Bloodhype (8 page)

“I beg to question, Commander, but there is no ‘if’ involved,” interrupted Amostom from his seat. The elderly nye made a sweeping motion with hands and tail. “The readings are plain for those who have the openness to read them. The thing lives. Weakened, granted, but it lives.”

“How ‘weakened’?” asked Parquit.

Amostom performed the AAnn shrug-equivalent. “By any reasonable standards, I should guess near to death. Indeed, it may, as the good Arris observes, never recover. But then, little of it observes normal or reasonable standards. By its own—who knows?”

The Commander grunted and turned back to the largest tridee monitor. It remained focused on the quiescent black mass.

“Well, we shall have to find out. A good external stimulus ought to be the best way. And we have one that has proven itself effective.” He gestured to Carmot and Arris to follow.

“Your pardon, Commander,” said the Observer-First, “but where are we going?”

Parquit looked back over a mailed shoulder. “Inside the vault, of course. What kind of stimuli did you think I had in mind?”

Carmot had not moved. “I hardly think that is wise, Commander.”

“Perhaps. But useful, certainly.” Parquit looked the small scientist over carefully. “Is it possible the nye have a coward in their midst?”

Carmot flushed. “A heightened instinct for preservation in the face of death is not cowardice.”

“Very facile. I will not force you.”

“Then of course I must come,” said Carmot.

The clumsy armored suits held their speed to a crawl. Designed for use in the weightless vacuum of space, they were terribly awkward on land. In ordering the use of the bulky suits, Parquit privately doubted that they would afford much in the way of protection should the creature decide to go on another rampage. If it was capable of further rampaging, he reminded himself. Amostom’s analysis left an uncomfortably large amount of room for disarming speculation.

Psychologically, however, the armor was valuable for such as the Observer-First. For a race of reptiles equipped with their own body armor by nature, armor of all types exerted an almost religious appeal.

Within the vault, the restored lighting (cut out when the emergency power was cut on) was sharp. Colors, shadows, even the walls showed grayish in the even lighting. The jagged debris of the creature’s interspace ellipsoid lay strewn about the room, twisted and torn like so much parchment.

The enigma
in vivo
rested in the center of the room. A huge, silent mountain of ebony opalescence and awesome power. It represented a universe of unanswered questions.

Together with a heavily armed escort, which was present primarily for psychological effect, a small group of volunteer scientists accompanied the three.

A single soldier preceded the small party. He walked slowly up to the unmoving hulk. A few nye held their breath. The soldier walked slowly around the base of the creature, tapping it at various points with the stock of his powerifle. After several minutes of this he flicked his tail at the waiting party.

A low sussuration, part relief and part burgeoning curiosity, began to emanate from the group of scientists as they spread through the vault. The atmosphere seemed to grow ten degrees warmer. Two were already deep in a heated discussion by the base of the melted watertight door.

Others were soon plying about the edge of the monster. Still others were pouring over the shredded remnants of the transportation ellipsoid that lay scattered about the vault.

Parquit still found it difficult to think of the mountain-quiet mass as alive in any sense of the word. Its one brief display of insensate violence and explosive motion had taken on the aspect of a bad dream, was receding into memory.

He passed one elderly observer calmly dictating notes into his belt recorder. The oldster was examining a fused lump of metal which lay close to the base of the creature. It was easy enough to identify—a partially digested arm and part of a shoulder protruded from the metal. The lump was the remains of one of the little inspection-repair scooters that had carried the nye who were to release the creature from its metal shell—and the remains of the scooter operator.

The Commander spotted Arris studying the point where the black hill touched the floor, He strolled over and the xenobiologist waved in greeting.

“Initial deductions?” Parquit asked smoothly.

“I am still trying to adjust to the fact that this is indeed a living thing and not a mountain of inorganic sludge, Commander.” The scientist tapped the black substance with a clawed foot. “I find it difficult to relate to something so enormous on any kind of personal level.”

“A feeling we all share. Still, I could do with some first impressions.”

