JAYDIUM
by Deborah J. Ross, writing as Deborah Wheeler
Chapter 8
They
dragged the spaceman from Brushwacker=s hold and laid him under a
massive tree whose branches spread out like an umbrella from its knotted trunk.
Although the spaceman was still unconscious, his breath came in hoarse grunts
as he jerked his head from side to side. Eril knelt beside him. The shade felt
cool and damp after the sun=s
brassy heat and the crushed grass gave off a sweet, earthy smell.
Kithri
touched the side of the man=s
neck. "His pulse is faster. Skin temperature feels okay. Shouldn=t we do something for him, like
get him out of his suit?"
"I
don=t think so," Eril said. If
this suit was anything like the extravehicular gear he knew, it had its own
life support function. It might be safer not to tamper with it.
Kithri
gave him an exasperated look. "We can=t
just sit here like a pair of brainless sand-hens! We=ve got to do something!
Look, I=ve got some more water in stores.
How about if we bathe his face? That can=t
hurt, can it?"
The
spaceman quieted as she wiped a damp cloth across his cheeks and brow. Slowly
his breathing deepened, and the color of his skin changed from waxen to pink.
His eyes moved behind his closed lids and suddenly jerked open.
Before,
the face had been one of an ordinary, fairly young man, neither handsome nor
ugly. When his eyes opened, so red-brown they looked auburn, they transformed
his face into one of startling intensity. His pupils dilated and constricted as
he shifted his gaze from Eril to Kithri.
Eril
put his hand on the spacer=s
shoulder. "You=re
all right now," he said, with his friendliest smile. "We=re friends."
"Uh...
Huh?"
"Friends,"
Eril repeated slowly. "Can you understand me?"
The
spaceman wet his lips. "Whuh hept? Whirrmy? Whirrs the shih?"
Eril
exchanged puzzled glances with Kithri, then tried again. The spacer seemed
confused, although not frightened, as he answered. "Wirron--explorshon
miss--Nited Therrin Spay Cummin--AlfaCentaw to Peers sunstar--we mit liestor--I
win offboar--then I wek up here. Hoor yoo?"
"I=m sorry, we can=t understand you," said
Eril.
"No,
wait," Kithri said. "It=s
like an archaic form of Pan-Anglish. Therrin, that=s like Terran, Old Terran!
That almost-last bit was, 'Then
I woke up here.=
Can=t you hear it?"
Now
that she=d pointed it out, he could. Eril
dredged his memory for the history lectures he=d sat through only because the
Academy required them. He never thought there might be anything useful in them.
"There was something about a Terran Space Cum-something--Command? United
Terran Space Command?"
After
a fraction of a second, the spaceman nodded vigorously and gestured toward
himself. The movement was hampered by the bulky suit. He repeated in a louder
voice, even more heavily accented, "Nited Therrin Spay Cummin--Cummind
Pascal, Lennart Pascal."
Commander
Lennart Pascal.
"Eril
Trionan, Kithri Bloodyluck," Eril said, pointing at himself and Kithri.
"Whirrmy?"
Where
am I? Not a bad
question to begin with. Before Eril could explain that they didn=t know where they were either,
Lennart Pascal tugged at the catches across his chest with his heavily gloved
hands. "I=m
bow too suffcay. Yoofol could hell me owtta this thin?"
Even
though Eril didn=t
understand all the words, their meaning was clear. "Just lie back and we=ll get you out of it."
With
Kithri=s help, Eril unfastened the
complicated series of clasps and locks. Underneath, Lennart wore a jumpsuit
with embroidered patches on the chest and upper arm--stylized rockets and
lightning bolts ringed with unrecognizable script. He grinned at them as he sat
up and gestured around him.
"Won
thin shoor, thiz play naw AlfaCentaw. Beezmee whuh hept, maybe Einstein rie bow
tie trav. Yoofol see fren enuh. Shors a pritt plan yoo gaw."
"Look,
I don=t know how much of this you can
follow," Eril said, "but when you popped out of--wherever you
were--it seems we popped into this place. Do you understand?"
While
Lennart clambered to his feet, Eril repeated himself, pointing towards the
city, the deserted spaceport, and the scrubjet. Lennart nodded before answering,
"Alnoo, yoofol too, heyh? Hot damm. Maybe niz we could bett unnerstan
chothre, sin we stuh kere for why. Weefol splore lessgo citee, heyh?"
"Explore
the city?" Eril guessed. "My thought exactly. No point in waiting for
a formal invitation."
