Drowning World (15 page)

Even if that someone was a skinny sumbitch like an overeducated, know-it-all Sakuntala or a goggle-eyed, malodorous wimp of a Deyzara.

10

E
xpecting chaos, Lauren Matthias was not disappointed. Having been almost completely taken over by the several departments responsible for local affairs, the skimmer port had been transformed into the largest refugee camp on Fluva. Thousands of displaced Deyzara crowded onto the main liftoff platforms, spilled over onto walkways and service chutes.

Supported by deep-driven pylons, the central portion of the port was as sturdy as anything ground-based could be on Fluva. But the ancillary facilities, like most of the structures added later by the Commonwealth, were underpinned or hanging from cables of strilk. The strands wouldn't break, she knew, but the same could not be said for the trees or smaller pylons to which the glistening lines were attached. As she was escorted toward the port's administrative offices, she saw at least two seriously stressed spinner crews working nonstop to reinforce dangerously overloaded lines.

“I'll come with you, if you want,” Jack had told her that morning. Smiling, he'd added, “If only so that you'll have someone around you can talk to without having to worry about their individual or cultural political agenda. No one's getting much work done at the lab these last few days anyway.”

She'd seriously considered taking him up on the offer, before finally turning him down. “Thanks, sweetie, but it wouldn't look good. People on staff as well as independents and natives would start wondering if maybe you had some influence over Commonwealth policy.”

“Don't I?” He'd punctuated the comment with a playful kiss.

She had to smile back. “Of course you do.” She put a finger to his lips. “But don't tell anybody—it's a Church secret between me and the Last Resort.”

“You're the Last Resort here,” he'd reminded her.

That was the thought she carried with her now. Even by Commonwealth standards, Fluva was a long way from the government and Church nerve centers on Earth and Hivehom. While bureaucrats on both worlds dithered, she was the one on-site. The one faced with issuing life-or-death edicts. The one responsible not only for her own people but, to a lesser extent, for the Deyzara and the Sakuntala as well.

She didn't want it. What she liked was the routine, the sane, and the predictable. Signing off on directives that came from her superiors, implementing modest improvements, and facilitating the humdrum. Instead, she was faced with a refugee crisis not of her own making and an escalating interspecies war. She would have been within her rights to ignore it. Within her rights but not her conscience. Had the situation been reversed and it had been the Sakuntala who were being driven from their homes by the Deyzara, she would have reacted in exactly the same way.

True, the Commonwealth was responsible insofar as it was its shortsighted decision that had allowed the emigration hundreds of years ago from Tharce IV to Fluva. But that had nothing to do with her. She wasn't hundreds of years old. Neither, she reflected, were the Sakuntala who were presently on the rampage, but she knew that argument was useless. It had been tried decades ago and had had no moderating effect on the determined predecessors of the extremists who were behind the current uprising.

The steady caterwauling of Deyzara broodlings overrode the usual forest sounds. The massed squealing did nothing to discourage the active predators who had gathered in large numbers in the water beneath the port. Occasionally, she had been told, they would pick off the isolated Deyzara who lost his footing and fell from a walkway or port structure. Few lingered to mourn such losses. The collective communal anguish was too great, too extensive, to allow for much in the way of individual sorrowing.

Deyzara body odor was strong enough to be detected even through the rain. With so many crowded together so closely, the stench bordered on the overpowering. Still, she wore no filtering mask over her face. While the need for it would have been understood by the Deyzara, who were quite aware of their own fragrance, it would not have been tactful. Striding through the temporary shelters that had been erected and the thousands of ropy limbs, writhing trunks, and bulging eyes, she tried to breathe through her mouth as much as possible.

Falu Bedara was a small man with thick artificial implants in his eyes that made him look more than a little like a Deyzara himself. His arms moved continually, as if he were conducting unseen music, when in reality he was only accompanying his own agitated oratory. As a result, his rain cape was constantly hurling repelled water in all directions. Matthias tried to keep as far from those flailing limbs as courtesy allowed. One thing she didn't need, one thing no human on Fluva needed, was more water to be thrown in her face.

Bedara was one of those people who lived inside proscribed procedures. At this he was expert, and without his hard work administering such procedures she knew that the bedlam at the port would have been ten times worse than it was. Consequently, she respected his efforts without feeling any particular fondness for their supervisor.

“. . . another thousand bubbles by the end of the week, at least,” he finished, referring to the lightweight and simple-to-erect aerogel shelters that had been pressed into service on behalf of the refugees. She had not paid much attention to his long recitation of needs. The refugee effort was short of everything, and there was no overflowing government warehouse ensconced on any of this system's empty worlds or dead moons capable of providing the desperately needed supplies.

“I'll authorize whatever you deem necessary for the short term,” she replied absently.

“That's all very well and good, Administrator Matthias,” Bedara huffed, “but given the predicted shortfall between what we have been able to scrounge already and what is likely to remain in the—”

She turned on him sharply. She was shorter than most of her subordinates, and in this instance she was able to take full advantage of the man's modest stature. “I can't give you what we don't have, Falu. You know better than I what's in the storehouses. And despite the desperateness of the situation here, I have to keep in mind the needs of other communities besides Taulau.”

He flinched, but only for a moment. “I understand, Administrator. I only want to do my best.”

“Nobody else on staff could handle this any better than you are, Falu.” There, she thought. That ought to satisfy him, even if she was obviously grading him on a curve that began and ended with him.

It did. “Thank you, Administrator. I assure you I will do my utmost to justify your continuing faith in . . .”

But the administrator had lengthened her stride, and his words were lost in the cacophony of mewling, hooting Deyzara.

