"They say a long time," she told me. "They probably do not know how long. Their brains are too tired to judge such things."
A long time… yet none of them had made an effort to move back to their original positions. And Jelca hadn't moved them back either. Sloppy, I thought — a conscientious Explorer would cover his tracks.
I turned to Oar. "Tell them we'll put them back properly in a little while. First, I want to investigate what Jelca was up to."
Oar conveyed my message. Meanwhile, I lumbered along the cleared path, wishing I could see better through the suit fabric. Glass bodies were difficult to discern; I worried about stepping on one I had overlooked. That, I supposed, was why Jelca hadn't dragged everyone back into place. He had unfinished business in the tower, and didn't want to trip over bodies every time he came in.
The path led through one room after another, three rooms of blurred body heaps, until I reached a single elevator in the heart of the building. Its door was open, ready for business; I stepped inside and waited for Oar to join me.
"Which floor do we want?" she asked.
"Start at the top and work down." Whatever Jelca was doing, he seemed to be keeping it secret from the other Explorers. If so, he'd avoid floors near ground level — too much chance of passersby hearing any noise he might make. The city was quiet as death and filled with hard surfaces perfect for echoes; even a small sound carried surprisingly far.
The elevator closed and we began to ascend — slowly, as if anyone who took this ride had no reason to hurry. People came here to die — not literally perhaps, but that was only a technicality. Those who rode up almost never rode down.
Cheerful thoughts, Festina. To take my mind off the elevator's funereal pace, I said to Oar, "You can see better than I can. Could you please check the floor for marks?"
"What kind of marks?"
"Any kind. The path Jelca cleared was quite wide — more than he'd need just walking through himself. He might have brought in equipment. Maybe heavy equipment."
"Explorers are not strong enough to carry heavy things," Oar replied smugly.
"But Explorers can have the local AI build robots to do the work — I saw several suitable haulers at the launch site. Just check, would you?"
Oar got down on all fours and crawled around, sweeping her fingertips lightly across the floor. "There are some dents here," she reported. "Not very deep."
"Sharp-edged or rounded?"
"Rounded."
Wheels, I thought. That didn't tell me much; but the marks had to be recent. Like other machinery in the city, this elevator must undergo regular maintenance and rebuilding, courtesy of automated repair systems. Even small dents would warrant attention — otherwise, they might become starting points for rust.
"All right," I said, "Jelca brought something here. The question is what."
The Second Spare
The answer was a Sperm-field generator. We found it on the top floor, pushed tight against the wall of the building. I recognized it from a distance, even with my blurred vision: a black box the size and shape of a coffin.
"Holy shit," I whispered.
"Amen," Oar answered dutifully.
This had to be a second generator. The first was still installed in the orca starship — I had seen it mere hours before. Callisto had been running diagnostics on the device; it had actually spun a short thread of Sperm for her tests.
What was Jelca doing with another generator?
I had no doubts where the machine had come from — it was the second spare from Jelca's former starship. He must have stolen both generators from the engineering hold, then installed them into separate probes and sent both down to Melaquin. Ullis told me Jelca had flown one probe south by remote control. He must have done the same with the other probe, picking a time when Ullis was busy or asleep. Later, he had retrieved the first generator and turned it over to the Explorers… but he'd kept the other for himself, smuggling it here when the others weren't watching. (Jelca had been the one to instigate the day/night cycle in lighting. Clever. It ensured the Explorers would all sleep at the same time, thereby giving him a chance to fetch the generator under cover of darkness.)
But why did he need a second generator? Why did he want it badly enough to steal it, leaving his ship with no backup in case of breakdown? Of course, angry people do strange things; maybe Jelca liked the idea of the Vac crew drifting in space until someone answered their may-day. He might have thought it would give them something to think about after abandoning him on Melaquin — a few weeks of being stranded themselves.
But if that was his rationale, why hide this generator here? Why not load it onto the whale, as a replacement in case the first generator malfunctioned?
No. Jelca had plans for this second generator. I just couldn't guess what those plans were.
Hampered by my obstructed vision, I examined the black coffin. It was wired into another piece of equipment: a waist-high glass box with wing panels attached to the top. "Photo-collectors," I murmured. "Curiouser and curiouser."
"What is a photo-collector?" Oar asked.
"These panels," I told her, "soak up light and other radiation that hits them… which must be a hefty dose of energy, considering the output of this building. The panels obviously transfer power to a battery inside this case, and the battery supplies the Sperm generator; but damned if I know why. What's the point of generating a Sperm field on a planet?"
"Jelca is very very stupid about sperm," Oar answered.
I gave her a look she couldn't see through my suit.
Cursed with Hope
Minutes later, we were back on the street. Oar had replaced the suit where she found it, and my skin was rediscovering the joy of breathing; wearing the suit had been like being wrapped in plastic, close and sweaty.
I had decided not to move the ancestors away from the walls just yet. Oar assured me they were all getting enough light and air, and would scarcely notice a few more hours of overlapping each other. Putting the people back would tip off Jelca that he'd been discovered… and I didn't want that until I was ready to confront him. At the very least, I had to talk with Ullis first. Maybe the other Explorers needed to know too; but maybe not.
Maybe Jelca had a sensible explanation for everything.
I know. I was being foolish. How much more evidence did I need that Jelca had degenerated into a self-centered bastard? Toying with Eel and Oar, then callously discarding them… hiding the generator from his fellow Explorers… giving me the cold shoulder as if I were a Vac-head…
And yet…
Since Oar had first told me he was here, I had dreamt about him. Thought about him. Imagined us together. Even earlier, during my years on the Jacaranda, he had crossed my mind now and then… especially when I lay beside some snoring substitute I had taken to bed because desperation got the better of me. Alone with my eggs, I invented fantasies about Jelca: a fellow Explorer I could make love with, not just a convenient Vacuum crew member to slick myself down.
I had such hopes. Stupid hopes — I knew that. But I had hoped that maybe, losing myself to Jelca would sear off my guilt, burn it away with white heat for just a few seconds. Whom else could I turn to? If I threw myself on another Explorer, or Ullis, or Oar, it would be so hollow, nothing more than drugging myself with sex. But with Jelca it could be different… couldn't it? He was not just someone within arm's reach, he was someone I'd thought about, dreamed about…
I'd even dated him. Twice.
This sounds so banal now. It embarrasses me. I'd say I was lying to myself, but the lies were so obvious I didn't believe them, even at the time. Yet I wanted to believe. I wanted to have something with someone somewhere. Who else did I have but Jelca?