“Oh, I beat it. Rather easily, as a matter of fact. They are not nearly as formidable as some people will tell you.”
Lightning reactions, acute vision, impenetrable hide, poison sting.
“A real Hymenopt, like Kallik there? Or a simulation?”
“A simulation. We were told that all living Hymenopts are out in the Zardalu Communion. I was surprised to see that you have one as a crew member.”
“A slave, you mean.” Nenda grunted. “Maybe sometime you’d like to try a tussle with Kallik.”
“I might. But I don’t think that would be nearly as much fun as one with you.”
The terrible thing was, Louis suspected that she was right. He looked at the way she was sitting, sprawled back provocatively with one knee raised high and her bare foot on the seat of the chair. Her calf and thigh had the plump smooth firmness of youth. The big blue eyes and curls of golden hair suggested an innocence quite alien to Louis. He had the feeling that it was equally alien to Sinara.
He stood up abruptly. “We’re through the node, and that’s our destination neutron star showin’ on the screen. I better go to the navigation deck an’ check the planetary patterns.”
His departure was only partially a pretext. Somebody on the ship ought to be taking practical survival steps, even if they had no formal training. The Have-It-All had the best computer that you could buy in the Orion Arm, but past a certain point an organic intelligence had to take over. The ship’s detection system had already performed the first checks needed on entering a new stellar system. It had asked and answered the question, were there warning beacons or other evidence that a planetary approach would be regarded as hostile?
Of course there was always the danger that such signals might be unrecognizably different between Orion Arm and Sag Arm civilizations, but thousands of years of trade by the Chism Polyphemes encouraged the idea that the Have-It-All’s signal beacon and message of friendly intent would be familiar to at least one of the planetary receivers.
Louis seated himself at the navigation console. Without a word being spoken, Kallik had trotted along behind and now crouched in the smaller seat at his side. She could react ten times as fast as he could, and in an emergency it was understood that she would take action on her own initiative.
Without looking at her, Nenda said, “So far, so good.”
“I concur.” Kallik’s double ring of bright black eyes had scanned every display around the cabin walls. “The transition went as planned.”
“Six planets. That’s a hell of a lot for a neutron star.”
“It is. But with respect, there is only one of interest. Five lack atmospheres, and they do not emanate structured radiation patterns consistent with the presence of intelligence.”
Nenda stared at the fierce point of violet-blue that formed the system’s primary. Most of the emitted energy was X-rays and hard ultraviolet, invisible to human eyes. And deadly.
“Think we’ll be able to live on the sixth one? There’s enough hot stuff coming out of that star to fry us.”
“The atmosphere of the planet is breathable. The ionization at its outer edges will provide some protection, but special clothing and masking will be needed if we hope to operate down on the surface.”
“Before we get to that, let’s find out if there’s anybody down there we’ll be able to talk to.”
“With respect, do you now wish me to seek to establish communication?”
“Better you than me. I don’t know a word of Polypheme gargle.”
“I will be honored. My feeling is that the unguarded nature of the signals coming from the planet implies pacific intent on their part.”
“Go to it, then, see if you can raise anybody. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
Nenda left as Kallik opened a communications channel. He headed not back to the main cabin, but farther forward toward the Have-It-All’s weapons control center.
Pacific intent was all very well. In Nenda’s experience, once you learned to fake that you had it made.
The Have-It-All’s space-to-surface pinnace held two humans comfortably and four at a pinch. Nenda had given the matter a good deal of thought before he made his decision.
“Look.” He was explaining to Atvar H’sial. “She’s the most dangerous sort of incompetent you can get. Completely wet behind the ears, but doesn’t know it. If she’s ever to learn what life is really like, better for her to do it here and now, where all the signs are that it will be pretty safe, rather than trying to learn when we are already in a bad fix. And it makes sense to use humans because that’s who the Polypheme we’ll be meeting is used to. You and Archimedes would put him right off. Not only that, you’d both have trouble fitting into the pinnace.”
The Cecropian did not seem enthusiastic, but at least she didn’t give Nenda a hard time. To lie using pheromones needed more skill than he possessed, and in this case he was speaking the exact truth and Atvar H’sial knew it.
The planet that the pinnace was drifting down to had an atmospheric haze that concealed detail. Only when they were below two thousand meters could Louis Nenda and Sinara Bellstock make out the rough terrain of jagged rocks and, lower still, mounds of purple and gray plant life. The spaceport was little more than a long cleared area, next to four low buildings with beyond them a great body of dark water.
“It doesn’t look much like Pleasureworld to me.” Sinara was staring out of the forward port with the enormous curiosity of one who had never visited worlds beyond her native regions of the Fourth Alliance. “Are you sure your Hymenopt understood what they were saying and translated it right?”
“Quite sure.” Nenda brought the pinnace in close to the line of buildings at the end of the landing area. “Kallik heard it in Polypheme talk. I heard it myself in a language of the Zardalu Communion, once they found somebody down here who’d traded in the Orion Arm.”
“Pleasureworld. That name is ridiculous.” Sinara was wearing a heavy leaded oversuit and hat, opaque to both ultraviolet and X-rays. She wore dark goggles, and all exposed skin was coated with a thick yellow cream. She looked grotesquely unattractive. Nenda regarded it as protective garb in more than one sense of the word.
“The name isn’t ridiculous at all—if you happen to be a Chism Polypheme or cater to them. There’s a huge colony of Polyphemes here, according to Kallik, even though they are not native to Pleasureworld.”
“Where are they native to?”
“A Polypheme never tells. But they’re great travellers, and one of them here says he’s totally fluent in human universal. In a few minutes we’ll find out if he’s telling the truth.”
“If they’re not born here, why do they come to such an awful place?”
“For the radiation. That’s why At and I picked a neutron star as target. The UV intensity on the surface of this planet is a hundred times what our eyes and skin can stand, but the Polyphemes love it. If you went for a walk by the water’s edge—which I don’t recommend—you’d find hundreds of them out there, sunning themselves. Of course, it makes them drunk.”
“Doesn’t the radiation hurt them?”
“That’s a matter of opinion. Does alcohol harm a human?” Nenda opened the hatch of the pinnace. Reflected radiation poured in and the air took on a smell of ozone, as though a continuing electrical discharge was going on. “We have to go outside, but we won’t be there for long. Kallik has arranged for our contact to meet us in a shielded setting. Come on, let’s get this over as quick as we can. Even with protection, enough radiation gets through to give you a burn in a few minutes.”