Pirates of the Thunder (36 page)

“China,” Chow Mai whispered. “They cannot change her back.”

“No. People are the most complicated of all living things. We know a lot about how people work, how they’re put together and why they are the way they are, and we can change much of it, but it’s not just one part we’re talking about here—it’s the whole thing, body, brain, blood, you name it. More cells than anyone can count, all of which have to work perfectly together. Once always seems to work, but try it again and it just doesn’t come back together right. It can kill or cripple or form a horrible kind of monster that’s one of a kind—and maybe not make the brain work, either.”

The twins were silent for a moment, then Chow Dai spoke. “You want us to be changed into these—others. Learn how to be these others. Then go in and steal the ring. And, after—we are these others forever?”

“Yes. It’s the first time this has been asked of anyone, but it will not be the last. Many of us, maybe even me, will have to do the same thing. We have three more rings to get before we can head home.”

“May we—see what these people look like?”

He got out a holographic still Star Eagle had run off and handed it to them. It was of the same male he’d seen. They just stared at it, not revealing their emotions, although Chow Dai breathed “Oh” very softly.

“I know what I’m asking and don’t think it’s easy. I expect to have to give this speech again a few more times. We may
all
need to do it just to sneak past Master System to get to its home, but we might not. It’s not fair, but that’s the way it’s set up. I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t think it could be done. We have Vulture—you remember the one who was Koll, then Sabatini, very well, I think—down there now, as one of them. He’s in their security system at the Center but he can’t do the job, only provide information and training and cover in and out. We
will
get you out.”

“As—them,” Chow Dai said quietly. “And then what?”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“I mean, suppose we can do it. All of it. We get your ring and then we come back here. What happens to us then?”

“You will still be human beings, damn it. You’ll still be the same inside, too. You’re both good pilots and we can use good pilots. We might also need you to train others to pick other, different locks. You will be no different from the woman with scales and her nose in the back of her head, or the Cantonese-speaking crew with their bones on the outside. Still people, still a part of the team.” He thought about the missing fourth ring and Captain Sukotae’s theory. “Someone, perhaps many, might have to become far more limited sorts than these. We believe one ring may be deep on a world of water breathers.”

The woman from the
Indrus
cleared her throat.

“I’m sorry,” Hawks apologized. “This is Sabira of the
Indrus.
She has dealt with these people and knows them well.”

“They are good people,” she told them, “and their bodies may look strange, but they are actually better than ours in many ways. They are tough and versatile. And, where it counts, they are quite human. They love their children, are generally good to one another, like luxuries and try to enjoy life as best they can. Most are peasants much like the sort of people yours are. If we are to win, this must be done.”

The girls were not properly enthused. “If we did not to this, then what would happen?” Chow Mai asked.

Hawks sighed. “I will not order someone to do this. I could, but it is not in my nature. Too many bad things were done to too many people aboard this ship now because someone or something ordered it done. If you refuse, then we will find volunteers. You will be expected to teach them all that you can about the problem, and then they will go and make the attempt. They will not have as good a chance as you would, but we will try and we will keep trying until we are down to no one here and we cannot win. We must. If we don’t get that ring then the rest doesn’t matter.”

They nodded. “This vault. You have information on it? Yes? Can we know what it is?”

Hawks gave them as detailed a description of the situation as he could. They listened attentively.

“That is not a difficult sequence but it is very tricky,” Chow Dai said. “No amateur, particularly in an unfamiliar body, could do it. It is worse because it is mostly mechanical. The mechanisms are not all that different from one big illusion in our uncle’s show. His wife would get into a coffin, and then they would fill it with water, seal it with many chains and locks, and my uncle would have to pick them all and open the coffin before she drowned. She was a Buddhist who had studied with some mystics in the high mountains and could remain under for several minutes, more than most people, but it was still a matter of speed and skill. As little girls, we knew just how it was done, and we would often practice with the coffin empty against an hourglass timer. Many long times it took us up to an hour —far too long. Now we could do it, perhaps faster than Uncle Li could. This is a very complicated version of the same problem. No one aboard here could be taught to do it fast and perfect the first time in just a few days or weeks or even months, and we cannot exactly duplicate it here because we have not seen it and its hidden surprises.”

“Nonetheless, we must try,” he told them.

Sabira spoke. “You would not be going in alone, as you might have had to do under other circumstances. We—the
Indrus
crew and some of the others—have talked it over. We know the land, the people, the customs. It was decided that one of us at least should go as well, take the same route as you are asked to take, to help teach you the subtler ways of those people. We also have a mindprinter program for the language, which is basically a very distorted version of Hindi, which is my first language. The omens of the gods brought us to you, as the minds behind the attack on the great computer demon brought you here. With all these things on our side, we cannot fail. Compared to what we might face with the others, this is readymade for us.”

They gaped at her.
“You
would become one of
them,
as well? Forever?”

“It is my duty. I will not tell you that I am excited by the prospect, but I do not fear it, either.”

The twins looked at Hawks. “How long before this would happen?”