“Well, if Amostom’s instruments
are
correct, then we can assume the thing capable of unknown actions at any time. Yet I would tend to believe we may have pulled its spines. Its intelligence remains an unknown—the most important one, I should think.”

“You believe it is of a high enough order to learn from its experience, then?”

“Its present lack of action might be read as such. But I hesitate to ascribe intelligence to an action which may be dictated solely by bodily demands and be thereby entirely involuntary. I don’t think in any case that it will risk another encounter with Pyorn’s electric charges. Not when it has been so obviously damaged by the first.” The xenobiologist scratched his leathery hide with one claw. “With your permission, Commander, I’d like to be about our schedule of experimentation. Suitable precautions will be observed.”

“I should expect so. Yes, certainly. Begin at once.” Parquit caught sight of Carmot standing off to one side and walked over. The Observer was careful to avoid contact with the monster.

“You’ve been very quiet, Observer. What do you observe?”

Carmot turned a drawn face to the Commander. “I observe that an appalling display of force resulting in destruction and fatalities is insufficient to install suspicion in the nye. We all underestimate this unspeakable mass of alien obscenity.”

He returned his gaze to the thing in question. “The display of electronic destruction put on by our engineers was quite impressive. It is possible that we may have exhausted the thing’s resources that its moment of terror was a last desperate attempt to avoid imprisonment and perhaps dissection.” He looked at Parquit evenly. “But I would not bet a
southing
on it.”

Carmot’s pessimism did not overly bother Parquit. Rather, it was the Observer’s unflattering intimations of ignorance on the part of the AAnn. Not fitting for one in the service of the Emperor.

“You would have us attempt to destroy it now, after the nye it has cost?” Parquit said sharply.

“Yes!” the Observer replied, with more violence than the Commander had ever seen him express. “Now, immediately! Before it regains the strength it showed. And for the very reason you yourself just said!”

Parquit was taken aback. “I said?”

“Truly! ‘Attempt to destroy it,’ you said. You cannot even conceal your own uncertainties, Commander.”

“That may be,” replied Parquit quietly. “But it is also for that very reason that we must continue to study it. Its ability to survive extraordinary assaults demands that we try to learn how this is accomplished. It promises us secrets to be learned nowhere else. I will not surrender these prospects to insubstantialities and personal fears.”

Carmot sighed. “Let us hope they remain only that.” The diminutive Observer turned back to his inspection of the dull hulk. Instinct betrays one, he thought perversely as he wildly wondered what the thing’s flesh would taste like. The oddest thoughts occurred to one at the oddest times.

His nursery was light-years and real years away. He wished he were in it.

The Vom rested quietly. It was aware of the small army of intelligences poking and prodding at it. It was aware of instruments sending questing energies throughout its structure and it did not resist, although certain information was allowed to be picked up subtly changed, carefully mottled. It did not even resist when one cluster of figures set about removing a small section of physical self, an unforgivable insult. In time past the very thought would have meant slow death for the thinker. Now, the Vom did not react. It could do penance.

The mistake it had just made required a good deal of it.

Very well, it would continue to present an aspect of docility that bordered on death. Also, it had much thinking to do.

So, and so. It had underjudged its captors. It reminded itself that under certain conditions a large number of small intelligences could act as efficiently as a single great one. Demonstrably, they could sometimes surpass it. It had relied too much on its unmatched body to carry the attack through. In forgetting to reason it had forgotten everything. It had been fortunate, yes, fortunate to have survived. After retaining life for millennia of near-starvation, it had nearly invited extinction by a single rash act.

It perceived that a group of the small intelligences had been gathering large groups of lower beings to one side, outside its first retainer. The Vom could not read minds now, but it was an astute interpreter of emotions and actions. It detected the long tubes leading into the vault from outside and the devices whose function would be to remove much of the tame water. So its captors were going to supply it with organics. It contented itself and calculated the time needed to regain its former plateau—the various sections reported: surprisingly little. In addition to many other things, the Vom had forgotten its own recuperative powers.

