The Mediteck deftly nailed an ulnar wire through his fracture to stabilize the fragments. Segments of shattered rib were excised through small incisions. Eyes were bandaged. Skin oiled. The repair work finished, he was left alone. He waited and dozed.
A hand touched his shoulder. He heard the old Watcher’s voice. Icy creams were painted on his skin.
“Drink?” asked Watcher.
“No,” said Val. “My eyes—?”
“The Mediteck says the electroretinogram is still equivocal. There’s a chance.”
His arm splint was checked and loosened slightly. He felt the to-and-fro motion as the stretcher team moved him into a cubicle.
“Of all the rotten luck,” he cursed.
The old Watcher cackled: “Rotten? You were very, very lucky, me lad. Those coweyes are cannibals. You were lucky she wasn’t hungry!”
During the days that followed, his visual cortex played with strange colors and shapes as pigments and enzymes were replaced. When the bandages came off he had vision of a sort—rod cells had regenerated their granules first. He saw black and white images—low brightness, high contrast.
Icy creams still coated his skin, but he could see the burns were covering with tough scabs. The splinted arm was painless—just knitting itch.
He reviewed the optic records of his ill-fated Hunt. Stills of the coweye analyzed out at nearly sixty kilograms mass. His arrow had struck dense, five-toed bone—the scapula. It was a solid, painful hit. Why hadn’t she hibernated?
Val glanced at the sensor readings—her body temperature did not drop. It stayed at 99.8 degrees. 99.8! A full 1.2 degrees above normal—ovulation temperature! She couldn’t hibernate, she was late follicular phase. That explained it.
The rest of the record made sense now too. She hadn’t killed him for her supper—instead she copulated. Using the trophy knife she had removed his Cl-En suit from his unconscious form. Mounting, her demand-type pelvic thrusts initiated his sacral autonomic cycle successfully. She was frightened off by the arrival of the Meditecks.
“Watcher,” he called. “Can I see the gear that was brought in with me?”
The withered old man reached under his cot and pulled out the locker. It contained his sliced-up suit, helmet and the archery set. There was an unfamiliar device too—something he had seen the coweye use on him prior to mounting—a long, wire needle attached to a fist-sized, knobby handle—the RUDEE.
“Where did you find this?” he asked.
Watcher shrugged. “The crew that brought you in said the coweye had stabbed you with it—low in the belly. They pulled it out and brought it along. The Mediteck analyzed it, said it was a RUDEE.”
“I recognized it. The depolarizing enteric electrode used to give tone to rectal and urinary bladder muscle when the sacral autonomies were destroyed by spinal cord injury. It is a crude, homemade device. But it worked. I wondered how the coweye had managed a successful mount so quickly—considering my comatose condition.”
Watcher smiled and nodded. “I’m afraid she must have had a course in neurophysiology or bioelectrics,” he laughed.
Val turned the device over and over in his hands. The parts had been collected from a variety of sources—power pack from a Pelger-Huet helmet, capacitors from Agromecks, and a circuit board from a wrist BD. Who would know enough to put one together? Who would do it for a coweye?
“Tinker!” exclaimed Val.
The remainder of his convalescent month was spent probing the Class Two’s memory banks for traces of Tinker and his men after the flood in the freight station.
“But less than three hours later the whole area was destroyed by meteor impact. New Lake is there now,” reminded the computer.
Val scowled—hurting his granulating burns. A scab flaked off his eyebrow.
“Give me the flow diagram for the sewers again.”
The screens flowed with color-coded boxes and lines.
“The sewer service had a station near those gratings. Did your sensors pick up any buckeye sightings there prior to New Lake?”
“No record.”
Val squinted at the screen. His color vision was returning slowly. He saw five sub berths. Three yellow—empty. Two purple—subs docked.
“Where were the three subs?”
“No record.”
Val sat back, calculating the Sewer Service sub’s speed at thirty knots—more than enough speed to escape into the Coweye Sump before the explosion that formed New Lake. Tinker could still be alive! Val clenched his fist, winced, and opened it slowly. Another scab flaked off.
Curious Nebishes crowded into the garage to hear Gitar’s song. Kaia had grown meatier—stronger with time. He sat with Gitar making a rhyme. Hypnotic music rolled at 150 hertz—entraining autonomies—locking onto cephalic rhythms. At 160 decibels they sang their five-toed songs—songs of violent passions, freedom and individual strength. The Nebishes joined in—hesitantly at first—and then with almost violent spiritual fervor.
Cursing the hive, Kaia led them Outside. But they clustered, wilted and died like rootless flowers in the next day’s sun. None survived to run on the green, for they lacked the buckeye’s five-toed gene. Kaia sobbed at the sight of their bodies baking.
Val limped into Walter’s quarters half-expecting the old man to have died. He was still propped in his bed. Venus fussed over Val’s scabby skin and arm splint. He accepted the drink she offered and turned to Walter.
“It’s good to be here. That ride back on the tubeways was almost worse than the burns—another segment flooded in the trench.”
“Learn anything?” asked Walter. His voice sharp, clear.
Val smiled. “Never hunt a coweye in the follicular phase.”
Walter snickered, then broke into a loud guffaw. He sat up, laughing, and holding his side. His arms and legs moved quickly. The edema was gone, and with it the peripheral neuritis and paralysis.
“Never hunt a coweye in the follicular phase,” laughed Walter through big tears.
Venus brought in a tray of nibblers and drinks. She was puzzled by their laughter, but Walter couldn’t collect himself long enough to let her in on the joke. Val rummaged around in his kit and handed the RUDEE to Walter. It was partly dismantled.
“So this is how she did it—electro-ejaculatory apparatus. Where would an aborigine get a device like this?” said Walter.
Val frowned.
“I’m not sure. But I suspect that Tinker—or someone with his skills—is Outside helping them.”
“Them?” said Walter. “Oh, you are referring to our old white-haired buckeye. They are on two separate continents. They just might be the last of their kind—too. Museum specimens, if we can catch them—certainly no threat to the Big ES.”
“No threat,” mumbled Val. “It is the principle of the thing. As a hunter I was supposed to wipe them out—I hate to see one get away.”
Walter sipped his drink.
Kaia carried Gitar into another shaft cap. His old body had been rejuvenated by his high-protein diet. He sought a mate. Gitar spoke with authority. Doors opened. They stood on the platform and focused the woofer downshaft. Fifty thousand heard the noble notes of stately guitars. Only a score of the dull citizens lifted their heads. Only one climbed the spiral—a pale, slight female—Dee Pen.
Gitar leaned on the dispenser—party edibles fell. He toned her soft tissues with strings while she ate and drank.