The guard led his charges down corridors which pulsed with the sounds of construction. At last he opened a door, waved them through, and closed it behind them. They heard a lock click shut.
The room held a bed and a disposal unit, meant for kzinti but usable by humans; the bed was ample for two, and by dint of balancing and clinging you could take care of sanitation. “I better help you till you feel better, Prof,” Ryan offered. “Meanwhile, why don’t you lie down? I’ll unpack.” The bags and floor must furnish storage space. Kzinti seldom went in for clothes or for carrying personal possessions around.
They did hate sensory deprivation, still more than humans do. There was no screen, but a port showed the spacefield. The terminator storm was dying out as the sun rose higher, and the view cleared fast. Under a pale red sky, the naval complex came to an end some distance off. Tawny sand reached onward, strewn with boulders. In places, wind had swept clear the fused crater floor. It wasn’t like lava, more like dark glass. Huge though the bowl was, Secunda much less dense than Earth, but significantly larger had a wide enough horizon that the nearer wall jutted above it in the west, a murky palisade. Tregennis took Ryan’s advice and stretched himself out. The quartermaster smiled and came to remove his shoes for him. “Might as well be comfortable,” Ryan said, “or as nearly as we can without beer.”
“And without knowledge of our fates,” the Plateaunian said low. “Worse, the fates of our friends.”
“At least they are out of Markham’s filthy hands.”
“Kamehameha, please. Watch yourself. We shall have to deal with him. And he—I think he too is feeling shocked and lonely. He didn’t expect this either. His orders were merely to hamper exploration beyond the limits of human space. He wants to spare us. Give him the chance.”
“Ha! I’d rather give a shark that kind of chance. It’s less murderous.”
“Oh, now, really.”
Ryan thumped fist on wall. “Who do you suppose put that kzin up to attacking Bob Saxtorph back in Tiamat? It has to have been Markham, when his earlier efforts failed. Nothing else makes sense. And this, mind you, this was when he had no particular reason to believe our expedition mattered as far as the kzinti were concerned. They hadn’t trusted him with any real information. But he went ahead anyway and tried to get a man killed to stop us. That shows you what value he puts on human life.”
“Well, maybe… maybe he is deranged,” Tregennis sighed. “Would you bring me a tablet, please? I see a water tap and bowl over there.”
“Sure. Heart, huh? Take it easy. You shouldn’t’ve come along, you know.” Tregennis smiled. “Medical science has kept me functional far longer than I deserve.
Ryan lifted the white head and brought the bowl, from which a kzin would have lapped, carefully close to the lips. “You’ve got more heart than a lot of young bucks I could name,” he said.
Time crept past.
The door opened. “Hey, food?” Ryan asked.
Markham confronted them, an armed kzin at his back. He was again pallid and stiff of countenance. “Come,” he said harshly.
Rested, Tregennis walked steady-footed beside Ryan. They went through a maze of featureless passages with shut doors, coldly lighted, throbbing or buzzing. When they encountered other kzinti they felt the carnivore stares follow them.
After a long while they stopped at a larger door. This part of the warren looked like officer country, though Ryan couldn’t be sure when practically everything he saw was altogether foreign to him. The guard let them in and followed.
The chamber beyond was windowless, its sole ornamentation a screen on which a computer projected colored patterns. Kzin-type seats, desk, and electronics suggested an office, but big and mostly empty. In one corner a plastic tub had been placed, about three meters square. Within stood some apparatus, and a warrior beside, and the drug-dazed telepath huddled at his feet.
The prisoners’ attention went to Hraou-Captain and another—lean and grizzled by comparison—seated at the desk. “Show respect,” Markham directed. “You meet Werlith-Commandant.”
Tregennis bowed, Ryan slopped a soft salute.
The head honcho spat and rumbled. Markham turned to the men. “Listen,” he said. “I have been in… conference, and am instructed to tell you. Fido has been found.”
Tregennis made a tiny noise of pain. Ryan hunched his shoulders and said, “That’s what they told you.”
“It is true,” Markham insisted. “The boat went to Prima. The interrogation aboard Rover led to a suspicion that the escapers might try that maneuver. Ya-Nar-Ksshinn—call it Sun Defter, the asteroid tug, was prospecting. The commandant ordered it to Prima, since it could get there very fast. By then Fido was trapped on the surface. Fenger and Yoshii broadcast a call for help, so Sun Defter located them. Just lately, Fido has made a new broadcast which the kzinti picked up. You will listen to the recording.”
Werlith-Commandant condescended to touch a control. From the desk communicator, wavery through a seething of radio interference, Juan Yoshii’s voice came forth.
“Hello, Bob, Dorcas, Laurinda—Kam, Arthur,… If, if you hear—hello from Carita and me. We’ll set this to repeat on different bands, hoping you’ll happen to tune it in somewhere along the line. It’s likely goodbye.”
“No,” said Carita’s voice, “it’s ’good luck.’ To you. Godspeed.”
“Right,” Yoshii agreed. “Before we let you know what the situation is, we want to beg you, don’t ever blame yourselves. There was absolutely no way to foresee it. And the universe is full of much worse farms we could have bought.
“However—” Unemotionally, now and then aided by his companion, he described things as they were. “We’ll hang on till the end, of course,” he finished. “Soon we’ll see what we can rig to keep us alive. After the hull collapses altogether, we’ll flit off in search of bare rock to sit on, if any exists. Do not, repeat do not risk yourselves in some crazy rescue attempt. Maybe you could figure out a safe way to do it if you had the time and no kzinti on your necks. Or maybe you could talk them into doing it. But neither one is in the cards, eh? You concentrate on getting the word home.”
“We mean that,” Carita said.
“Laurinda, I love you,” Yoshii said fast. “Farewell, fare always well, darling. What really hurts is knowing you may not make it back. But if you do, you have your life before you. Be happy.”
“We aren’t glum.” Carita barked a laugh. “I might wish Juan weren’t quite so noble, Laurinda, dear. But it’s no big thing either way, is it? Not any more. Good luck to all of you.”
The recording ended. Tregennis gazed beyond the room—at this new miracle of nature? Ryan stood swallowing tears, his fists knotted.
“You see what Saxtorph’s recklessness has caused,” Markham said. “No!” Ryan shouted. “The kzinti could lift them off! But they—tell his Excellency yonder they’re afraid to!”
“I will not. You must be out of your mind. Besides, Sun Defter cannot land on a planet, and carries no auxiliary.”
“A shuttle—No. But a boat from the warship.”
“Why? What have Yoshii and Fenger done to merit saving, at hazard to the kzinti for whom they only want to make trouble? Let them be an object lesson, gentlemen. If you have any care whatsoever for the rest of your party, help us retrieve them before it is too late.”
“I don’t know where they are. Not on P-prima, for sure.”
“They must be found.”
“Well, send that damned tug.”
Markham shook his head. “It has better uses. It was about ready to return anyway. It will take Secunda orbit and wait for an asteroid that is due in shortly.” He spoke like a man using irrelevancies to stave off the moment when he must utter his real meaning.
“Okay, the warship.”
