Torkel gave her one of his suave smiles, which she had begun to find infuriatingly smug and condescending. "Yana, get real! We own the planet, and the natives are technically nothing more than employees. Also, it seems to me that you're treading-you should pardon the expression-on thin ice here. Are you really offering to do this job, or have you, in fact, gone over to the side of the people you were supposed to be investigating?"
"Why does it have to be sides?" she asked, leaning forward and willing him to keep making eye contact with her. "If this is a company planet and the inhabitants are company employees, isn't the company interested in the potential above and beyond the usual? This may be something entirely new here, Torkel. Something that would be useful without the expense of reterraforming a planet." She could see that "expense" was a key word, and he was definitely mulling over the "entirely new" notion. "At any rate, we'll need to delay any evacuation or even the transfer of a single Petaybean until we've developed some means to compensate for their dependency on the planet."
"Fresh air, freezing temperatures, and no microbes to attack their disabled immune systems." Torkel shrugged. "That should be easy enough."
"If that's all there is to it," she said darkly. 'That's what I know now, and I'm only scratching the surface. Please go carefully here."
"Oh, we're being careful okay. Since you're so concerned, you'll be glad to know that my father has been following all of the events here, too, and he's seen the Maloney woman's autopsy report, as well. Since he understands the brief evolution of this planet better than anyone, he's decided to personally conduct an investigation to rule out any malfunction in this planet's development resulting from the terraforming process as a cause for the aberrant occurrences you mention. That's Dad-nothing if not conscientious. And he likes nothing better than a new scientific mystery. Me, I'm a simple, practical kind of guy. I think the explanations for all of this are probably traceable to fairly uncomplicated sources."
There was a knock on the door. Torkel stood and walked over to it, stepped into the hall, had a few low words, then opened the door wider.
Giancarlo stood there, along with Terce, the snocle driver. Torkel shrugged.
"I'm sorry, Yana. And very disappointed to have to say this to you. However, Terce here corroborates Giancarlo's suspicions that you've entered into a secret pact with the guerillas and betrayed the company. I'm afraid we're going to have to hold you for questioning, pending complete physical and psychological examinations and testing, as well as the standard interrogation."
"Torkel-" she began. "Captain Fiske. That young man is one of the fai-"
"In light of our conversation," Torkel said, cutting her off midword, "I'll see to it that the investigation is conducted here on Petaybee for as long as possible, but it may be necessary to move you to more sophisticated facilities."
She stood and did an about-face, forbearing to tell him that being moved would probably not harm her in the same way it would the Petaybeans.
Giancarlo glared as she started past him. She kept her eyes straight ahead, focusing slightly over his left shoulder, as if he weren't there. With a hand jarring against her shoulder, he stopped her in her tracks, his expression guarded but hostile.
"We're also looking for Dr. Shongili, Major Maddock. You could save yourself an extra charge of obstructing investigations if you'll give us some idea where he might be found."
She said nothing.
Bunny Rourke's snocle was her dearest prerogative, if not possession, but she didn't bat an eyelash when she saw it was gone from the place where she had parked it.
She had been all set to take Diego and Steve Margolies back to the village, to let Steve meet Clodagh and the others and talk with them about what had happened to the Metaxoses. Steve had the same specialty as Dr. Metaxos and, if only he could be convinced to keep an open mind, that would give them one more ally to avert what Bunny knew in her gut was going to be a catastrophic change in Petaybean lives.
She had felt it in the cave during the night chant-just the least tremor, nothing someone unacquainted with the planet, like Yana, would notice, but the planet was worried, fearful. Sean had felt it, too, she knew, but she was also sure he had been clearing his mind of any negativity to help Yana. They were waiting for Steve to finish talking with Dr. Metaxos's doctor, so she and Diego had gone to start the snocle while they waited.
"I've got to go now," she said, turning to Diego. "They've taken my snocle, but I think you and Steve should get the first ride to Kilcoole you can."
"Maybe the major can get one for us from her buddy, that Fiske guy," Diego said, not understanding.
Bunny shook her head even as she pulled away from him. "No. If the major was okay, my snocle would still be here."
"I'll come with you." Diego still didn't get it.
"I have to go on foot. You'd freeze."
"Nah, it's warm today. I-"
"No. Meet me later. Bring Steve and we'll introduce him to Clodagh. I got to go before they catch me, Diego. Bye."
She didn't hear whether or not he returned her good-bye as she ducked between the buildings, behind piles of unassembled equipment, her white and gray rabbit-fur parka blending with the snow as she circled around to the river and headed back toward Kilcoole. There, she would pick up Charlie's dogs and go somewhere: Sinead's old trapper's cabin, maybe, the one Sinead had lived in before she had hooked up with Aisling. The PTBs wouldn't know the location of that one.
She hoped Diego would tell Yana what she had done, and then she realized that what she had told Diego was true: Yana wasn't okay. That redheaded captain, the nice one, either hadn't been able to help her or hadn't been as nice as he seemed. All the more reason she needed to get back to the village and try to get help. Behind her she heard more shuttles landing and smelled the fumes from the hot housings on the spacecraft as they touched down. There were so many of these company people with their machinery and equipment and all of Intergal's resources. The company men acted as if her people had to do anything they said, and for the first time, she was scared that they might be right.
She didn't run: running attracted attention. She tried to move with the rhythm of the wind and the snow, except that today the snow wasn't blowing, it was melting. Diego was right. It was a very hot day. She shed her parka as soon as she thought she was safely out of sight of SpaceBase and the river road.
She could hear the roar of the snocles on the river; an altered sound now, sort of muted, wet, splashy, accompanying the sound of the engines and the swish of snocle skis on ice. The day was really very warm. Warmer than it ever got even during the middle of the short Petaybean summer, when most of the snow was gone and it was no longer necessary to have a fire in the house. But how could that be? Actual breakup usually didn't come for weeks, and then usually gradually, a crack in the ice one day, a soft spot the next, and then the ice began to move. Never was it this hot so early in the season.
In the distance, the sound of an explosion was muffled but audible. She wasn't surprised. She had seen the explosives loaded in corps snocles setting out from Kilcoole in a northerly direction earlier in the day. They claimed to be "exploring," which meant they were blowing sores on the face of the planet.
Though the explosion sounded distant, the shock waves made the ground beneath her feet shudder.
Her boots were made of hide, suitable for dry snow. She had another, waterproof pair she wore for early and late winter, but she hadn't thought about changing into them yet. She could have used them now. The soft moosehide soles of her boots were soaking up icy wetness from the melting snow. If she didn't reach Kilcoole by nightfall, when, despite the unseasonable warmth of the day, the temperatures were likely to drop below freezing again, her feet would freeze. Maybe she should have stuck closer to the river. But she thought that it would be quicker, and safer, to cross-country to where Uncle Seamus was ice-fishing. She planned to ride the rest of the way home with him.