Fall of the White Ship Avatar (22 page)

But when it was all gone they'd barely cut their hunger pangs and thirst was on them again. The good news was that Alacrity and Paloma had found a tiny runnel not far off, making water less a problem.

"This is gonna be a very tough day," Alacrity said. "So,
if nobody objects,
we can try to gather more food and do the tree markings at the same time. If it doesn't work out, we just go back to concentrating on one thing at a time; mark fewer trees and eat less."

All three of them had eaten well on the day Hecate showed up to Oz them away to her Precursor lair.

Real hunger hadn't begun to hit them yet. The plan was carried unanimously.

Floyt regretfully banked his fire and they moved out with Paloma at point once more. Floyt was again amazed at how long a day could be—in this case the Lebensraum day, some twenty-seven Standard hours. As a comfortable Earthservice accessor—if not a free or happy one, or permitted much dignity—

Floyt had lived a not-much-varying routine that, mercifully, made time not seem to hang heavily upon him. At least, not unless he thought about it.

He worked a straight day schedule and that was a tremendous plus, going from his apt to his work carrel and back. There was his accessing, a succession of minor absorptions, broken up by periods of light office exercise and a midday meal. In the evening he returned home to watch media with his family, indulge his hobby of genealogical research, or occasionally have a night out at some recbureau function.

Freedays, he liked to bicycle, his worst eccentricity.

But for the most part days had drifted together in a comfortable routine sameness, blurred so that they passed with an easy timelessness. Only now and then would Hobart Floyt get the twinge, in his carrel in the morning or his apt living room at night,
Didn't I just leave here
?

That first morning, like Floyt's experience on a couple of other worlds, was utterly different from functionary life. To the distant booming, belching, and flatulence of the gawklegs, he and his companions stole through the brush, alert to peril, watching for trees to mark, searching for scare-flare signs, careful of their footing, wary of noxious plants and insects. The first half hour had them perspiring in spite of the morning chill and was so uncomfortable, demanding, and fatiguing that it seemed to Floyt file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry%20krui...%20-%20Fall%20of%20the%20White%20Ship%20Avatar.htm (110 of 242)23-2-2006 17:03:13

[Fitzhugh 3]-FALL OF THE WHITE SHIP AVATAR

longer than a workweek, even a dull and toilsome one, back on Terra.

They found another knucklenut tree but passed it by when Paloma Sudan judged that the nuts were unripe enough to make them sick, possibly be lethal. A midge-like thing tried to crawl into Alacrity's ear to explore, others being drawn to mouths and nostrils by warmth and smells. Less than two hours after dawn, the temperature was already 20° C by Paloma's proteus. They paused for a long drink at a runnel.

Just after that, Floyt stepped in some unidentified fewmets.

They came to a tree that seemed suitable—the scare-flares only used certain types—and Alacrity borrowed Floyt's web belt to join with his own and use as a climbing belt. After extending the climbing spikes, Alacrity took position while the other two stood guard.

Most wildlife was unfrightened of them, but none they saw was inclined to attack. Three adult humans were too much for any rock-eel, ringwing, flapcat, or kobold to tangle with.

They passed the day marking out territory around the lair, gathering food when they could, eating most of it on the spot. They also discussed the gawkleg census.

"From a distance is how we're gonna do it," Alacrity said. "Preferably by intelsat."

"That
would
be nice," Paloma answered, "if it were possible. But we've got to do it accurately, and that may mean getting uncomfortably close, because if we haven't got our facts right the first time, those beauties will probably never listen to us again."

Floyt gave Alacrity a hand down from the last tree. "We don't have a lot of time," Alacrity said yet again.

By late afternoon they'd finished a fair perimeter of marked trees, pretty well using up the scent in the foreleg paw pads as far as Alacrity could tell. All three were dirty, tired, hungry, and thirsty despite water stops and intermittent foraging of berries and other things okayed by Paloma's data. They were also sweaty and increasingly rank. Floyt had been fantasizing about a sylvan bathing scene, jungle-romance style, finding a pool or a safe, deep part of the little river that wound through the middle of the valley, until Paloma mentioned sliver-worms, stingfish, and similar noxious life forms liable to be prowling any stretch of deep water not claimed by the gawks. A sponge bath began to sound grand.

