Postmarked The Stars Part 11

"But"-Meshler turned his head as if it was a distinct effort to do so-"it is against the law to import without a certificate. The Trosti people would not-"

"Who said these were imported, or-if so-in these forms?" Tau asked. "If they have a box, these could be retrogressions of things entirely different. The Trosti people have a high reputation, of course, but are you entirely sure, Meshler, that this is a Trosti undertaking?"

"This is top-security country under Trosti management," the ranger said slowly.

"Orders can be used as a screen at times," commented the medic, and in that he was reflecting what the Free Traders had learned long ago.

"Why would anyone want monsters?" Dane looked to the blob and then away. He didn't like to remember the details of that recent struggle, though he had no sympathy for the monster who had lost.

"Maybe not monsters for the sake of monsters," Tau acknowledged. "These are probably experiments of some sort. But there are other uses for such radiation. Suppose such a box were planted on a holding, how long could a settler stick it out if his livestock began to mutate to this extent? It would be an excellent way to clear off a world. Or, if they could make it work on human beings-"

Dane sat up. Tau was giving voice to fears he shared. But Meshler was more interested in the first part of the medic's speculation.

"Why would they want to get rid of settlers?"

"You know more about your own planet than I do. Ask yourself that. I am wondering whether that thing can climb," Tau watched the blob. "Also how long before it is hungry again-"

Dane stood up. There were huge reptiles on his native world, which, engorging a large meal, were then sluggish for days thereafter. One could never judge unknown fauna by what one knew of other species, but they could hope this was the case now. He turned to look for the haze marking the barrier. They should be able to see it from here and mark out a path if the brach was successful and the force field went out.

"There is no reason-" Meshler was still wrestling with the problem of the settlers being the target. "There is no reason here. And this, this kind of experiment, it can't be known by the Council."

"Good. Let us get out, and you can tell them all about it," replied Tau. "Is the field still up," he asked Dane.

"Yes." The thin haze was unbroken. How long before they must conclude that the brach had failed? And how long before that blob would uncoil and be hungry again? Could it climb? He would rather not guess, though his treacherous imagination kept suggesting that there was no reason in the world to believe it could not.

Resolutely he concentrated on the matter at hand, to calculate the nearest point of the haze. He thought that lay to the north, and he said as much.

"The question is, do we stay here, or do we try to reach the field before our visitor comes out of his after dinner trance," Tau said. "I'm wondering how many more surprises may be lurking in the undergrowth."

He had gotten so far when Dane saw the flicker of the haze. Had the brach been successful? But the barrier steadied, and he choked back his cry, only to see a second flicker before the force field disappeared.

"It's off!"

"We move!" Tau stooped to pick up something Meshler had laid beside his pack. It was the torch made from the branch. The medic weighed it in one hand, as if he meditated its use as a club, then thrust the b.u.t.t in his belt.

Dane took a careful bearing on the nearest point of freedom. Beyond that the land was clear, and they could make better time. He gave a last glance at the blob, but that remained so quiet that one could believe it a rock outcrop.

He kicked the ladder out, feeling its weighted end thump on the ground, and swung over. But as he descended, he continued to peer between the supports to watch the blob. He wished that they did not have to turn their backs on the thing to flee.

There was thick brush between them and the open, matted stuff through which Meshler had earlier guided them. As they ran for that, Tau pulled the torch from his belt.

"How inflammable is this woods?" He came level with the ranger to ask.

"This is winter, and the leaves are dried. They will fall in the spring when pushed off by new growth. What would you do?"

"Set a wall behind us-make sure we won't be ambushed by other nasty surprises."

Again they locked hands, and Meshler led them through the bush. When they could see the open land, Tau brought from one of the loops of his belt a sparker and touched it to the soaked torch. The thing blazed fiercely, and the medic turned, whirled it about his head, and hurled it into the thicket through which they had forced their way.

That's a perfect beacon," Dane protested.

"Maybe so, but it's the best answer, short of setting on the field again-which we can't do-to deter a tracker. I don't fancy anything from that horror pen sniffing on my trail!"

They ran, speeding out into the open. When they stumbled into the road left by the crawlers, there was a growing line of fire behind.

"Where now?" Dane fully expected Meshler to turn back to the lamp-guarded way. But instead he faced in the other direction.

