Power Play Part 19

"I thought you wanted to return to your planet. I'm just trying to tell you that there might be a way, but it'll be tricky."

"Getting Louchard to agree?"

"Believe it or not, the captain will be easier to convince than the crew. If it was up to Megenda, you'd all be s.p.a.ced. You have no idea the personnel problems one has trying to obtain crewmen who are rough enough to do the job but still controllable. It can be a real nightmare."

"I'm sure you didn't ask me here to tell me how hard it is to get good help these days, Dinah. Will you get to the fraggin' point?"

Dinah dropped her confidential air and became very businesslike. "The fraggin' point, Colonel Maddock-Shongili, is that under certain circ.u.mstances I can use my influence to return you to the planet. One of those circ.u.mstances is that you must personally guarantee my safety and that of my crew, when and if we release you."

"I certainly won't be able to arrange for your guarantee unless I am free to do so," Yana said acerbically. "What else?"

"I have business in a place called Tanana Bay. I've obtained an aerial map which leaves a lot to be desired..."

"How? Sean didn't just give it to you!"

"No, a cunning old devil named Adak pointed it out."

"Adak is Bunny's uncle. You didn't hurt him?"

Dinah shrugged. "Megenda had to give him a love tap. But he was standing in the door of a Nakatira Cube that seemed to be functioning as an immigrations office, alert, and watching your spouse's bare a.s.s sink into the river when last I saw him. He's fine. But the map is too d.a.m.ned indistinct-no roads, no towns, no names. We'll need a guide to the settlement, and I also want to find one of those-whaddayacallems? Communion caves?"

"Wouldn't you prefer the one at McGee's Pa.s.s perhaps, or Savoy, to view the fruits of your previous efforts?"

"After what happened to Satok and company? No, thanks. Listen, I hope you're not holding that against me, too-"

"It's not me you have to worry about, mate," Yana said drolly.

"Well, then, I have to worry about whatever it is that allegedly makes Petaybee... unusual-at least unusual enough to allow a human being to do what your husband did. Change, I mean. I hope whatever that that is won't hold Satok's operation against me. All I knew about that business was that the men delivered such and such an ore to such and such a site and that they had developed something involving Petraseal that let them succeed at mining where the company had been unable to." is won't hold Satok's operation against me. All I knew about that business was that the men delivered such and such an ore to such and such a site and that they had developed something involving Petraseal that let them succeed at mining where the company had been unable to."

Yana leaned forward and said with all the earnestness in her, "Dinah, if I have to personally cover every inch of ground near Tanana Bay to find the communion place for you, I will do so just to watch you tell that story to the planet and hear what response you get. But what are you going to tell Louchard if the planet refuses to consider your demands?"

"I'll think of something," Dinah said. "Now, however, it's time for us all to climb into the shuttle and take you home, don't you think?"

"And Bunny, Diego, Marmion, and Namid? Bunny's probably the best one to guide you."

"And not much good to me otherwise. Actually, Marmion has become a bit of a liability, delightful as her company has been. Had it not been for her offer of a transport fee, I'm afraid the boss might have done something drastic to, er, eliminate the danger. But a fee is a fee, and I'd much rather drop her off on your quaint little planet than, er, deliver her to her door on Gal Three, where I'm sure her friends and employees would all be there to greet me. And I suppose I'd best face it that it's all over between Namid and me. Petaybee's as good a place as any for the tasteless b.a.s.t.a.r.d." She gave a deep sigh. "Oh, very well. You can have it all your way for now. There! It's settled! Don't you feel better now that we've talked things over? I know I do!"

The moment the hatch opened, Bunny took a sniff and said, with a deep sigh of satisfaction, "Home."

Snow was falling against a pink and tangerine twilight, gilding the heavy snow cover with rose and gold, a glistening sheet stretching to mountains dwarfed by the distance.

"Very good, sweetie," Dinah O'Neill snapped, "but I knew this was your home already. Where exactly and specifically are we?"