Invictus was getting lower. They could hear the cavorting and eructations of gawks happily traipsing around in an environment where little could harm them unless they were badly injured or sick.

Well, maybe not completely happily,
Alacrity thought.
They're smart enough to know something's wrong.

All we've gotta do is get them to admit it and then believe we have the answer. Good luck …

"We'll have more time for food gathering tomorrow, now that the Walls of Jericho are finished," Paloma said. "I wouldn't mind a little more to eat, but I really don't feel like stumbling around in the dark, file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry%20krui...%20-%20Fall%20of%20the%20White%20Ship%20Avatar.htm (111 of 242)23-2-2006 17:03:13

[Fitzhugh 3]-FALL OF THE WHITE SHIP AVATAR

especially with drillbugs."

Just then a scare-flare gargled somewhere and another replied, from across the valley. They tended to become active around dusk. "It certainly seems an advisable time to draw the wagons into a circle,"

Floyt declared.

The gawklegs were starting up their droning again; they sometimes did it by day, but always in the evening, Paloma's info said. The kicker was, the droning wasn't simple animal herd sounds; it was a blend of recitation and something a lot like prayer.

The three moved back to camp quickly. They checked carefully, but the former den was still empty.

Alacrity supposed that the fire ring with its ash might have something to do with that. The new occupants used short branches as rakes, pulling out debris and loose dirt. Then they refloored it with leaves and heaped more to the side to use as covers. The den didn't smell so much rank as oily. To Alacrity, scare-flare scent was redolent of old machine parts.

Then they built up the fire, readied plenty of wood, and each made a last commo with nature while the others did sentinel duty. Alacrity gently detached the drop-netting from his brolly and hung it across the mouth of the cave, weighting the bottom and filling in gaps with dirt.

As the fire burned down, they waited for the next drillbug onslaught. The night came on. "Maybe the fire's keeping them back from the overhang, or they're someplace else?" Alacrity speculated.

But just then a miniature hydra shape, then another, bumped the netting. As if that was a signal to relax, the three settled down in the crawlspace cave to watch. Paloma dug into her pouch and came up with a sweetspeck dispenser.

"I was saving it for a morale booster," she explained, and carefully flicked a tiny flavored dot onto each man's palm. The sweetspecks tasted wonderful; they dissolved in moments, but the taste lingered.

Stomachs growled like gawks' droning.

There was no swarming of drillbugs, just assaults from roving individuals and small groups. Alacrity guessed that the smoke and heat of the fire were masking the humans' scent and body warmth. It was full dark before a ringwing zipped through the firelight, taking a drillbug on the fly.

After another half hour Floyt volunteered to go out and test the air. His fire was burning low and he couldn't bear the idea of watching it go out. "Just another caveman," he muttered.

The drillbugs had again disappeared. According to Paloma's data, they fed on fruits and plant sap when there was no blood source available, and didn't much like spending time in the air. Alacrity and Paloma joined Floyt by the fire and they went back to talk of the gawklegs' recruitment drive.

file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry%20krui...%20-%20Fall%20of%20the%20White%20Ship%20Avatar.htm (112 of 242)23-2-2006 17:03:13

[Fitzhugh 3]-FALL OF THE WHITE SHIP AVATAR

"I've been thinking about it," Alacrity said, tossing a length of wood on the fire carelessly. Floyt frowned and rearranged everything more to his high standards in fire esthetics. "And I have an idea," Alacrity went on.

Floyt sighed. "Just when things were getting restful."

CHAPTER 11—MIDDLE-OF-THE-FOOD-CHAIN BLUES

"I make it fifty of them in this group," Floyt insisted.

He was quite comfortable stretched out on his stomach, where he'd been for two hours; he'd learned a hunter's stoic patience from Alacrity and Paloma. He no longer reacted to or worried about midges, for example, and as a result they seemed less interested in him.

"And I'm telling you it's more like seventy-five," Alacrity repeated. "Just count the number you see in the area we measured off by those trees and multiply by—"

"See here, Alacrity, I understand the procedure and I'm not blind."

