"It looks the same," said the lookout, then added with a grin, "only there's no smoke from burning Nips."
"There was plenty of smoke," Matt agreed, "but we wouldn't have seen it from here. Balikpapan's still a hundred and fifty miles away."
They heard a whoop over the crow's nest comm. "Surfuss taagit! Surfuss taagit!"
After a shocked delay, the frustrated talker responded. "Where?
Where?! What bearing? Who the hell's up there foolin' around? Maintain proper procedures!" There was no response. Matt looked up at the crow's nest, and there was Chack, not in it but on top of it, standing as high as he could and waving both arms over his head. He uttered a low-pitched, but astonishingly loud ululating cry. He was signaling something or someone ahead, and Matt turned and stared as hard as he could, scanning back and forth. It was that tough time of morning when submarines were so dangerous. The sky was growing brighter, but the sea was almost black.
Unless something was silhouetted, it was practically invisible.
"There, sir!" cried the lookout. "Not three hundred yards away, dead ahead! A boat!"
Matt shifted his gaze and sure enough, a boat appeared in his binoculars. It was about forty feet long, with two tripod masts and junklike sails.
It was also ridiculously close. There was no silhouette since the masts were short and Borneo provided a backdrop. He was amazed that even Chack had seen it. "Helm, right ten degrees. All engines stop!"
"Right ten degrees, all stop, aye," came the reply. Matt studied the boat and saw figures now, scampering excitedly about.
"More 'Cats," he said. "I'll be damned."
"Skipper," said Rick Tolson, "look a little to the left." Matt did so, and to his surprise he saw another boat. And another! "They're fishermen!"
Tolson exclaimed with complete certainty. "Coastal fishermen! Look!"
Each small ship had one end of a net hooked to its side, while the other was supported by a long boom. As they watched, the boom on the farthest boat began to rise. The end of the net drew closed as the boom rose higher, and a multitude of flopping, thumping, silvery shapes poured onto the deck. Nimble Lemurians waded among them with clubs that rose and fell. At a shouted warning, a few club wielders stopped and looked in shock at the destroyer coasting toward them. Chack silenced his booming cry, but jabbered excitedly at the fishermen as they drew near.
"Mr. Tolson, relieve the crow's nest lookout and send him to the fo'c'sle to talk more easily with the fishing boats. Use the engines to maintain position to windward of them, if you please."
Moments later, Chack was on the fo'c'sle, leaning forward and conversing with the nearest boat. Its crew hadn't raised their net and they all stood, amazed, looking up at him.
"He sure got there quick enough," Tolsen observed. "My God, I think he slid down the forestay!"
Matt chuckled. "Well, thanks to his keen eyes, we didn't ram anybody.
But do have a word with him about procedures. The last thing we need is other guys trying a stunt like that—which they will—just to prove that if he can do it, they can too." He looked back at the fishing boats, their crews now shouting excitedly back at Chack. Beyond them in the distance, clearer now, was Borneo. Lush and green and familiar. And yet . . . It was almost like seeing a photograph of a place he'd been. It looked like it, but it wasn't it. He remembered what Bradford had said about the "wild" Grik they'd dissected: judge it by what it is like, not what it looks like. There was a profound difference. He wondered how different Borneo would be.
They saw many more boats that day. Most were fishermen, like the first they met, and Chack explained that land People fished only mornings and evenings when the smaller fish came to the shallows where the gri-kakka felt confined. The big plesiosaurs could go shallow, but were usually content to linger in deeper water and wait for food to come to them. Most of the boats they saw weren't designed or equipped to hunt the brutes, although their fat was a valuable commodity. That was a job for a Home.
Like all Homes, Big Sal's People did hunt the big fish, and the result was her primary trade asset—gri-kakka oil. Much of her store was lost in the fire, but hopefully enough remained to finance her repairs.
Some boats ran away as soon as they sighted them, and some went on ahead after a short conference with Chack. A few stayed and took station on Big Sal as they made their way north-northeast. Occasionally, curious crews ventured to gawk at Walker and her outlandish folk, but generally they avoided the destroyer.
Late the next afternoon, as the sun neared the horizon and set the low clouds aglow, they entered Balikpapan Bay. For the first time since they'd seen her, Big Sal's massive sails descended and scores of great sweeps extended from her sides like the legs of a giant centipede and she propelled herself against the ebbing tide right into the mouth of the bay. Matt wasn't sure what he'd expected. A small settlement perhaps. Chack and the others often referred to Balikpapan as the "land colony," and he guessed that made him think in diminutive terms. But the civilization they beheld was a virtual metropolis. Two more Homes, similar to Big Sal, were moored in the broad harbor, and hundreds of smaller vessels plied back and forth.
A long pier jutted from a point of land almost exactly where they'd last seen Japanese troopships burning. The sensation was surreal. Lemurian fishing boats were tied to it now, and beyond the pier was a city.
That was the only word to describe it, even if the architecture was . . . unusual. Wooden warehouses lined the waterfront, but beyond were high pagoda-like structures much like Big Sal 's towers. Most were just a few stories tall, though broader than those on the ship, but a few reached quite stunning heights. These were multitiered, and each "story" was slightly smaller than that directly beneath it, which gave them the appearance of extremely tall and skinny Aztec temples. Otherwise, the pervasive "pagodas" continued to make a generally Eastern impression.
The most unusual architectural feature, however, was that every building in view—except the warehouses—was built on massive stilts, or pilings, that supported the structures at least a dozen feet above the ground. In the open space beneath them was an enormous market, or bazaar, that had no apparent organization at all. As far as they could see from Walker's bridge, it occupied and constituted the entire "lower level" of the city. The market was teeming with thousands of Lemurians, coming and going, engaging in commerce, and deporting themselves more like the denizens of Shanghai than the 'Cats they'd come to know. Color was everywhere. Most of the buildings were painted, and large tapestries and awnings were hung beneath and, in many cases, stretched between them. The dominant colors were reds and blues, but gold was prevalent as well, and the whole thing starkly contrasted with the dark green jungle beyond and the dirty, gray-blue bay.
"Looks like Chefoo," Gray murmured, mirroring Matt's thoughts.
The arrival of the destroyer and the battle-damaged Home hadn't gone unnoticed. Hundreds of spectators lined the quay and watched as the two ships approached. Small boats sailed back and forth, jockeying for a view, and twice Matt ordered full astern to avoid running over the more intrepid or foolhardy sightseers. The smell of the city reached them on the gentle breeze, and although it wasn't unpleasant, it too was somewhat alien. Riotous, unknown spices on cooking meat and fish predominated, although there was a hint of exotic flowers and strange vegetation.