Megenda was climbing out behind Dinah, but as soon as he stepped on the narrow gangplank, the port side of the shuttle sank approximately four feet into the ground, cracking the big pirate's chin on the ledge.

Bunny made a face. "Sinkholes. From the permafrost, you know."

Megenda's foot was trapped between the side of the hole and the shuttle. The other two pirates were left inside the shuttle, which continued to list further into the water.

"The fraggin' hole's filling up with water," Megenda bellowed. The words were just out of his mouth when the hatch closed abruptly.

"Oops," Yana said, watching the shuttle and the pirate sink further. "I don't think that's a sinkhole after all, Bunny. I think we may have landed on ice and it broke through under the shuttle's weight." She called down into the hole, "Hope you can swim, Megenda."

Dinah stepped to the edge of the hole to help the first mate, but the ice broke under her foot. Had Namid not grabbed her, she, too, would have fallen in the black and freezing water. As the hole broadened, Megenda lurched with his hands to find a hold on the exterior of the shuttle and managed to catch one of the security hooks, his heavy body precariously dangling from one hand.

"Help him!" Dinah said, reaching for her laser pistol. But it was gone, extracted from her belt by Namid, when he had rescued her from falling into the hole. "d.a.m.n!" She clenched her fists in frustration.

"Why should I help him?" Diego asked.

"You guaranteed safe conduct," Dinah reminded Yana.

"I didn't mean against natural disasters," Yana said. "He'd be no great loss to me."

"He's still a human in trouble on my my planet," Bunny said, down on her stomach and ready to give a.s.sistance. "Diego, Namid, hold on to my ankles!" planet," Bunny said, down on her stomach and ready to give a.s.sistance. "Diego, Namid, hold on to my ankles!"

Marmion hesitated only a moment before extending the link by grabbing Diego's ankles.

"Oh, very well," Yana said, and started to flop down on the ground, but Namid shoved her away and took her place, holding Marmion's ankles.

"You must think of your child, Colonel," he told her.

"Here, Megenda! Take my hands," Bunny told the pirate. "We can pull you out, but you're going to have to turn loose of the shuttle first. Swing your body this way."

Megenda let go of the shuttle and grabbed Bunny's arms so quickly that she screamed in pain. Next he got a hold of her long hair, pulling himself half out of the freezing water.

The ice cracked ominously under the load it now bore and the edge disintegrated abruptly so that Bunny hung facedown into the opening, looking into black water while the pirate hoisted himself over her legs to Diego, whose grip on Bunny's ankles slipped as she tilted downward.

When Megenda hauled himself onto the secure bank, Yana walloped him on the jaw with Dinah's laser pistol.

"Get off those kids, you a.s.s!" she commanded. He slumped sideways, relinquis.h.i.+ng his hold on Diego's arms. Dinah and Yana scrambled forward on their knees to haul the girl out of the hole.

Yana collapsed in the snow, coughing and panting, while Diego and Bunny nursed various bruises and strains the big pirate had inflicted.

Dinah crept forward and peered over the edge of the hole, then considered the precarious cant to the shuttle.

"I don't suppose they can just fly out of there, can they?" Yana asked.

Dinah shook her head. "One skid is caught under the edge of the ice. They're off balance."

"On the bright side, at least the shuttle seems to be able to float."

Bunny said, "Yana, we gotta get out of here. I can feel the temperature dropping, and this gear of theirs isn't good for more than minus seventy-five."

"It gets colder than that this early?" Dinah asked, appalled.

Bunny nodded. "I'd be all right, I expect, but the rest of you are in trouble unless we get to shelter pretty quick."

"Have you got a clue where the town is, Bunny?" Yana asked.

"If we're right on-almost in-the bay, it's got to be over that way," Bunny said, pointing to what looked to Yana like an identical piece of the snow-covered terrain all around them. "Sorry. I usually come by dogsled along the trail and don't need to pa.s.s this way. I've no landmarks here, except the mountains, so we'll have to head that way until I can get my bearings. And we do have to move or you're all going to freeze."

