the search east. No other trails were found by the
time Mitchie spoke up. “There’s some dust behind us. Might be a vehicle.”

“Turn around, let’s go look,” directed Yukio.

“We don’t want the sun in our eyes while we talk to them,”
advised the captain. “Swing around and approach them from the south.” Yukio
agreed. The floaters went back out on the savannah.

The dust came from a pair of open-topped wheeled vehicles.
When they spotted the floaters they turned south and halted. “Bring me close
enough to talk, then kill the engine,” ordered Yukio.

“Yes’m,” said Jisi nervously.

Like the floaters, the cars were four-seaters with a cargo
platform on the back. The floaters carried camping gear. The cars had dead
animals—a hyena on the lead one, a pair of gazelles on the other. The lead car’s
front passenger seat was occupied by the hunter. He wore a tailored khaki safari
suit with gleaming gold buttons, sported a hat with a snakeskin band, and
rested his right hand on his rifle case. He stood and called out, “Hello! Are
you our new neighbors or the old neighbors?” The two thugs seated behind him
studied the floaters intently. His driver hunched down as if he hoped no one
would notice him.