"We still need transportation-more than ever if they hunt us down after that-" He gestured to the fire, not only spreading a red and yellow ring at ground level, but also now setting tall candles by igniting trees.

"We just walk in and ask-" Dane stood where he was. "That's about as stupid as kicking that blob-"

"No." At least Meshler had some sense left. "We wait." He looked about, hitching the pack off his shoulder. "That place up there might do."

The place up there was a cut made by crawler treads running between slightly higher banks. There was cover, though of a meager sort, in some crumbling ridges of soil. Had they blasters, it would have been a place for an ambush. Was Meshler thinking that the fire would draw attention-bring a vehicle here they could take? But without weapons?

"What will you do?" he demanded. "Wave them down?"

For the first time he heard a rusty noise. Could it be that Meshler was laughing?

"Something like that. If we are lucky and someone comes to see what is happening."

He took something from his pack, but what it was Dane could not see. It appeared the ranger was not going to explain his plan. The sensible thing was to jet off-he and Tau-and leave Meshler to his folly, but they were not left time for decision. The clank of a crawler in operation came to their ears.

With Tau, Dane speedily took cover behind the all-too-slight ridge. The ranger was on the other side of the road and had so well melted into the landscape that Dane had no idea where he lay.

Whoever drove the crawler was pus.h.i.+ng that machine to its top speed. The engine and frame were protesting the resulting shaking with a medley of small noises. They could see it nosing into the cut, and it clanked on past them, while Dane waited tensely for Meshler's attack. When that did not come, he gave a sigh of relief. The ranger must have thought better of his wild idea.

As the crawler continued, a dark shape separated from the opposite ridge and came down into the road. What followed Dane could not see clearly, but he thought that Meshler had tossed something on the rear of the machine. The crawler ground on for a couple of rounds of its treads, and then vapor began to wreathe it in.

From the cabin sounded coughing and shouts indistinguishable to the Terrans. The door swung open on one side, and a man threw himself out and rolled to the ground, followed by another. There was a spat of blaster fire aimed straight up into the night. By that Dane saw two more men drop from the cabin, clawing at their faces and yelling. The blaster fell from the grip of whoever had held it and lay in one of the ruts, beaming its deadly ray along the ground, sending the full of its charge back within the narrow walls of that deep track.

Reflection from that continued to give them a limited view of what was going on. The crawler, cabin doors hanging open, kept on, but the men who had fallen or jumped from it were lying still. Two more had made valiant efforts to draw hand weapons. One got his free of the holster before he went limp.

Now Meshler appeared, sprinting along beside the road, leaping for the crawler, catching an open door, being dragged until he pulled himself up to wriggle in. The heavy machine ground to a stop.

The blaster still continued to discharge fire along the rut, and the two Terrans made a careful detour by that ribbon of radiance as they ran to join the ranger. Tau paused by the first of the crumpled figures. He did not stoop to touch the man, only sniffed and then hurriedly drew a succession of quick breaths to clear his lungs.

"Sleep gas," he said to Dane. "So he did have a weapon."

"And used it brilliantly!" Dane was willing to give credit. But what if only one of those in the crawler had had time to really aim? Meshler could easily have been crisped. He went down on one knee, caught at the discharging blaster, and thumbed it off. With the failure of that light, he had to feel his way from one body to the next, collecting the rest of their weapons.

But in spite of recklessness, Meshler had made his venture pay off handsomely. They had the crawler, plus four blasters, though one was close to power exhaustion, transportation, and arms.

Only Meshler was not yet satisfied, it seemed, when the Terrans joined him. The crawler had come to life again and was slowly edging around. The ranger only grunted, as if thinking of something else when the Terrans congratulated him on his success.

"Clear them off the road, will you," he said when the machine was turned to face its source. "Stow them well up on the ridge. They'll sleep it off."

"But where are you planning to go?" Dane demanded.

"You know how fast one of these moves?" There was a shade of contempt in that question. "We can take it, sure. And then they can retake us, long before we reach Cartl's. We need a flitter, or a shuttle flier-"

"You believe we can just ride into their camp and pick out the kind of transportation we want?" snapped Dane.

"Won't know until we try, will we?" Meshler sounded reasonable, but reason and what he suggested had no common base. "Crawler came out with their men in it-crawler comes back. Who's to know it isn't their men coming back? And you have blasters-"

Oh, it was all logical in an insane kind of way. The Terrans could pull the blasters on Meshler, but the ranger probably knew they would not. And the crawler was slow transport.

