A Matter For Men Part 13

"I think I already have."

"Just eat your sandwich," she said. "You're getting skinny." And then she climbed forward and back into her pilot's seat. Ted smiled hopefully, but she just jerked her thumb rearward and paid him no further attention.

He sighed and came back, and strapped himself into the chair where she had been sitting. "Whew!" he whispered. "I remember her. She b.u.mped into the t.i.tanic once and sank it."

"Oh, I don't know. I think she's terrific!" I didn't think she had heard me, but the tips of her ears turned pink. At least, I think they did.

Ted merely grunted, curled up sideways in his seat and went to sleep.

I finished my sandwich and spent the rest of the trip thinking about a tall spiky anomaly at fifty-nine hundred angstroms. I wished I had a terminal so I could study the data first hand instead of in my memory. Something about the millipedes' behaviorsomething so obvious I couldn't see it-was staring me right in the face. It was frustrating as h.e.l.l-because I couldn't not think about it! It was a bright red vision, a blood-colored room with a table in the middle, and sitting on the table, a cage full of skittering active millipedes. Why? I leaned my head against the window and studied the clouds and thought about rose-colored gla.s.ses.

The chopper banked then and the sun flashed in my eyes, leaving a brilliant afterimage. I put my hand over my eyes, closed them and watched the pulsating blob of chemical activity on my retinas. It was white and yellow for a while, then it was crimson and it looked like a star-I decided it was Chtorr, and wanted to blow it up. After a while, it started turning blue and faded away, leaving me with only its memory and another dozen questions about the possible origin of the Chtorran invasion. I also had a niggling suspicion about something. More than ever, I wanted to get back to a terminal.

The chopper banked again and I realized we were coming in toward Denver. And Major Tirelli was about to demonstrate a "stop and drop."

She'd brought us straight over the Rockies without bothering with a descending glide path-and now that we were over the city there wasn't room for one, at least not without a long swing over eastern Colorado to shake off ten kilometers of alt.i.tude. So instead, she cut in the rotors, baffled the jets down and let us fall. The technique had been developed eight years earlier, but never used; the army had wanted a way to boost men and supplies quickly over enemy territory, never coming low enough to be in range of their portable ground-to-air missiles. It was one more thing to be grateful to the Pakistan war for. Even if your nerves forgave you for such a landing, your stomach never would.

"Wow," gasped Ted when he realized what she was doing; we'd been dropping for several decades, even though my watch insisted it was only two and a half minutes. "Either she's a real hot shot, or somebody wants to see us in an awful hurry."

"Both," she called from up front. She was downchecking the auto-monitor.

Ted looked embarra.s.sed; he hadn't realized she could hear us. She got on the radio then to warn them we were dropping in. "Stapleton, this is Tirelli. Clear the dime-I've got that high-pri cargo and I'm putting it right where I said I would."

A male voice answered immediately. "Negative, Tirelli. Your priority's been double-upped. They need the chopper for some bra.s.s. Veer off and drop it next door on Lowry. There's a truck waiting for you on north zero-six."

"Oh, h.e.l.l," she said. But she began cutting in the jets, firing short bursts to bring us around and slow our descent. The deceleration was sideways. And b.u.mpy.

"By the way," added the radio. "Tag your auto-monitor for inspection. We lost some of our remote metering just before you voiced in."

"Naw, that was me. I was downchecking."

"d.a.m.n it, Liz! You're not supposed to do that in the air."

"Relax, Jackie. You had me on your scopes. I saw the beeper. You didn't need the telemetry or the inertial probe anymore. And I'm in a hurry."

"Liz, those systems are for your safety-"

"Right. And worth every penny of it." She grinned. "I can't talk anymore, Jackie. I'm gonna drop this thing." She switched off the voice circuit. The auto-monitor continued to flash.

"Uh," I said, "maybe I don't understand-"

"You're right," she cut me off. "You don't." Without taking her eyes off her controls, she explained, "The excuse I gave him was a blind. What I'm really doing is cutting the control monitors. I don't want him knowing I'm not using noise abatement-it takes too much power from the engines."

