After an hour, Ryeland began to appreciate the difficulties of the problem.
Back in the file room, he found a summary of the existing knowledge of the spaceling; he took it to the landing pit and read through it, watching the spaceling, trying to allow it to become accustomed to his presence. The creature hardly moved, except to follow Ryeland with its eyes.
The notes on the spaceling showed a fruitless and painful history. The spaceling had been captured by an exploring Plan rocket retracing the steps of Lescure's Cristobal Colon. A section of notes, showing how the capture had been effected, was missing; the account took up the story with the creature being brought into the hastily converted rocket pit. It had been chained at first, so that the first investigators approached it with impunity. Then the chains had been taken off—and, in quick order, half a dozen investigators had been bashed rather severely against the bars. The spaceling did not seem to have attacked them; they simply were in the way of the thing's terrified attempts at escape. However, after that the observations had been conducted primarily from outside the cage. And mostly—at least in the last two weeks, since Colonel Gottling had taken over charge of the specimen—with the help of the goad. Or worse.
There were reports of blood tests and tissue samples. Ryeland glanced at them, frowned and put them aside; they meant nothing to him. There were X-ray studies, and reams of learned radiologists' reports. Also of no value to Ryeland, whatever they might have meant to Colonel Pascal Lescure.
Then there were physical tests. Dynamometers had measured the pull against the chains. Telemetering devices had registered the change in the recorded curves of its vital processes under various conditions—at rest, as it "flew," and "under extraordinary stimulus," as the report primly put it. Meaning, Ryeland supposed, under torture.
No radiation of any sort had been detected. And someone had thought to surround the creature with plumb-bobs to test for an incident side thrust; there was none; the plumbs were undisturbed.
No thrust!
Then this nonsense that everyone had been spouting so glibly was not nonsense after all!
For if there was no measurable thrust against its environment to balance its measured dynamometer pull—then the spaceling had, indeed, a true jetless drive.
Ryeland looked up from the notes to stare at the spaceling, slumped in the bottom of its cage, its great eyes fixed on him. Jetless drive!
He suddenly felt very small and, for all the Togetherness and the Teamwork, for all the joint effort embodied in the Plan of Man, very alone. Jetless drive—here in this creature lay the seeds of a fact which would destroy Newton's Third Law, change the shape of the Solar System. For unquestionably, with such a drive, the scope of the Plan of Man would widen beyond recognition. Out past the useless, frozen methane giants, the Plan would drive to the stars!
Ryeland shook his head, confused.
For suddenly he didn't want the Plan of Man expanded to the stars. That word that Pascal Lescure had used—"Freedom!"
It did not seem to live under the Plan.
Abruptly his reveries were ended; there was a rumble like thunder in the pit.
Ryeland leaped to his feet, astonished, while the spaceling mewed worriedly in its cage. A blade of light split the dark above. He looked up, and a slit of blue sky widened.
There was a confused clattering behind him and someone came running into the pit. The Technicorps sergeant, shouting: "Mr. Ryeland, Mr. Ryeland! Get out of the way. Some crazy fool is coming in for a landing!"
The sergeant raced over to the cage and began frantically trying to unbolt its heavy fastenings, to push it on its tiny wheel to the side of the pit. There was a wild cataract of flame thrusting into the opening gates of the pit overhead, radio-triggered; and a tiny rocket came weaving in, settling on a cushion of bright white fire.
Ryeland thought grimly: "Thank God it's only a little one!" A big one would have been the end of the spaceling—and of himself and the Technicorps sergeant as well. But this little speedster had plenty of room to land without incinerating them all. It was a one-man craft, built for looks and play; it dropped to the black concrete on the far side of the pit, a hundred yards away, and though heat washed over them like a benediction, it did them no harm. A sudden gale roared through the floor ducts, sweeping the rocket fumes away.
A ramp fell.
A slim figure in white coveralls ran lightly down the ramp and across the concrete, confusingly half-familiar birds fluttering about its head.
Ryeland was galvanized into action. "Stop it!" he shouted. "Keep away from that cage!"
The intruder ignored him. Swearing, Ryeland raced to intercept the stranger. He took a dozen angry strides, caught a slim arm, swung the intruder around—and gasped. Silvery doves tore fiercely at his face and head.
"Get your hands off me, Risk!" It was a girl—that girl! He could see now that her white coveralls did not disguise her sex. Her eyes were a greenish blue, and very familiar eyes; her voice, though charged with indignation, was a familiar voice.
She gestured, and the Peace Doves fluttered muttering away. "What do you mean?" she demanded, shaking his fingers off her arm.
Ryeland gulped. It was the Planner's daughter, Donna Creery. "I—" he began. "I—I didn't know it was you! But what do you want here?"
"Want?" The ocean-water eyes flashed. "I want to know what you people are doing—what you think you're doing by torturing my spaceling!"
6
The girl stood staring at Ryeland. She was an entirely different creature from the lovely girl in the bubble bath, almost unrecognizable. The Donna of the Planner's private subtrain car was a teenager in the process of becoming woman, with the sad shyness of youth and its innocence. But this girl was something else. This was the Planner's daughter, imperious. And not a child.
Ryeland took a deep breath. Planner's daughter or no, this girl was in his way. The only way he had of getting the collar off his neck lay through the creature in the cage. He said sharply: "Get out of here, Miss Creery. The spaceling is dying. It mustn't be disturbed."
"What?" The Peace Dove, settling on her shoulders, whirred and muttered.
"You aren't allowed here," he said stubbornly. "Please leave!"
She stared at him incredulously; then, without a word, turned to the cage. "Here, sweet," she whispered to the great seal-like animal. "Don't worry, Donna's here." The spaceling lifted its head and stared at her with great, limpid eyes.
Ryeland said harshly: "Miss Creery, I asked you to leave."
She didn't bother to look at him. "There's a good girl," she cooed, like a child with a puppy. "Where's the damned door?"
Ryeland was angry now. "You can't go in there!" He caught at her arm. It was like catching a tiger by the tail; there was a quick movement, too fast to follow, and she caught him a stinging blow across the face with her open hand. Sheer astonishment drove him back; and by the time he recovered his balance the Planner's daughter had found the catch and was inside the door of the cage.
The spaceling came heaving seal-like toward her, whimpering.
It was a bad spot for Ryeland. If anything happened to the girl, there was no doubt in the world that he would be held responsible. Gottling would see to that. And then good-by dreams of freedom.
In fact, more likely it would be good-by head!
Ryeland swore angrily. The Peace Doves squawked and rose into the air, circling around him. He paused, searched around, found a length of heavy chain just outside the cage door. Heaven knew what it had been used for—though the stains on it suggested one possibility. He caught it up and dove into the cage after the girl.