The next time it took action it would be much stronger. A properly planned course would be pursued. The thought of having to endure captivity by another kind of intelligences was strange and repugnant. In fact, it was harder to bear the thoughts in the minds of its captors, which pictured the Vom as a prisoner, than it was the reality. The Vom firmed its resolution and counted this another form of penance for its errors. Soon, it would be strong. Not as strong as it had once been (it had energy to spare now for remembering) but, yes, strong enough. Time brought power.

The little girl couldn’t have been more than nine or ten. She crouched fearfully behind a moss-covered rock in the dense rain-forest. Warm water dripped off the trees all around. It was the only movement in the dead, humid air; the sound the only sound. Drops fell heavily from branch to branch in the riot of silent greenery. Filicales and bryopsids dominated the scene.

Clasped tightly in her right hand was a small blaster. Cautiously, she raised herself enough to peer over the rock. The forestscape showed nothing unusual. Nothing to see but the delicate trees, mistiphytes, and an occasional patch of chromatic fungi.

A dull maroon something moved between two mushroom things on her left. The gun twisted around and fired and the maroon thing exploded in steam and green blood. Bits and pieces continued to hump around in a horrible travesty of retained life.

The girl stepped around the boulder, keeping the blaster focused on the area of destruction. When the remnants of the still unidentifiable thing had ceased their life-burlesque, she lowered the weapon and moved forward.

She wasn’t looking up, so she didn’t see the fire-constrictor as it dropped silently from its branch. Just as she didn’t see the double rows of tiny scimitar teeth which sank inches into the muscle at the back of her neck with the force of a hammer.

Kitten blinked as she exited the booth, rubbing a spot above her left ear where the head contacts had chafed slightly.

“Well,” asked a foppishly clad Porsupah. He was sitting on a bench gayly lit from within, chewing a stick of arromesh. “How was it?”

She replied in a broadly accented, aristocratic tone. This, like Porsupah’s suit, was for the benefit of the many who strolled the noisy, glittering pathways of the amusement arcade.

“Rather dull, I’m afraid. Oh, of
itself,
it doesn’t fail. And the killer-illusion choice was somewhat different—slinkering is something I haven’t done more than once or twost before. But compared to the simies of Terra or even Myra IV, it’s not much. The cortex of a fire-constrictor doesn’t permit much of the real pleasure of the kill to seep through, if you know what I mean.”

“I told you we should have gone fishing!” Porsupah put on a petulant look. “How anyone can compare the thrill of hooking a parapike with the sterility of the imitation stimuli of a simie booth—it’s all just so, so
gauche!”

He handled the role of a spoiled merchant’s nephew with a skill and verve Kitten couldn’t hope to match.

“Fishing, fishing! Honestly, Niki, sometimes I swear you’d be happier a fish yourself. And I never compared the two.” She flicked ashes idly from the long stick of Terran tobacco. “Even if some of the fish are bigger than your hoveraft, I can’t see much of a challenge to someone using a powerhook and reel.”

“The thrill’s in the play and the landing, not the size of the fish. At least I don’t use an explosive hook, like some. And it’s a more honest form of fun than plugging yourself into one of those infantile joyboxes!” He waved contemptuously at the row of simies. A few had lights on over the doors, indicating they were in use. Each one they passed had a more garish sign than the next, promoting this or that forbidden thrill in safety and perfect simulation.

“Meretricious mental masturbation!” the Tolian concluded grandiosely. He rose and started to walk down another arcade way. Kitten followed, strolling on his left.

“And furthermore,” he continued as they passed a stall where a tall alien was vending home-cooked pastries, just like Emethra used to make, “there’s nothing stopping
you
from trolling for giant groupert or malrake with plain old hook and line, you know.”

She drew herself up haughtily. “I may enjoy taking risks now and then, it’s true, but I’m not
crazy,
Niki.”

“Does my lady seek something a bit more intense yet sure and private, then?” came a voice from one side.

They turned together. A portly human was seated in a wicker chair at one side of the still walkaway. In an age of multiple diet chemical controls and adequate cosmetic surgery, the man was a living fossil. He was fat.