"Before
we go anywhere," said Kithri. "I=m
stashing what=s
left of this haul."
With
visible reluctance, Kithri allowed the two men to help her unload the packaged
jaydium and set it in a pile well away from the tree. She opened a safepocket
in the scrubjet=s
inner wall and drew out a small device. Eril recognized it as a guardsafe-field
generator. She set it on top of the pile and stepped back. After a short delay,
the field ignited over the pile, shimmering poisonous ocher for an instant
before it flickered into invisibility. No sign remained of the jaydium stash or
its safekeeping system. Lennart watched the whole proceeding intently.
Eril
slipped the force whip into its holster and slung his small pack over his other
shoulder. "Who do you think=s
going to steal your jaydium out here?"
She
paused, considering. "I don=t
know--it=s just habit, I guess. It=s probably only a matter of time
now until the stuff goes to junk."
"Kithri,
do you have some kind of weapon?" As he=d unloaded the insulated jaydium,
Eril had considered the problem of self defense. He=d even thought of the lazer
cutter, but rejected it as too heavy and cumbersome to be of much use. He found
the idea of Kithri wandering unarmed through an alien city unaccountably
disturbing.
She
studied him for a moment before nodding, then brought out a battered stungun
from beneath her pilot=s
seat. Eril recognized the palm-sized gun, a combination short-range nonlethal
weapon, heat beam--for cutting thin sections of metal and starting fires--and
emergency beacon. He carried a survival unit very much like hers, only his had
a hollow handle containing a back-sharpened knife blade, a length of permawire
and three large-eyed needles.
"I=ve
got the whip and my emergency kit," he said. "You take your little
stun-popper there, and the water container. He turned to the spacer and said
slowly, emphasizing his words with gestures, "Lennart, I don=t have a weapon for you, so I
want you to stay close to us. In fact, I want us all to stay together. No
exploring on your own, and if I say Jump, I don=t want you to stop and ask How high? I just want you to do it.
Understood?"
"You=re taking a lot for granted,
throwing around orders like that," Kithri said, lifting her chin. "We=re not a pair of recruits--or
babies."
"And
I=m no nursemaid," he said.
"But we don=t
know what nasty surprises the city-builders left for us. You haven=t had training in how to deal
with such things, and I have. I may not have any fancy infiltration equipment,
but I=ll do my best to keep us alive."
A
stormy expression flickered across Kithri=s
gray eyes. "Okay," she said after a moment, "you=ve made your point. You don=t have to rub it in. I=ll go along with you. For now,
anyway. You too, Lennart?"
"Dun
luh to me lie arm fortreh, buh I=m
ease. Tever yoosay, baw."
oOo
The
parkland ended abruptly in a narrow apron of quartz-like stone. The grass grew
right up to it, and on the other side lay pale satiny pavement that marked the
beginning of the city. Eril kept to the cover of overgrown bushes and umbrella
trees as long as he could, searching for any traces of automatic weaponry.
There was no response when he hailed the city or rolled a clod of earth over
the threshold. He took a deep breath, drew his force whip and stepped
cautiously into the open.
He
wasn=t sure what he expected to find
or what he=d do when he found it. Neither
his Academy training nor his wartime experience had prepared him for First
Contact. If the city builders--assuming there still were any--were anything
like the gentle, timid aliens known to the Federation, then the last thing he=d want to do was blast them away
with the force whip. He slipped it back into its holster and adjusted the
straps so he could draw it again quickly.
Eril
started down a broad avenue flanked on one side by a lacy, pearlescent
rectangle. On the other side sat a delicate spindle, two stories high and
faceted like rubies. His boots crunched shards of multicolored crystals that
littered the street. There was no other sound except for the rasping of his
breath in his throat and the muted pounding of his heart.
He
cupped his hands around his mouth. "Hallo! Anybody out there? Hallo!"
"H-a-a-l-o-o-o..."
His voice echoed down the spacious avenue. It sounded eerie, barely human.
He
stopped in front of the spindle and studied it for a moment. It was about
fifteen feet on each side of its square base, and deep crimson in color. The
nearby buildings, pearly shades of pastel, looked anemic by comparison.
"Eril!"
Kithri yelled from the bushes. "What=s
going on out there?"
"Nothing
so far," he called back. "Stay where you are! I want to check--"
"The
hell you are!" Kithri strode across the stone border, Lennart at her
heels. She halted in front of Eril and set her fists on her hips. "We=re not going to wait back there
while you go off by yourself!"