He shrugged. “The Vulture has a lot more to set up, and we have to coordinate things. We don’t think that getting you in will be a problem. We’ve been running
Pirate One
in and out at regular intervals for months now, so that it appears to be a new but regular run. It isn’t even challenged anymore. Vulture can arrange a much easier and more convenient arrival than we arranged for him. We’ve manage to get his old ship out and put in one with a transmuting station—the same one we used on the island world. We can send directly from
Pirate One
to that transmuter now, if Vulture is there and we time it right. In fact, first we have to find prospects for Star Eagle to copy and study, and get them to
Pirate One,
where we now have a transmuter and some storage. Covers must be arranged, and no one, least of all Master System and its personnel, must suspect. We are pretty sure that down there at Cochin Center someplace is a Val. You will have to go in and be accepted there before you pull the job. Then we have to get you all out and away under their noses. It’s going to be very tricky and very dangerous. Even Vulture can’t become a Val.”

“Very well, then,” Chow Dai said almost matter-of-factly. “Then we will do it.”

He was surprised. “Just like that? Don’t want to talk it over or think about it?”

“There is no need to do so. We would both be dead at the hands of the security guards at China Center had this not been arranged as you say. You have given the reason we have never understood, which was why we were taken from there and sent to where only important people are sent. The ones who chose us did not make us break into the Center apartments and offices or steal. We did that ourselves, and we were caught for our ignorance. Our lives and our bodies were forfeit because we were caught. They belong to the ones who saved us. You cannot know what it is like to be so helpless as we were, to be beaten and raped not by one but by many brutish men, again and again. Neither of us has really been able to get close to a man since then, nor really trust another. When this—Vulture—creature saved us from Sabatini, we owed still more. We will do it”

“Nobody
owns
anyone’s bodies or lives here. That’s what this is all about.” He looked at Chow Mai. “And you? You agree?”

“We do not need to speak. We know each other’s minds,” the other said.

Hawks sighed. “All right then. We’ll set it up.”

PASSAGE: TWO CHARACTERS MEET IN HELL
 

T
HE ENORMOUS CREATURE ENTERED THE SMALL DOMED
enclave easily, pressing the passwords as if it had set diem up, which it had. No one was present to greet it, which mildly irritated it, but it stalked down the entry corridor and into the main room where it found a lone Earth-human sitting with a glass and a bottle.

“You’re late,” the man said. “I’d offer you some, but I know it would be a waste.”

“You should lay off that stuff,” the creature admonished. “Those substances that dull the mind are dangerous.”

The man chuckled. “And you should know, right? So I lay off the drinking and the smoking and maybe an occasional pleasure pill and I won’t die young? I’m already dead, remember? I sure as hell do. Scared the living
shit
out of me, too. Damn it, if you can’t even sin in hell then what’s the use of living
any
kind of life?”

The creature let that pass. “You have been monitoring the progress of our friends?” it asked.

“Naturally. That’s what this floating mausoleum was designed to do, wasn’t it? After all,
we
reprogrammed Star Eagle back on Earth. You know, I wonder when Hawks is gonna think of that? He’s a pretty clever fellow.”

“Perhaps too clever for his own survival. The real question is what are their chances of success?

The man sighed and took another sip of his drink. “This stuff’s good. Like the old country. Not like that synthetic crap we’ve endured all these years. Anyway, what can I say? We front-loaded Janipur as much as we could, even lucked out in spotting the
Indrus
just ahead of the troopers and sending it a divert message to the rest of that refugee fleet. Stroke of luck. Makes me think even God is on our side, if I only could figure out who God was and what He, She, or It wanted.”

“Then you rate their success as probable?”

The man shrugged. “Hey! We did all we could, but short of going in and getting it ourselves and handing it to them on a silver platter, there is no way in
hell
we can do more now. For the first time, and not the last, they are now truly on their own. We couldn’t interfere if we wanted to. You know the rules that bind us. Even with everything, this one’s not gonna be any snap, although I think they came up with some real original touches in their planning. Now they got two ignorant girls soon to be in very strange clothing whose only gift to the universe is that they can pick any lock ever imagined by machine and man, one girl who knows the route but is gonna still hav’ta learn to be a hoofer, and one creature—whatever the hell that thing is—against maybe sixty troops, the entire Center security system and its personnel and computers, and a shipload more troops lurking around under the command of a Val. How can they lose?

“You are not amusing.”

“I do not intend to be. And if they somehow manage to pull this one off, the next one has its own real problems, and the third’s a dilly and a half. And we won’t mention number four, considering even we aren’t real sure where it is, but they got some clues and bright ideas. Did your people bring in this Ikira girl? She’s a real asset.”

“We had no knowledge of her or her ship being involved in this. I am pleased to hear it, though. The more they depend upon themselves and the less they need us, the more—comfortable—I am. This is no easy thing for any of us, as you should know.”

“You really don’t believe they’re gonna do it, do you?”

The creature paused a moment. “No. I cannot see how they can, with or without our help. Each victory will make defeat more certain down the road as Master System redoubles its efforts.”

“Yeah, well, we know well how infallible Master Systems is. Scratch one Val, build a pirate fleet, and maybe snatch one big fat ring to stick in Master System’s guts.”

“Perhaps. I do not like to hear you say that. I find this whole thing most distasteful, as you know. It is a logic loop of gigantic proportions. If
it
is mad, then am I not also mad by definition? And if I am mad, then am I abetting a mad thing by aiding this attempt at Master System’s destruction?”

“Beats the hell out of me, pal,” Arnold Nagy said, lighting a cigarette.

“You are no help at all, Nagy,” the Val responded.