"Right," Yana said. "How about the communion place? Do you know where that is from here?"

Bunny shook her head. "It's within the town someplace is all I know. When it was their turn to give the latchkay, I was sick and couldn't go."

"Okay, then," Yana said, "let's move out. On your feet, you," she commanded, using her toe to nudge Megenda, who groaned but remained limp.

"You shouldn't have hit him so hard," Dinah said.

"I should have let him drown," Yana told her. "And he'll be the first to freeze, wet as he is. So come on, Namid, Diego, you're strong! Let's get him up and head on out of here."

Gal Three

Dr. Matthew Luzon, striding along the corridor from the shuttle that had brought him back to his head offices on Gal Three, was feeling very good. a.s.siduous application of the physiotherapy exercises, careful diet, and self-discipline had completely restored him to the level of physical fitness that he deemed necessary for a man with his responsibilities.

He had been reviewing applicants for the positions left open by the defection of the highly paid and supposedly loyal a.s.sistants who he had brought with him on the disastrous Petaybee investigation. Those who had survived the initial stages of security clearances were awaiting him in his office. He was going to start afresh on the many tasks awaiting him as he looked ahead, for bigger and better things.

A gaggle of people coming from the pa.s.senger lounge were advancing on him in a solid phalanx. Frowning, he gestured with his right hand for them to clear to the side to allow him to pa.s.s. But then he saw the reason for such a ma.s.s: an invalid vehicle, one of the newest types, was in the midst of the people, its occupant turning from left to right as he issued a stream of orders, which were being recorded. To Matthew's intense surprise, the man in the chair was none other than Farringer Ball, Secretary-General of Intergal: the one man he cared less about seeing than any other in the galaxy; the very one whose intransigence had resulted in the wretched planet being adjudged sentient and autonomous, ruining all Luzon's careful plans for its future.

"Why, Farringer," Luzon said in his heartiest voice, tingeing it with concern and sympathy, "whatever has happened to you?"

"Luzon?" Farringer's voice was a wispy croak, and Luzon was genuinely shocked at the man's condition. The chair obviously contained life-support devices; Luzon was now close enough to see the tubes running from the man's body to a machine under the seat of the chair. "Recovered from your injury?"

"Indeed, and I could wish you the same good fortune. Whatever has reduced you to this sorry state?" Not that Luzon wasn't delighted to see that justice was being served. "On your way to Petaybee, are you? For one of their miracle cures?" Luzon smiled graciously.

"To Petaybee?" Farringer Ball's wheeze went up an octave, and he stared at Luzon in surprise. "Why should I go there, of all places?"

"Why, hadn't you heard? Since the board so n.o.bly decided that Intergal should withdraw and allow Terraform B its autonomy, every drug company in the galaxy is trying to sign up the exclusive rights to the therapeutic treatments only available there." Partially true, of course, since representatives were were on the planet, although, according to Luzon's informants, none of them had reported back to their head offices, or anywhere, on the results of their missions. on the planet, although, according to Luzon's informants, none of them had reported back to their head offices, or anywhere, on the results of their missions.

"What therapeutic treatments?" Ball snapped, and half of the crowd around him looked expectantly at Luzon for the answer.

Luzon then realized that medics of various sorts made up most of the groupies around the secretary-general.

"Why, I thought you'd have heard. You always know what's going on in the medical field." Luzon could afford to be slightly condescending: poor health was Ball's true reward. "There is something about the pure air and organically grown food products on Petaybee, not to mention the ambience, that absolutely changes a man!"

"It does?" Ball wheezed. "How?" He peered suspiciously up at the obviously robustly healthy Luzon. "You only broke your legs..." His tone implied that a pair of broken legs didn't take much healing.

