Part 10 (1/2)

'Sign it, ”yours affectionately, Riidi WW, Baron etc., etc.” And get me a drink.'

Chapter Thirteen.

It was autumn, Mother Mastiff bad closed up the shop, packed a lunch, and taken them both off to the Royal Parks. It was a cloudless day, which was why. Literally cloudless. On Moth this wasn't merely a pleasant exception, it was an event. He could remember staring endlessly at the funny-coloured sky. It was blue, so different from the normal light grey. It hurt his eyes. The thoughts of the animals, the birds, were odd and confused. And the hawkers sat listlessly in their respective booths, cursing softly at the sun.

It had stolen all their customers. It was a softer sky, and softness of any kind was rare in Drallar. So everyone bad taken the day off, including the king.

The Royal Parks were a great, sprawling place. They had originally been created by the builder's of the first botanical gardens to use up the s.p.a.ce left over from those great constructs. By some monstrous bureaucratic error it had been opened to the general public and had remained so ever since. The great f1as.h.i.+ng boles of the famous iron wood trees shot straight and proud to impossible heights over his boyish head. They seemed much more permanent than the city itself.

The ironwoods were moulting. Every other week the royal gardeners would come and gather up all the fallen leaves and branches. Iron wood was rare, even on Moth, and the sc.r.a.ps where far too valuable to be swept away. The guards in their lemon-green uniforms sauntered easily about the park grounds, there more to protect the trees than the people.

Children were playing on the marvellous gyms and tangles that an earlier king had setup. As long as the people had abrogated the park, he felt that they might as well enjoy it to the fullest. The kings of Drallar bad been greedy, yes, but not exceptionally so.

He had been too shy to join the giggling, darting shapes on the funchines. And they had all been frightened of Pip, silly things! There had been one little girl though ... all curls and blue eyes and flushes.

She had shuffled over hesitantly, trying hard to appear disinterested but not succeeding. Her thoughts were nice. For a change, she was fascinated by the minidrag rather than repelled by it.

They had been on the verge of making introductions in the simple but very correct manner that adults Jose so quickly, when a. great leaf had drifted down unseen and struck him fair between the eyes.

Ironwood leaves are heavy, but not enough to produce injury, even to a small boy. Only embarra.s.sment.

She had started giggling uncontrollably. Furious, he had stalked off, ears burning with the heat of her laughter, his mind frozen with her picture of hum. He had thought momentarily of siccing Pip on her. That was one of the impulses he had learned to control very early, when the snake's abilities had been gla.s.s-gruesomely demonstrated on a persistent tormentor, a stray mongrel dog.

Even as he strode farther and farther away, the sounds of her laughter followed, ghostlike. As be walked he took vicious and ineffectual swings at the rust-coloured leaves floating down uncaringly about him.

And sometimes he didn't even touch them when they dropped brokenly to the ground.

Chapter Fourteen.

Then the sky wasn't blue anymore. Nor light grey. It was pastel green.

He stopped flailing his arms and looked around, moving only his eyes. Pip stopped beating his pleated wings against his matter's face and flew off to cur] comfortably against the nearest bed-bar, satisfied with the reaction it had produced. The mi n id rag's tough const.i.tution had apparently suffered few ill effects, Flinx didn't know yet whether to curse it or kiss it.

He tried to sit up but fell back, exhausted by the brief effort. Oddly enough, his bones didn't bother him at all. But his muscles! The tendons and ligaments too, all of the connective web that held the framework together. Felt like they'd been tied end to end, stretched out, rolled together into a ball, and pounded into one of Mother Mastiff's less palatable meatloafs.

It was a trial, but he finally managed to sit up. The events of ... how long had he been out? ... came back to him as he rubbed circulation back into benumbed legs. As soon as he felt reasonably humanoid again, he leaned over and spoke into his s.h.i.+pmike. In case the others were in less positive shape than he, he enunciated slowly and clearly so as to besure to be understood.

'Captain? Captain? Control? Is anyone up there?' He could sense all the other minds but not their condition, as his own was too addled to focus yet.

'Rahisi, kijana! Take it easy. Glad to hear you' re back too.' The trader's voice was a familiar healthy boom but Flinx could read the strain on his mind. In another minute his picture flashed on to the small viewscreen. The blocky face had added another line or two, the beard a. few white hairs, but otherwise the craggy visage was unchanged. And although his body and mind looked wearied by the stresses they had undergone, the face reflected old enthusiasms.

'Wolf and I have been up, although not about, bymoyo Uzito , what an experience! It seems that our friend the hard-headed philosoph, who wears his bones inside out, stood it better than the rest of us. He's been up here rubbing us poor softies back into consciousness.'

