Adam slowly convulsed again. The transformation would have been a horrible sight had the humans never seen one of the amorphous robots go through it before. As it was, Derec found it quite unsettling to see himself-or an image of himself-slowly being reshaped, apparently against its will, into another, alien, species.
Adam began shivering as a long, whip-like tail extruded from his hips. Then, with one last mighty convulsion, his silver skin erupted into a thick blanket of wiry silver fur.
“ARROOOOO!”The howl was deafening in the close confines of the bridge. Adam’s eyes opened; in a flash he rolled over, sprang to his feet, and got a wall behind his back. “Spaceport Control!” he snarled in HuntTongue. “Tell them SilverSides has returned!”
“Toolbox!” Avery hissed urgently at a utility robot, staring wide-eyed at the snarling monster that Adam had become. “One centimeter welding laser-and hurry!” For a moment they were all frozen in place-human, robot, and robot kin-trying to gauge each other’s intent. Mandelbrot was having perhaps the worst time of it, since invoking his personal defense subroutines had unleashed a flood of Capek memories.
Then Adam/SilverSides relaxed his hackles, closed his mouth, and assumed a relaxed stance. “Friends,” he said in perfectly normal Standard, “forgive me. I was momentarily disoriented by my transformation. ” He paused and inspected his chest and forelegs. “In this shape the natives-the kin, that is their preferred term-know me as SilverSides. I am a female of some standing in their community. ” He/she turned to Derec. “Contact Spaceport Control again. I believe you will find landing permission forthcoming. ”
Derec looked to Avery; Avery nodded. He invoked his internal commlink and this time found Spaceport Control absolutely eager for them to land. He patched into the main viewscreen optic feed and found that the kin were clearing the tarmac as fast as their four legs could carry them.
Avery gave Derec a grim wink and lifted his hand out of his coat pocket long enough for Derec to catch a glimpse of the black, flashlight-sized welding laser that Avery had aimed at Adam/SilverSides.
Derec nodded to Wolruf. “Okay, Wolruf, set us down. ”
SilverSides apparently was unaware of the laser. She favored Derec with a wolfish smile, then turned to the other amorphous robots. “Eve? Lucius II? We have a few minutes yet before we land. If you will open your commlink direct-memory access channels, I will download the grammar and lexicon of the native language. ”
Mandelbrot tentatively raised a hand. “Friend Adam, may I share in this data transmission?”
SilverSides seemed surprised by Mandelbrot’s effrontery, but her expression quickly turned to a tolerant smile. “Friend Mandelbrot, I sincerely doubt that your brain is capable of using this information. However, you are welcome to make the attempt. ” If Mandelbrot had a reaction to this insult, he didn’t show it. Instead, he joined the other three robots as they locked their joints rigidly at attention and switched over to DMA mode. Four pairs of eyes dimmed as the download commenced.
Avery, fondling the welding laser in his pocket, studied Adam/SilverSides until the last glimmer of awareness faded from the robot’s eyes. Turning to Derec, he said, “Son? Has Adam ever insulted Mandelbrot’s intelligence before?”
Derec shook his head. “Not since we left this planet before. ”
Avery’s eyes narrowed, and he resumed studying the robot. Then, with a snort of disgust, he left the laser in his pocket and went back to watching the main viewscreen.
Chapter 21. Advent
Maverick muscled through the crowd on the edge of the tarmac, trying his best to keep track of WhiteTail. “There he is!” she shouted, somewhere up ahead. He bounced up to his hind feet-a devilishly tricky way to stand in a crowd-and caught a glimpse of her.
“WhiteTail!”
She looked over her shoulder and made eye contact with him just as someone lurched into Maverick’s weak leg and sent him staggering. “Over there!” she shouted, pointing with her tail. He caught his balance, looked in the direction she was pointing, and spotted LifeCrier at the leading edge of the crowd.
“I see him! Try to - oof!”Someone jostled his leg again, and this time he fell down. The large, muscular female that he landed on reacted with a growl, a snap, and the first words of a challenge in HuntTongue.
Then she saw the amulet that hung around Maverick’s neck and backed down with a snarling submission just two hairs shy of being a challenge itself. He accepted it before she had a chance to change her mind and darted off through a gap that opened in the crowd.
By the time he’d worked his way over to join WhiteTail at LifeCrier’s side, the flying thing had started descending again. The great whistling roar of its flight grew louder, and gusts of hot wind swept over the crowd, filling the air with the reek of lightning and brimstone.
“Are you sure this is safe?” he shouted at LifeCrier, trying to make himself heard over the noise.
“If it were dangerous,” the old kin shouted back as he pointed his muzzle at the flying thing, “the WalkingStones would chase it away!”
“But what is it!” WhiteTail shrieked, as the roar suddenly pulsed louder.
“Remember how I told you,” LifeCrier paused for a breath, “SilverSides first came down-in a flaming egg?”
“Mother’s whiskers!” Maverick howled. “Is that the bird?” The whistle that accompanied the roar abruptly shot up in pitch and choking clouds of dust blew up off the ground, momentarily blinding Maverick.
An instant later the whistle stopped, the wind ceased, and the tarmac was silent, save for the distant echo of thunder off the buildings and the frightened whimper of a pup in the crowd.
Slowly, Maverick’s ears adjusted to the quiet. The great flaming bird sat on the tarmac, stiff and rigid on its three slender legs, emitting only the occasional ping! of cooling metal. A few in the crowd were finally daring to breathe and murmur in low, worried voices. LifeCrier himself was standing with his head bowed, mumbling a prayer that seemed to be in extremely formal HuntTongue. He ended the prayer by nuzzling his amulet. “Well, then!” LifeCrier abruptly looked at Maverick with a madly cheerful expression. “Are you coming with me?” Not waiting for an answer, he started walking toward the bird, his tail held high, his ears cocked at a jaunty angle, his shadow stretching out before him in the long afternoon sunlight.
Maverick hesitated only a moment and then went after LifeCrier; the rest of the inner circle followed on his heels. “Father,” he heard WhiteTail growling under her breath as she trotted up to join him, “one of these times your faith is going to get us all killed. ”
WhiteTail had just about caught up to Maverick when a loud clang! came from the bird, followed by a massive creaking sound and a deep, unsettling hum. Several of the inner circle broke and dashed skittishly back to the crowd, but LifeCrier simply stopped and stood there calmly, as if he were expecting this. Gasps rose from the crowd as a small depression appeared in the bird’s skin just behind its head; after a few moments it became apparent that a large hole was irising open. Maverick could see that something was moving in the opening, but when he tried to get a clearer look at It, his eyes were dazzled by a blinding flash of reflected sunlight.
As if the flash was a signal, LifeCrier suddenly dropped to his belly and placed his head on his forepaws: the meekest gesture of submission a kin could make. “Down!” he said through clenched teeth. Maverick decided to follow his example. He could tell from the shadows that everyone near him did as well, with the exception of WhiteTail. She was still standing there, her tail twitching nervously, when the flap touched the ground and SilverSides stepped out into the light.