The giant seemed so shocked by his own brutal behavior that Moses assumed he had been a very gentle man. His acromegalic features—giant head, hands and feet—gave him a very formidable appearance, but he was in many ways helpless. His joints were large and inefficient—so arthritic and stiff that he had not been able to keep up with the main body of fugitives.
Later the wounded man slept—anemic and weak.
“Hunters.” Moses handed the bloodied arrow to Hugh Konte. “I’ve been wondering if Court’s map gave us any protection. This little episode removes any doubt. We’re all fair game as long as we’re Outside.”
Voices rose up around the campfires.
“What’ll we do?”
“Let’s fight!”
“With what? Dirt?”
“The acromegalic killed one with his bare hands, and he’s a cripple. They can’t be so tough,” said Hugh, “and for weapons, we have this for a starter.” He held up the arrow. “Let’s backtrack and find the bow.”
The cold body of the hunter lay at the attack scene—head buried in the loose soil. Moses crushed the wrist buckeye detector with his heel while Hugh Konte gathered up the bow, knife and kit full of basic calories. One trophy was already in the hunter’s bag. Agrifoam closed over the scene as they left. They waded a half mile through the waist deep fluff. Their corridor was still dry.
The next day the five-toed glacier moved more slowly, so there’d be few stragglers. An occasional hunter stumbled onto the human herd and let his quiver of arrows fly from a bowshot distance. Anonymous victims screamed and tried to bind their wounds. The hunter waited with trophy knife while the mob moved on, leaving its dead and dying. Moses, Hugh and some of the more aggressive men tried to intercept the hunters, but four square miles was a big area. By sundown they had three more bows, a dozen arrows—but twenty of their number were dead.
“Survival is impossible under these circumstances,” observed Hugh. “Let’s test our environment. We’re going to need food and weapons. What would happen if we tried to commandeer a couple of those big machines that come out to work the land during the day?”
Moses glanced at Toothpick. The bandaged cyber squeaked—
“With this level of EM disturbance it might be possible. Squeak—pull off the antenna. That should put a class ten on voice-command mode. Neurocircuitry is color-coded a myelin-yellow. Shouldn’t be any danger to try. They wouldn’t deliberately harm a human—squeak.”
Josephson was frightened. He and Court silently accepted the reprimand as it came down through channels from the Class One itself. All over the globe buckeyes were migrating—straining the hunter facilities. And now this Court and its human monitor, Josephson, had been responsible for a sizable spill of more five-toeds onto the planet’s surface. Crop crushers—breeders—hive deserters.
“But sir,” whined Josephson, “we asked for permission through the routine channels. The EM disturbances must have—”
Court interrupted: “Actually there was an answer—approval. I have it filed here someplace.”
“Approval? From me?” asked the CO.
The Class One was not a single entity—rather, his identity and authority flowed from the combined circuitry of millions of cities. Like the collective soul of the Big ES hive, the interlocking inorganic nerves of the hive acquired its own ego.
“Here is your answer—” said Court.
“A poem?” exclaimed the CO with a note of disbelief.
“An epitaph,” said Court.
“See that it is an epitaph, then,” commanded the CO. “I have no record of giving such an authorization. No one is allowed in the gardens.”
Court agreed and signed off. For hours he replayed the message. It had come in on the CO’s frequency—true, it was garbled by the EM disturbances—but it had seemed so logical at the time.
“Josephson,” said Court. “Organize a Big Hunt.”
For three days Val had camped on Mount Tabulum with Bird Dog IV. There were no buckeye sightings to disturb his star gazing—no buckeyes for months. He had the guess maps of the skies assembled by the Big ES. Each time he made the request he obtained another jumbled printout unrelated to the previous one. Now he was Outside to see for himself. He flipped up his helmet visor and counted the evening stars again. Last night there had been three. He had the optic records. Tonite there was one. Clouds made his first night a waste of time.
“How do they look?” asked fat Walter over the wristcom.
“It,” said Val, discouraged. “There is only one and it looks fine.”
“Where are the other planets? They can’t disappear in twenty-four hours.”
“Maybe not. But they did.”
Val adjusted the viewscreen in the Huntercraft for optic pickup. Bird Dog turned its heavy three-foot-diameter EM sensor to the heavens. Jupiter was still in Sagittarius—confirmed as the night wore on. But the only other planet he saw was in Gemini—with the sun—six signs away. He didn’t know which planet it was, but assumed it was Venus. Other nondescript lights glowed and moved from sign to sign much too rapidly to be planets.
“Space junk,” said fat Walter after studying the relayed views. “Not planets—just space junk. Where is Saturn? We should be able to see the rings at this magnification.”
“Probably near the sun or behind the moon. I’ll have Bird Dog pay attention to the eastern sky at dawn—try to pick up any morning stars,” said Val, studying charts. “I should be able to identify five of the planets with this gear. It may take a couple of months of mapping though—with clouds, space junk, and no previous records to go on.”
Walter sighed. “I had hoped it would be easier. The Big ES probably won’t be able to spare you or the Huntercraft much longer. Since the buckeyes left our country the job justification of hunter has been questioned by committee. We may lose our craft power and floor space.”
“Reassignment?” asked Val.
“For you, maybe—but it’s retirement for me,” said old Walter, sadly… knowing what the loss of flavors meant in terms of life span.
The call from Evergreen Country broke into a quarter of the screen.
“Josephson here—we’re setting up a Big Hunt. Need hundreds of Huntercraft. How many can you send?”
Walter was speechless. The fugitives were to be hunted down like buckeyes.
“None,” said Val. “We’re about to be cut back here at HC.”
“The CO has authorized this one,” said Josephson. “Requisition priority will be raised, I understand. You should be able to get most of your craft back in working order. We don’t know exactly where the Hunt will take place, yet. If we wait long enough the Dundas fugitives will be across the border into your neighbor’s country—Apple-Red or Oat-Yellow. But we can’t even plan it until we know when your craft will be ready.”
Val showed mild interest.
“If we get the replacement parts, and if we get the volunteers—I’d guess we could have twenty dogs—er—craft ready in a month.”
“Don’t limit yourself to volunteers. Use supervisory personnel too.”
“That is still just a guess—one month.”
“I’ll keep in touch,” said Josephson, signing off.
Val looked at Walter through the screen.