Port Administration's offices were a refuge from both the sound and smell of the refugee flood. She embraced it readily, if not gracefully, as she pushed back the hood of her rain cape, striding straight over to Harriman's desk. Looking more than a little disheveled, the younger woman was in no mood for formalities. That was fine with Matthias, who felt similarly. Though engrossed in a tridee projection, Harriman, Matthias noted right away, was carrying a side arm. Stopping in front of the desk, she gestured in its direction and spoke without ceremony.

“Expecting trouble, Nichole?”

“Prepare for every eventuality. That's what the handbooks tell you.” The tired blonde smiled wanly. “They just don't prepare you for an eventuality like this.”

“I just finally managed to lose Bedara.”

“Lucky you.” Harriman made a face. “I have to deal with him every day.”

“Try to be understanding. He's good at what he does.” Matthias indicated the hovering projection. “How are we doing—really?”

“About as well as could be expected. Maybe even a little better.” Harriman leaned back in her chair. “Thanks to the bubbles, most of them now have a place to sleep out of the rain. A large number brought food with them, and we've been able to supplement that enough to prevent any hunger, let alone starvation. It helps that the Deyzara eat only soft foods and that those are easier to store and transport, not to mention rehydrate.” She summoned up a reluctant smile. “The Commonwealth can be proud of its representatives on Fluva.”

“Hang the Commonwealth. We need to settle this soon, before our facilities are overwhelmed. And overwhelmed they will be, if this keeps up.”

Murmuring to her desk, Harriman snuffed out the projection and turned to her superior. “How is it in the other towns?”

“Pretty bad. A few better, where moderate, reasonable Sakuntala have been able to intervene.” Her expression darkened. “Several worse. There have been some killings.”

Harriman nodded somberly. “I've heard. Word gets around. Much more of that and the Deyzara won't wait for us to adjudicate. They'll start finding weapons of their own and fighting back. Then we
will
have a tragedy on our hands.” She hesitated. “Well, a bigger tragedy.” She gestured toward a window. “A few of these Deyzara can trace their lineage on Fluva back five generations. Some of them have lost everything. They'll be petitioning for redress.”

“Let the government on Earth and Hivehom worry about that,” Matthias responded impatiently. “Our job is to try to take care of these people until they can safely return home.” She shifted in the chair, the transparent material of the deactivated rain cape crackling beneath her. “Let me see your latest.”

Harriman obediently called forth a series of descriptive projections. Viewing them while occasionally asking pointed questions, Matthias was not pleased with either the visuals or the figures. They were as remorseless and unforgiving as Bedara's statistics. The conflict had to be brought to an end, and soon, or the ability of her people to manage the situation was going to fall apart. In the mayhem that would follow a collapse of local Commonwealth authority, deaths on both sides were sure to be numbered in the thousands. Then there was the still small but slowly escalating threat to her own people.

Her attention was briefly diverted by movement she glimpsed out of the corner of her eye. A pair of Sakuntala had entered the administration building. They were young but well dressed, with finely decorated and embossed strappings that served to emphasize their height. One was a Hata-nau, or Low Chief, while his attendant companion was a commoner. It must have taken more than the usual quotient of Sakuntala nerve to make their way here through the teeming mass of Deyzara refugees, she reflected. One of Harriman's subordinates took them in hand.

Assuming they were on some kind of port-related business, she did not give them another thought until she saw them coming closer, picking their way carefully between workstations. Absorbed in their own assignments, staff engaged in manipulating data and projections ignored the two lanky green-and-brown-furred natives. They must have a question for Harriman, she was thinking even as she saw the Hata-nau reaching into one of the larger pouches hanging from his torso strappings. That was not what tipped her off: it was the ears. A strolling Sakuntala's ears were always pointed outward, in opposite directions, to pick up as much ambient sound as possible. They pointed directly toward something only when their owner was engaged in person-to-person conversation, confronted with a threat—or about to pounce on prey.

The two Sakuntala were not talking with anyone, including each other, there was nothing in the room to threaten them, and as for prey . . .

There being nowhere to run and no place to hide, she did the only thing she could. It was also the last thing the Sakuntala expected. Rising abruptly from her chair, she extended her arms, lowered her head, and charged straight at the oncoming native. She hit the startled visitor low while he was still trying to take aim with the pistol he had pulled from his pouch. It was brand-new, still gleaming with the pride of its thranx manufacturers.

Though eager to make use of it, the Hata-nau was not entirely familiar with the lethal device. By the time he had succeeded in slipping one of his six fingers around the trigger, he was down on the floor with his would-be victim on top of him, flailing madly at his face. While the Sakuntala were possessed of considerable lean strength, the willowy build that made them so agile in the forest also left them vulnerable to a straight-ahead attack by a stockier opponent. Though she would have been loath to admit it, Matthias weighed more than her prospective assassin.

Before he could throw her off or bring his weapon to bear, half a dozen alerted workers were on top of him. A sizzling sound terminated the shouts of the Hata-nau's companion. Breathing hard and brushing back hair as she rose, she saw one of the other office workers looming over the body of the other Sakuntala. The pistol she held tightly in her right fist was pointed down at the prostrate native. He lay unmoving, except for the smoke that coiled upward from the hole in his forehead.

Concern writ large in her expression, Harriman was at Matthias's side in an instant. “Are you all right, Lauren?” Her gaze shifted to the two prone bodies; one dead, the other defiant. “O'Morion, what the hell just happened here?”

“Death to Commonwealth!” the pinioned Hata-nau rasped. “Death to thieves of Fluva! Those who stay, we kill!”