"Light two prayer sticks to Xampbrema," Tau commented. "Beat the drum, summon the seven spirits of Alba Nuc-" He might have been reciting one of the spells he had culled over the years. "He's mad enough to try it. We might as well aid and abet him."

Together Dane and Tau carried the sleepers to one of the ridges, stretching them out to await dawn or whatever waking hour the gas allowed them, while, under Meshler's guidance, the crawler waddled past the scene of the ambush.

Anyway, he did, as Meshler had pointed out, now have a blaster, thought Dane, as he climbed into the cabin. And the-the brach! In the push of late events, he had forgotten the brach. Somewhere the alien must be-they could not pull out and leave him.

What the crawler, following its own rutted trail, brought them to was a basin, oval in shape. But when they stared down, Dane shook his head and rubbed his eyes. There was something there- "Take it in quick!" Tau gave that order sharply, as if they were confronted by danger.

The crawler's nose dipped. There was a strange feeling of disorientation, almost akin to that one felt on entering hyper. But they were not on board s.h.i.+p now.

Dane had closed his eyes almost involuntarily to keep out that queer feeling. Now he opened them, realizing the crawler was descending a steep slope.

What lay before them was no longer affected, or else he was not affected, by the dizzying blurring that had struck moments earlier. There were diffuse lamps out, none of them on high, yet strong enough to have provided a beacon reaching above the level of the basin's rim. Only they had not seen them. They had been in the dark until they slipped through that thing which acted as a lid over the valley basin.

"A sight-distort," Tau murmured. "A wide-scale distort. This place could not be seen by a flier."

But Dane was more interested now in what lay ahead. The lamps marked four bubble structures, the usual shelters carried by any scouting camp. Beyond those were two buildings that looked, so low were their walls and those roofed with earth, as if they were more excavated in the ground than built above the surface.

What was more important now was a vehicle park to one side. There was another crawler there, and beyond it a flitter, and farther still-Dane gave a m.u.f.fled exclamation, for the surface of the ground had been hollowed out and in that large pit, balanced on its fins, was a s.p.a.cer. The diffuse lamps near the rim showed the gla.s.sy, congealed earth, proving that the s.h.i.+p had planeted here more than once. Many blast-offs and setdowns, with the pilot riding in on deter rockets, had built up that burn.

"The flitter-" Meshler nodded as if he had known all along their amazing luck was going to hold.

But the camp was in nowise deserted. Men were hurrying to the other crawler. Dane distinctly saw in the light the long barrel of a disrupter, though what such a weapon, forbidden for civilian use, was doing here was just more of the puzzle. Also, from one of the earth-roofed buildings rose a rod s.h.i.+ning metallically in the light. That was a power com send, by its length able not only to reach the port in the north but also perhaps to beam messages into s.p.a.ce.

Meshler kept the crawler at its steady pace. They would have to pa.s.s close to the other vehicle in order to reach the flitter, and he made no attempt to swing wide. Perhaps he thought their bluff would hold.

The other machine, which had started up, ground to a halt as they approached, and a man leaned out of its cabin to shout at them. Meshler waved his hand through the window. Perhaps he hoped that ambiguous gesture would buy them a little more time. The bulk of the crawler and its walls would protect them for a little. But once they left it to run to the flitter- Dane's blaster was ready. He measured the distance yet remaining, and then Meshler brought the nose of the crawler around, aiming it so that its body would provide them with shelter. The shouting from the other machine grew louder, more insistent. Then a vicious spat of blaster fire cut the ground warningly before their hose in a signal to stop.

Tau slammed the door open. "Now!" He was out and running for the flitter.

14. CARTL'S HOLDING From time to time the ranger tried the com, only to meet the crackle of interference. But suddenly he indicated an ice-edged river.

"The Veecorox!"

"You've seen that before?" inquired Tau.

Perhaps, thought Dane, the medic was now as uneasy as he over their very vague route.

"An expedition got this far last year." Meshler settled back in the pilot's seat with a relaxation that could have been relief. The ranger must have been just as disturbed as they about their unknown course.

"We have only to follow this to where the tributary, the Corox, feeds in, then turn east. That is the beginning of Cartl's land."

He banked the flitter and turned to follow the river. The land under them showed no signs that men had ever ventured this far.

