Ripples of the Bandersnatch’s white underside ballooned into the opening. At first Jook thought it was just normal pressure expansion, the weight of the animal forcing its underside into a new cavity as the Bandersnatch settled its mass over the ship. But as he watched, the volume of white flesh inside the hatch grew. It began lapping around the cross bracing for the portside inertial thrusters and weapons pods. As the flesh made contact there, the Bandersnatch’s belly vibrated and the metal began to scream.
It also began to dissolve. Big, fuming drops of fluid wept from the point of contact and fell into the bilges. Wherever they touched, except on the hull material itself, that spot also started smoking and dissolving.
Jook moved. He climbed along struts and down handholds, swinging his stiffened leg over obstacles and bashing it twice. The pain didn’t slow him down. He made it past the waist, where his nominal duty station was, and kept on going, around the hyperdrive engine. In the rear, about as far forward from the tail as the main hatch was back from the bow, the hull had another opening. This one was smaller and fitted with an airlock. He thought briefly about hiding inside the lock, but he remembered it was constructed of the same vanadium steel that had failed in the main hatch. No, his only option was to climb through while that end of the ship was still uncovered by the creature’s bulk, get to the ground before the Bandersnatch noticed him, and run like hell, or as fast as his bad leg permitted.
To lower himself from the lock entrance, Hugh Jook pulled on a climbing harness and gathered up the grapple, launcher, line cassettes, and gas cartridges. Almost as an afterthought, he broke out a laser rifle and a personal radio.
While dry-locking through, he punched up the radio and whispered into it.
“Captain…!”
Nothing, not even static. “Jared!”
Still nothing.
Of course-inside the lock even the strongest signal would be blocked. He’d have to wait until he was outside and clear before calling the ground party.
The outer hatch opened, and Jook was looking up into a billowing wall of rough, white flesh. There was no time to set the grapple or pay out line. He levered himself up on the hatch coaming, scrambled over the ceramic hull surface trailing down toward the tail, got his good leg lowermost to take up his impact with the ground, and dropped.
He fell over on his bad leg and cried out-then looked up to see if the Bandersnatch was interested in falling on top of him.
It wasn’t. Instead, it rolled back and forth over the hull, driving the bow down and bending out of plumb the trees that had wedged it right and left. The Bandersnatch worked its rasp deeper and deeper into the main hatch, and Jook could faintly hear the screech of breaking metal inside.
Still, he didn’t trust the white beast’s absorption in its task. As soon as his breath was back, Jook picked himself up and hobbled into the next pentagonal clearing. There he set the line cassette in his grapple, loaded the gun, and fired up into the trees. After the few seconds it took to anchor and set the grapple, he was soaring up into the green vault.
“I can now give you more detailed information, sir on the hardsight contacts.”
“Good, uff, Navigator. Uff. Continue.”
Nyawk-Captain ran full out, stretching his long muscles. At full extension, his forward-reaching claws just grazed the rack that held the brainbox of their long-range starfixer; his hind claws ticked against the panels of the weapons locker. He was exercising in a variable gravity field that could be rippled to simulate ground passing under his pads. At present, the field was going under him at twice his own body length every second. He had to stretch to keep up-or be shoved back into the locker.
“We are definitely seeing two contacts, not one with a reflection,” Navigator said. “The brighter return is the smaller-an absolute return of all radiation. That would indicate an infinite density, which I cringe to propose to you.”
“How big is this infinitely dense source?”
“Small, Nyawk-Captain. No bigger than a kzin’s torso.”
“And it orbits a star-is it dead star matter itself?”
“No, sir. It does orbit a star, but on a planet. I now have a layered return shadowing this planet’s lithosphere and iron core. The object is on the surf ace, or near to it. The second contact -“
Nyawk-Captain growled him to silence. He then reached out in his stride and killed the gravity field, ending his run on a single, four-footed pounce into the middle of the exercise area. The cabin steamed with the heat of his exertions-but neither of his crew members would dare complain.
Navigator held the thought and obeyed silence while his captain stretched in place and considered the implications of that hard return.
Infinite density. Small volume. But not enough mass to push the object deep into the planet’s gravity well. Those observations could lead to only one conclusion: a Thrintun storage container, protected by its own time-warping field.
Honor and glory a full name and heirs, the personal friendship of the Riit, all would go to the discoverer of such a box. The artifacts concealed in those few that the kzinti had found in the past often yielded good weapons-or the dues to improving their own armaments.
Navigator and Weaponsmaster would be having similar thoughts, Nyawk-Captain realized. It was time to distract them.
“Continue,” he grunted.
“The second contact is bigger, but not as dense. It presents a volume suitable for a ship’s hull-a small one, but still capable of supporting a crew, drive systems, and weapons. I hypothesize it is a Leaf-Eaters’ hull, such as they make as gifts to the humans.”
“Is it near the other object?”
“Almost on top of it.”
Nyawk-Captain casually ran a foreclaw into his mouth, probing the gaps between his teeth. It was a habit his father would not approve of, but it relieved stress while he thought.
“Shall we alter course, sir?” Navigator prompted.
Nyawk-Captain growled him into silence.
The Last Fleet followed Cat’s Paw with a lag often days and a leeway of two days. Those two days were calculated to allow Cat’s Paw to make minor course corrections, take evasive action, and conduct a brief survey of Margrave’s defensive positions before Nyawk-Captain began his attack run against the system. The ten days would allow the human forces time to reach their maximum dispersal, following the near-simultaneous attacks by Paw and the other outriders, before the fleet struck behind him.
Timing was everything-but Nyawk-Captain knew he operated within a window of opportunity, not under split-second coordination… And what an opportunity was now presenting itself!
He could, of course, contact the Last Fleet and request a delay in the planned attack. He would ask for enough time to allow him to alter course, stop, and retrieve the Thrintun box. A few days at most. But then, Nyawk-Captain would be honor-bound to explain his reasons to Lehruff, who was the commanding admiral. And Lehruff would want to share in the discovery.
Of course, if he could move in and get out quickly enough, Nyawk-Captain might retrieve the box and still make his rendezvous with Margrave well ahead of the fleet. All honor and glory would then come to him alone, when he eventually produced the Thrintun artifacts. His two crew members, being subordinates and inferiors in rank, would defer to him on the discovery. He might even share with them for form’s sake-a sixteenth of the value for each would be a graceful gesture.
Of course, if Nyawk-Captain contacted Lehruff, he would also have to report the General Products hull that lay in close proximity It was one hull only and not a large one; such a vessel had low probability of preceding and leading a massive attack by the Leaf-Eaters and their human puppets. Yet that was how Lehruff might read it. He would then want confirmations. Analyses. Councils of war. He might even send other ships to investigate the contact. Reason for delay. And an excuse to take the prize from Cat’s Paw.