"Oh," I said. "But what about the people below?"

"I try not to think about them," she said. And then added, "Would you rather be a considerate spot of red jelly on the runway-or rude and in one piece?"

"I see your point." I shut up.

"Besides," she continued, "anyone who lives that close to an airport deserves it-especially now, when half the city is empty." The copter was caught by a crossdraft then and we slid sideways. For a moment I thought she'd miscalculated and we were going to miss the runway, but she did nothing to correct our descent. Then I caught sight of the truck and realized that she'd even outthought the wind. We were being blown toward our landing spot.

A moment later we touched ground easily. It was the last easy thing in Denver. Even before the jets whined down to a stop, a ramp was slammed into place and the door was being pulled open.

It popped outward with a whoosh of pressurized air and slid sideways. Almost immediately, a hawk-nosed major with red face and beady eyes was barking into the cabin, "All right, Liz, where are the-"

And then he caught sight of me and Ted. "Who're you?" he demanded. He didn't wait for an answer, but snapped at Major Tirelli, "Dammit, Liz, there wasn't supposed to be any deadheading on this flight!" He was wearing a Sony Hear-m.u.f.f with wire mike attached. "Hold a minute," he said into it.

"We're not deadheading," Ted said. He blinked at us, annoyed.

Ted poked me. "Show him the orders."

"Orders? What orders?" To the mike: "Stand by. I think we got a foul-up."

I pulled the papers out of my jacket pocket and pa.s.sed them over. He took them impatiently and scanned them with a growing frown. Behind him, two middle-aged privates, obviously tapped for the job of carrying the specimen cases, peered at us with the usual mixture of curiosity and boredom.

"What the h.e.l.l," he muttered. "This is a b.l.o.o.d.y nuisance. Which one are you?"

"I'm McCarthy, that's Jackson."

"Right. McCarthy. I'll remember you." He handed our orders back. "Okay, grab your cases and lug them down to that cruiser." He turned and ducked out. "You two are dismissed. They sent their own flunkies." He had all the charm of a drill press.

Ted and I exchanged a glance, shrugged and reached for the boxes. Major Tirelli finished her power-down, locked the console, and squeezed past us toward the door.

As we stumbled down the ramp after her, I noticed that the two privates had parked themselves in the V.I.P. seats of the wagon, leaving the service seats for us. The major-already I disliked him-was standing by the hood, talking to an unseen someone. "Yeah, that must be it.... Well, find someplace to bed them down until we can figure out what to do with them-I don't care where.... What? ... I don't know. They look like it. Wait, I'll find out for sure." He glowered over at us. "Are you boys fairies?"

"Oh, honey!" Ted gushed at him. "When are you going to learn? The word is f.a.ggot! Don't they teach you anything at those fancy eastern schools?" Before I could react or step away, Ted had hooked his arm through mine. "Jimmy, we've got a lot of consciousness-raising to do here."

"Ted!" I jerked away and stared at him angrily.

"Yeah, they are," the major was saying. "Put them somewhere out of the way. Let's not give our Fourth World friends any more ammunition. . . . Right. Out." He looked at the two privates. "Move it! Make room there for Major Tirelli!" To us, he just growled, "Stash those in the back! You'll have to crawl in with them; there's not enough room up front." He planted himself beside a weary-looking driver.

I scrambled in behind Ted and tried to make myself comfortable-Hah! That bus hadn't been designed for comfort. There must have been an army regulation against it. We bounced across the field toward a distant building.

"What was that all about?" I hissed at Ted.

Ted half-shrugged, half-grinned. "I don't know. Seemed like a good idea at the time."

"Not to me!"

Ted reached over and patted my arm affectionately. I glared at him. He said, "Jimbo, take a look around you. It's a beautiful day. And we are back in civilization! Not even the army can spoil that!"

"I'm not a fairy!"