"Your southland is largely wilderness then," commented the medic.

"It is hard to clear land-to import machinery is wasteful. We cannot keep bringing in fuel and techs to service the machines or repair parts. And horses or duocorns from Astra or any of the off-world draft animals do not do well here-not in the first generation, anyway. They have been trying to breed some at the Ag stations, to develop a strain that can live here without being constantly cared for. There is a native insect, the tork fly, which goes for their eyes. So far we haven't been able to build up any immunity in imports. There are no native animals that can be used for heavy labor. The result is that the holdings have machinery in community owners.h.i.+p and move the pieces from place to place for clearing. Then in some dry seasons they try a burn-off; only that must be controlled, which means an army of men on the job."

"So settlements have not advanced much since First s.h.i.+p," commented Tau.

Dane saw the line along the ranger's jaw tighten, as if he were biting back some hot and hasty comment, and then Meshler replied.

"Trewsworld's done enough to keep autonomous. We won't go up for any resettlement auction, if that's what you mean." Then he paused, looked to Tau, and Dane saw a shade of worry on his face. "You think-that might be it?"

"A chance, is it not?" Tau asked. "Suppose what you have so hardly won could be lost, or even a part of it? Enough so you could not claim autonomy any more?"

Dane understood. Any planet under pioneer settlement had to grow, to show appreciable gains each year in size of population and then in exports, or else the Grand Department of Immigration could legally put it up for auction. Then if the settlers could not match an outside bid, they lost all they had worked so hard to gain.

"But why?" asked Meshler. "We're an Ag planet. Anyone else here would face the very same difficulties we have been fighting from the first. There's nothing to attract outsiders-no minerals worth that much for exploiting-"

"What about the rock from the sealed compartment of the prospectors' crawler?" Dane asked. "They had found something they thought rich enough to lock in. They were killed, and that was taken. Perhaps there is more here on Trewsworld than you know, Meshler."

The ranger shook his head. "A mineral survey was run by detect on second survey. There are normal amounts of iron, copper, other ores, but nothing worth s.h.i.+pping off-world. We use what we can ourselves. Besides, those men may not have been blasted for what they carried but what they saw and the rock taken to confuse us. You said the antline was roaming near there. They might have run into a party trying to get it back."

"Perfectly possible," agreed Tau. "At the same time, I would suggest that another minerals survey be run-if you are left time to do it."

"The basin camp," Dane said, "was not a recent setup. How long have the Trosti people been here?"

"Eight years-planet time."

"And how about any new holdings cut in their direction during that time?" Now Tau had given him the clue Dane was groping for.

"Cartl-let's see. Cartl had his clearing gathering in the spring of '24, before gra.s.s growth. And this is '29. He has the southmost holding."

"Five years then. How about other holdings-east, west, north?"

"North is too cold for lathsmers. They have only a couple of experimental Ag stations north of the port," Meshler answered promptly. "East-Hancron. Hancron cleared in '25. And west-that was Lansfeld. He was in '26."

"Three years since the last new clearing was established then," Tau commented. "And in the years before that, how many?"

But Meshler, prodded by their questions, was already reckoning the list, judging by his expression.

"Up to '24 we had one, maybe two, sometimes three new clearings a year. Had four emigrant s.h.i.+ps come in '23. Only one since then, and its pa.s.sengers were mainly techs and their families to settle at the port. The push-out had stopped."

"And no one noticed?" Dane asked.

"If they did, there wasn't any talk about it. Mostly the holding people are self-sufficient and don't come to the port more than once or twice a year-just when they have cargo to s.h.i.+p. There are five-six families to a holding under the signee who puts up the bond. They use self-repair robos for light field work, but robos of that size are no good for first clearing. Since the lathsmer trade has begun, it's been easier. You don't have to crop for the birds, just give them clear living s.p.a.ce and put in one or two fields of smes seeds for extra winter food. They like the native insects and a couple of native berry plants and thrive on them. The buyers think that's what gives them the unique flavor and makes them worth more. You can run lathsmers on ground that has been only partly cleared and patrol the field with robos to do the extra feeding. But it takes men and women to pluck for the down for export-and that comes in the late spring. Then they take the down, and it's baled at the port."

"So you are getting to be a one-crop world?"

Again Meshler showed uneasiness at Tau's question, as if he might have drifted and never really thought of it before.