Eril,
realizing the futility of arguing with her, turned his attention back to the
spindle. Kithri followed his gaze, throwing her head back to stare.
"Wow,"
she said in a hushed voice.
Lennart
grinned, poked Eril with one elbow, and repeated, "Wow."
Eril
placed his flattened hand on the side of the spindle. The faceted wall felt
hard and smooth, like gemstone. It was slightly cool, but warmed almost
instantly. He jerked his hand away.
"What
is it?" Kithri asked.
Eril
shook his head. "Damned if I know. It=s
not like any substance I=ve
ever seen before." His right hand went automatically to the hilt of the
force whip as he began searching for a door. There was none he could identify.
After
a few minutes, they gave up looking and went on. Several blocks southward, they
spotted a squat lavender pyramid with a curious fuzzy surface that contrasted
sharply with the smooth exteriors of the other buildings.
A
few buildings later they came to a single-storied cylinder of light, clear
blue, like blue topaz. A doorway gaped before them, wide enough for all three
to pass abreast. They went in, cautiously picking their through the piles of
splinters that had fallen from the causeway overhead. The doorway was slightly
elevated from street level but there were no steps, only a smooth ramp.
Inside
they found a single central room, about twenty feet in diameter and ringed with
delicate fluted columns of the same pale blue. With the exception of some
multicolored dust piled up along the curved wall, it was completely empty.
Eril
took a few steps on the unexpectedly spongy floor. When he prodded it with one
heel, it didn=t
give perceptibly although it effectively muffled his footsteps. He glanced up
and saw the blurred outlines of nearby buildings through the translucent roof.
Kithri and Lennart spread out, examining the walls.
"What
would you do in a place like this?" Kithri murmured. She wiped her
hands on her dun-colored overalls, which looked even dingier than before.
"Space
only knows," he answered. "Hold a tea party?"
"Nobodd
home," said Lennart. "Nafor lon tie. Whoover bill thiss playz grayon
dezih buh litt shor onth upkee." He held up his hand, his fingers coated
with rainbow-colored sparkles.
Eril
nodded, getting the general idea that Lennart didn=t approve of the current standard
of housekeeping. I hope we understand each other better before some crisis
lands on us. Most of the time I=m
only getting one word out of three, and it=s probably the same for him.
Beyond
the blue cylinder they found a series of spacious, interconnected courtyards,
lined with opal-tinted benches and abstract sculptures. The street slanted down
into a broad trough lined by knee-high curbs. At regular intervals, round
openings appeared in the lower part of the walls. They looked to Eril like
water pipes rather than drains. He knelt to inspect them, but could discover no
trace of liquid or other contents. Nor were there any discernible seams in the
paving material.
Here,
near the center of the city, the buildings stood closer together, their shapes
and vibrant colors clashing. Eril thought them the visual equivalent of the
Academy banquets he=d
been forced to sit through, getting more glazed in the eye and queasy in the
stomach with each passing course. The red of rubies, the purple of amethysts,
the blues of sapphire and turquoise formed a riotous mixture of color, with
only narrow corridors separating the towers.
Kithri
pointed to the tiny tracks skirting a pile of grit-fine dust. "Something
lives here."
"Something
the size of a lizard," Eril commented.
"You=d think there=d be something more," she
said. "Weeds poking through cracks, the local version of
cockroaches." She grimaced. "Believe me, you never get rid of them."
Eril
ran his hands over the seamless paving material. He glimpsed something moving
at the far end of the dust pile and bent to examine it further. He saw what it
was and chuckled. Not one of Kithri=s
cockroaches, but an ant. Every planet he=d
ever been on had them. This one had eight legs and bright red antennae. It
seemed to be a lone scout, quite uninterested in the dust granules.
They
went on for a while, deeper into the crowded heart of the city. Some of the
courtyards were sunken, accessible only by ramps. After a while they no longer
exclaimed at each new building, as if their capacity for awe had gone numb with
overload.
Eril
knelt and picked up a fist-sized piece of flame-colored glass shaped like an
elongated teardrop. Was it a sculpture, a thing of deliberate beauty, or only a
fragment that happened to have a pleasing form?
Straightening
up, he saw the sun had begun to dip behind the horizon. A chilly,
moisture-laden breeze sprang up, whistling eerily between the towers. The
crystal buildings seemed even colder and less human as daylight left the sky.
o0o
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