"True." Luzon leaned down conspiratorially. "But then I didn't need need the special sort of healing that only Petaybee provides. We really shouldn't have let the planet out of our control, you know. You'd be glowing with health again if you'd taken the cure there." the special sort of healing that only Petaybee provides. We really shouldn't have let the planet out of our control, you know. You'd be glowing with health again if you'd taken the cure there."

"Taken the cure? What cure?"

"Now, that I don't know in any particulars, I'm afraid," Luzon replied, knowing that he had Ball just where he wanted him. "Of course, now that Intergal no longer has any rights on the planet, its administrators-if you can call such novices by that term," he added, permitting a belittling sneer to color his voice, "are of course setting up a monopoly on the surface. I really feel that one cannot put a price on such natural benefits, and one certainly shouldn't restrict those who are chosen to receive the cure to such a narrow category..."

"What category? What monopoly? What natural benefits?" Ball's agitation made his wheeze worse and he started coughing, a dry, hard, rasping sound despite the fact that he was also spraying spit around him.

Luzon moved a discreet step to one side. "Well, I'm no longer au courant to the latest developments, but they have been amazing. Truly amazing. I wonder that none of your medical advisers have suggested the Petaybean Cure to you. It'd make a new man of you, I'm sure." From the avid expression in Ball's eyes, Luzon knew that his little spiel had had the desired effect. "Do hope you're feeling better real soon, Farrie. Nice to have seen you. Must rush."

As soon as he had left the gaggle behind him, Luzon indulged in a smugly satisfied chuckle. The transport business he had backed to get as many people to Petaybee's surface as possible might have come to a cras.h.i.+ng halt, but there were other ways of overloading the planet and proving that it could not take care of itself and/or its inhabitants, much less any visitors. CIS would have to step in and alter the current arrangement. Planets could not, should not, go about managing themselves, not in a well-organized intergalactic civilization. Citizens of the galaxy had the right to pursue commercial ventures whenever these were possible. Citizens were also guaranteed certain basic rights-rights that Petaybee jeopardized by its very existence.

And then there was the matter of Marmion de Revers Algemeine. Luzon had heard nothing on the news media, about the kidnapping. "Nothing" on that situation was the best news he could possibly imagine. That took care of her-permanently. When was it he and Torkel Fiske were to meet? He tapped up his engagements on his wrist pad. Ah, this evening. Very good. They had a lot to talk about. Petaybee might not be a lost world after all.

21.

Tanana Bay

Muktuk and Chumia had been home ten days when Sinead arrived on skis. As she was delivering her message while wrapped in warm blankets and sipping from the hot tea Chumia brewed for her, one of the men on sea watch reported that a very funny-looking seal had just beached itself off the ice pack.

"Sean!" Sinead cried. She threw off her blankets, pulled on her still snow-wet coat, and headed out the door, the others behind her.

"Sean?" Chumia asked, open-mouthed. "Your brother Sean?"

"Bring clothes!" Sinead yelled back over her shoulder to Muktuk, but Chumia had already shoved Muktuk's latchkay snowpants and parka into his arms.

"By all the powers that be, if it ain't the guy himself!" Muktuk said when he saw Sean striding briskly toward them, sanguine, purposeful, and naked.

"n.o.body mentioned this was a dress occasion," Sean said, grinning. "Sis, I'm glad to see you. Have you told them what's up?"

"She said somethin' about that pirate kinswoman of ours maybe comin' for a visit," Muktuk said.

"That's right," Sean said, pulling on the snowpants. "And we want to make sure she has a warm reception, don't we? We'll need to get as many folks as possible armed with whatever they have."

"We told her if she lost her job she should come," Muktuk said reluctantly. "Greeting her with an armed mob doesn't seem real hospitable."

"Not a mob, a posse," Sean said. "She and one of her henchmen hit Adak O'Connor over the head and stole that aerial map Whittaker Fiske gave us to get them here. I don't think she's coming here to settle, Muktuk. I'm hoping she's ready to do a deal for Yana, Bunny, and the others. I doubt she'll come without a suitable escort of her own, so we'll need a suitable one, too."