"I know, dear-but the major was looking for a reason to dislike you and I didn't want to disappoint him. Wow! Look at that sky! Welcome to Denver!"

SIXTEEN.

OUR FIRST stop was Specimen Section, ET-3. Ted and I pushed the cart down the long disinfectant-smelling hall of the section, while Major Bright-Eyes and his honor guard followed us -glowering.

At one point we pa.s.sed a heavy steel door with a very tantalizing sign: LIVE CHTORRAN OBSERVATION.

AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY.

I craned my neck as we pa.s.sed, hoping to peer in through the windows in the doors, but there was nothing to see. And Major s.h.i.+thead gave me a dirty look for my trouble.

We went all the way to the end of the hall through a pair of double doors marked SUPERVISION. The person in charge of the section was a surprisingly unmilitary little old lady, who peered at us over the tops of her half-frame spectacles. "Well, h.e.l.lo!" She gave us a twinkly-sweet smile. "What did you bring me today?" She took the clipboard from the major and peered at it, smiling and blinking as she did so. "Uh huh, yes ... yes, very good. . . ." She had rosy pink cheeks and s.h.i.+ny white hair piled and curled on top of her head. She was wearing a white lab coat, but where it was open at the neck I could see the collar of a green and blue flowered dress. Her nametag said M. PARTRIDGE, Ph.D.

"Millipedes, yes ... uh huh, eggs ... uh huh, wall sc.r.a.pings . . ." She thumbed through the rest of the specimen list, squinting carefully as each page flashed up on the clipboard. "What's this? Purple Coleus? Whose cla.s.sification is that?"

"Mine." I raised my hand.

"Oh, yes." She blinked at me. "And you are-?"

"McCarthy, James. Special Forces."

"Ah, yes," she said. "Well, James, please don't cla.s.sify specimens anymore. Leave that to those who are better qualified for the task. I know you were only trying to be helpful-"

"Excuse me," I interrupted. "But I am qualified."

"Eh?" She looked up at me. And blinked.

"I'm Special Forces, ma'am. Extraterrestrial Section. I gathered those specimens myself. At some risk. And I've had several days in which to observe them. I've also had access to the entire Scientific Catalog of the Library of Congress. 'Purple Coleus' is an accurate description of that plant, regardless of the qualifications of the person pointing to it and saying, 'That's a purple coleus.' " I looked at Ted, but he was busy admiring the ceiling. It was very well plastered.

The major was glaring at me. Dr. Partridge shushed him and turned to me. "James, we receive many, many specimens every week. I have no way of knowing whether this is the first time we've seen samples of this particular species or not. This may not even be a Chtorran species at all-"

"It was growing in a carefully cultivated ring all around the Chtorran igloo-" I started to explain.

"Yes, yes, I know." She held up a hand. "But please let us make that confirmation. If we accepted the cla.s.sifications of every person who brought in specimens, we'd have fifty different descriptions of every single plant and animal." She patted my hand like a forgiving grandmother. "I know you'll remember that with the next batch of specimens you bring us."

"Uh, ma'am-" I fumbled my orders out of my pocket. "We've been rea.s.signed here. We're detached from the Rocky Mountain Control District to function as independent observers in the National Science Center, Extraterrestrial Division."

She blinked. And blinked again. "Goodness," she said. "Well, it wasn't cleared with me. How do they expect me to run a section if they don't keep me informed?" She took the pink copy of my orders, adjusted her gla.s.ses on her nose and looked down at it. She held it almost at arm's length. When she finished scanning, she said, "Hm," very quietly. She pa.s.sed the paper back almost absentmindedly. "Yes. Well, I'm sure we can find something for you boys to do. Come and see me on, ah . . . Tuesday. No, wait a minute-where did I leave my calendar?-oh, here it is. Let's see, now. No, Thursday will be better-"

"Uh, ma'am?" She stopped and blinked and gave me that wide-eyed look again. "We'd like to get to work immediately. If you could a.s.sign us a terminal ... ?"