"Oh, forget it!" They were on a boulder low on the valley's side, less than two hundred meters from where some gawklegs were grazing. As they watched, one cow reared and shied away abruptly from something in the grass, trailed by her calf. The men saw a flash of green and gunmetal and knew she'd almost stumbled on a scare-flare. The two species usually gave one another wide berth; a gawkleg could, of course, trample one of the predators to pulp, but if the scare-flare got its sting into a vulnerable area, a gawk could become quite ill, though death was unlikely.

The scare-flare sprang away through the high lichen-grass. Alacrity shifted his weight. "We already know all we have to. I say it's time to talk to those ladder-legs again. Today. Now."

Floyt shook his head. "We should try for one more count, closer in." He rose a centimeter or two and eased back off the boulder, moving cautiously, circling to get closer to the valley floor. He moved with an ease acquired over long days of stalking, knowing the local dangers.

Floyt had learned other things, as well, like banging out his boots before putting them on, no matter how short a time he'd had them off, and how to blow his nose with his fingers and other facts of outdoor hygiene that Scagway Scanlon and his ilk had somehow never gotten around to mentioning.

Alacrity resignedly trailed after. They kept track of the wind to make sure the gawklegs didn't pick up their scent. The two came down onto the open stretch and stalked toward a good vantage point, one from which they'd have a good view of the gawks and still be fairly safe. Then a sudden, minute sound came file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry%20krui...%20-%20Fall%20of%20the%20White%20Ship%20Avatar.htm (113 of 242)23-2-2006 17:03:13

[Fitzhugh 3]-FALL OF THE WHITE SHIP AVATAR

to them both, a tiny shifting of weight among branches only meters away, as twigs and leaves rustled against tough hide.

They both froze, turning their heads slowly, slowly, quick motion being a sure way to draw attention and be spotted, or attacked.

A gawkleg was watching them from ten meters away. It couldn't possibly have crept up on them through the foliage, given its size and horns and weight. This one was a male, one of the smallest of the adults, whom Paloma had named Nosey.

Floyt's first thought, after total shock and just as he began casting about for the nearest tree, was
But they
don't stalk or lie in wait! Gawks just don't
do
this kind of thing!

But then, Nosey wasn't like the rest of his kind. He was quick, but too small to compete in the bull battles and so, as a nonbreeding male, had little status in the herd. He was curious, even eccentric, always rooting around and prying into this and that.

Alacrity grabbed Floyt's arm just as Floyt was about to bolt. "Don't you get it, Ho?
He's
observing
us
!"

Nosey watched them steadily, rocking from side to side as gawks did when passing time, a sort of contemplative sway, except that Nosey hadn't done it while he was waiting to get a better look at them.

Alacrity must be right,
Floyt realized, not daring to speak,
because Nosey isn't taking off or using us as
doormats. And that is something new under this particular sun.
He nodded, to show he understood.

Men and gawkleg stood there in tableau, dappled by the shade, until Nosey let out an
oinking
belch. It was muted for a gawk, not doing much more than stirring the men's hair and carrying a strong gust of herbivore-breath to them. Then the gawk turned ponderously, bending a small fractal sapling, and trotted away.

"There's no record here of a gawk ever doing anything like that," Paloma concluded, scanning her data as Floyt operated the linked proteuses. She scratched a leaf-mite bite on her arm; all three had them from their bedding, but the bites were preferable to shivering through the long nights.

They were sitting on the ledge in front of the den, eating wheyberries that had just gone green and ripe.

The gawks were droning and bellowing in the afternoon light. "That doesn't change the fact that it happened," Alacrity reminded her.

"Here's something from back when the first human research group became isolated and started allying with the gawks," Floyt said, pointing out a bit of info he'd projected with the holofeature.

file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry%20krui...%20-%20Fall%20of%20the%20White%20Ship%20Avatar.htm (114 of 242)23-2-2006 17:03:13

[Fitzhugh 3]-FALL OF THE WHITE SHIP AVATAR

"Hey, how'd you find that?" Paloma answered her own question. "Oh, that's right; accessing was your specialty, hmm? What's it say?"

"Rather what we might have supposed. Gawklegs assumed that swaying, peaceful mode in talking to humans, just as they do when they're doing their droning. Not that any of them have talked to a human in a while, except us."