The voice of the insect came over the speaker from some-where off-camera, but Fiinx could place the thranx from the strength of its thoughts, which were indeed better organized than those of its companions.

'If the rest of your body was as hard as your head. Captain, you, at least, would not need my aid.'

'Je! Well,kijana , Tse-Mallory's been up the longest of us poor humans, and I believe Der Bugg is just now bringing Atha 'round... yes, bless her flintymoyo . We were going to send him in to see you next, Flinx, but I see that's not necessary.'

'Did we...?' but Malaika seemed not to hear and Flinx was too tired to probe.

'Mwanamumeandmtoto , what a buggy ride! Sorry, bwana Truzenzuzex. No offence intended. It's an oldTerran saying, meaning ”to go like blazes,” roughly. I know only that it's appropriate to our present situation. Perhaps it's designed to invoke a friendly Mungu,je ? Metamorphosis! Fxlinx me lad, mekijana , memtoto , we went past that star so fast after hitting that field that our transversion 'puter couldn't handle it! The mechanism wasn't built to programme that kind of speed, and I'd hate to tell you where the cut-off max is! If there were only some way this sort of thing could be done on a commercial basis ... owk!'

He winced and gingerly touched a hand lo the back of his neck.

'However, I must admit at the present time there appear to be certain drawbacks to the system.Uchawi !. I would have given much to have' seen the face of our friend the Baron when we shot off his screens,je ! Unannounced, as it were. I wonder if he ... but unwrap yourself from that webbing,kijana , and get thee forward. I've a bit of a surprise for you, and it looks even better from up front.' Flinx could feel the tone beginning to return to his muscles He undid the rest of the harness and slid slowly off the bed. There was an awkward moment as he had to grab the wall for support, balancing himself on shaky legs. But things began to normalize themselves quickly now. He walked around the room & few times, experimentally, and then turned and headed for Control, Pip curled comfortably about his left shoulder.

Malaika swivelled slightly in his seat as Flinx appeared on the bridge.

'Well'? What's the surprise?' He noted that Truzenzuzex had disappeared, but could feel the insect's presence in another part of the s.h.i.+p.

Apparently Malaika noted his searching gaze. Or possibly he was becoming sensitive. He'd have to be careful around the big trader.

'He's gone to try to help Sissiph. She figured to be the last to return,rudisha .'

That was undoubtedly true. Atha and Wolf he could clearly see busy at their instruments.

'Kijana, that big kick in the... boost we got shoved us far ahead of my antic.i.p.ated schedule ... on our prearranged path! I planned it that way when we were setting up the interception co-ordinates. No use wasting a brush with death if it can be utilized to profit also ... but I honestly didn't link theGlory's field could hold us that steady. How- ever, it did, and here we are.'

'Which is where?' asked Flinx.

Maiaika was smug. 'Not more than ninety minutes s.h.i.+p-mafasifrom our intended destination!' He turned back to his desk, muttering. 'Now if there's only some way to make it commercially feas...'

Flinx put together what he knew of bow far they'd come when they were intercepted by the AAnn wars.h.i.+p and how far they'd still had to go at that time. The result he came up with was an acceleration he had no wish to dwell on. That's great, of course, sir. Still, it would also be nice if...'

'Um? If what?'

If when we get where we're going we find something worth getting there for.'

'Your semantics are scrambled,kijana , but I approve the sentiment.Mbali kodogo , a little way off, perhaps, but I do indeed approve.'

Chapter Fifteen.

The planet itself was a beauty. It would have been ideal for colonization if it hadn't been for the unfortunate dearth of land area. But even the fact that ninety per cent of the land was concentrated in one large continent might not make such exploitations prohibitive. Oceans could be farmed and aimed, too, as on colony worlds like Dis and Repler. And those of Booster, as they had named it, were green enough to suggest that they fairly seethed with the necessary base-matrix to support humanx-style sea-culture.

Fortunately the chlotophyll reaction had proved the norm on most humanx-type planets found to date.

By contrast the single continent appeared to be oddly dry. Especially discouraging to Truzenzuzex, as the thranx would have preferred a wet, tropical climate. He confirmed this opinion by voicing it every chance he got.

As far as they were able to determine from orbit, every-thing was exactly as it had been described on the star-map. Atmospheric composition, with its unusual proportion of free helium and other rare gases, UV radicount (est, surf./ sq.mi./ki), mean and extreme, temperatures, and so forth. There was only one fact their observer had failed to note.