"My goodness, are you Special Forces boys always in such a hurry?"

"Yes, ma'am, we are. There's a war on." I remembered something Shorty had said and added, "It's the first invasion ever fought on American territory." I held up my disk meaningfully. "A terminal? And can we get our live specimens settled in?"

Major Bombast interrupted then. "Dr. Partridge-it's already Friday afternoon, and you have a reception and a plenary session-"

"Yes, I know." There was an impatient edge to her voice. She caught herself and smiled sweetly at him. "I'll finish up here, and you can pick me up for the briefing in-ah, forty-five minutes." The major hrumphed and disappeared. Dr. Partridge stepped to a desk and hit a buzzer. "Jerry!" she called.

Jerry was a dumpy-looking potato of a human being hiding a rubbery face behind thick gla.s.ses and a frazzle of dirty blond hair. He appeared in a smudged lab coat and was carrying a disemboweled modulator. He didn't seem to be aware that he still had it in his hands. His nametag said J. LARSON, and he wore a slightly confused frown, as if he were perpetually preoccupied in some minor befuddlement.

Dr. Partridge gave him a cloying smile. "Oh, there you are. Will you handle James and-what is your name? Ted? Will you help them out? They're here as observers."

"Oh," said Jerry. He stared at us as if we were intruders. He looked to be somewhere in his mid-thirties, but he could have been any age from twenty-five to fifty. "Do you have orders?" he asked.

I pa.s.sed them over. As he glanced through them, Dr. Partridge chirped, "I know that Jerry will take good care of you. If there's anything you need, just see him. He represents me. Now, if you'll excuse me-" And she disappeared into an office.

Jerry finished reading our orders and pa.s.sed them back. "Special Forces, I see." He coughed. "My uncle's in the Special Forces. My Uncle Ira."

I nodded politely. "Sorry. I don't know him. Look, can we get on with this? I need a terminal. And I want these millipedes installed under special conditions."

Jerry rubbed his nose, then looked at me with a flat expression. "I'll have to have you cleared before I can a.s.sign you a terminal and work s.p.a.ce. It'll take two weeks."

"Oh, terrific," I said. "Look-I'm in the middle of a process here. I can't wait two weeks." I pointed to the cases on the cart. "Those eggs and millipedes have to be installed under special conditions-"

"What kind of conditions?" Jerry had stepped over to the cart and was opening the metal handling cases and peering in.

"A cool, dry place for the eggs. The millipedes too-a cool room with dim light. I can give you specific recommendations."

"That won't be necessary."

"Ahh-I strongly suggest it."

Jerry opened another case. "Why?"

"Because that's what they like." I stepped over to the cart next to him. "Use a little common sense. Look at the size of their eyes. They're all pupil. Of course they're not going to like bright light."

Jerry hmphed.

I said, "Hazy suns.h.i.+ne blinds them. Indoor light blinds them. Even dim light blinds them. They can maneuver in twilight or dusk, but they can only see well in the dark."

Jerry looked skeptical. "Even absolute dark?"

I nodded. "I think their eyes are heat sensitive. I wasn't able to test it, but it looks as if they can see pretty far into the infra-red."

Ted spoke up then, for the first time. "Tell him what that means, Jim."

"Uh . . ." I wished he hadn't done that. I said, "They're not nocturnal-"

Jerry looked up from the case, frowning. He shoved his hands into the pockets of his lab coat. "I don't get that."

"-on their home planet. On Earth, they have to be."

"Huh?"

"Well," I said, "it's the size of their eyes. That really suggests that they've evolved under much poorer lighting conditions than we have here. It's compensation. Either their home planet is farther from its primary, or the primary doesn't put out as much light in the visible spectrum as Sol. Or both. That makes the planet noticeably cooler than Earth; probably its temperatures range between five and twenty degrees Centigrade. Maybe it's in a long glaciation. The millipedes seem most comfortable between ten and thirteen degrees, but that depends on the amount of light hitting them."